Andrew S. Erickson, “Tracking China’s ‘Little Blue Men’—A Comprehensive Maritime Militia Compendium,” China Analysis from Original Sources 以第一手资料研究中国, 17 January 2024.

CHINA’S MARITIME MILITIA: DATA & ANALYSIS

“Maritime Militia (China),” Wikipedia, entry as of 16 January 2024.

Maritime Militia (China)

***

Andrew S. Erickson, “Xi’s Fast & Furious Nuclear Buildup & Beyond: Key Text from Pentagon’s 2023 China Military Power Report,” China Analysis from Original Sources 以第一手资料研究中国, 16 January 2024.

Office of the Secretary of Defense, Military and Security Developments Involving the People’s Republic of China 2023 (Washington, DC: Department of Defense, October 19, 2023).

• Publication summarizing report’s China nuclear weapons-related content:

Gabriel B. Collins and Andrew S. Erickson, Reaping the Whirlwind: How China’s Coercive Annexation of Taiwan Could Trigger Nuclear Proliferation in Asia and Beyond (Houston, TX: Baker Institute for Public Policy, Rice University, 25 October 2023).

CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD FULL-TEXT PDF.

KEY CONTENT FROM 2023 CHINA MILITARY POWER REPORT (INCLUDES SOME MARITIME MILITIA-SPECIFIC ADDITIONS NOT INCLUDED IN THE ABOVE POSTING):

[Please note: bolding, underlining, italics, annotations in brackets, etc. are from me – Andrew Erickson – and not from the original report itself. Be sure to check the report’s exact text firsthand here.]

p. 18

The PRC continued to employ the PLA Navy (PLAN), China Coast Guard, and maritime militia to patrol the region throughout 2022.

p. 32

The National Defense Mobilization System. This MCF system binds the other systems as it seeks to mobilize the PRC’s military, economic, and social resources to defend or advance China’s sovereignty, security and development interests. The Party views China’s growing strength as only useful to the extent that the party-state can mobilize it. China characterizes mobilization as the ability to precisely use the instrument, capability, or resource needed, when needed, for the duration needed. Within the PLA, 2015-16 reforms elevated defense mobilization to a department called the National Defense Mobilization Department (NDMD), which reports directly to the CMC. The NDMD plays an important role in this system by organizing and overseeing the PLA’s reserve forces, militia, and provincial military districts and below. This system also seeks to integrate the state emergency management system into the national defense mobilization system in order to achieve a coordinated military-civilian response during a crisis. Consistent with the Party’s view of international competition, many MCF mobilization initiatives not only seek to reform how the PRC mobilizes for war and responds to emergencies, but how the economy and society can be leveraged to support the PRC’s strategic needs for international competition.

p. 75

PLA Reserves, Paramilitary, Militia: increasing operability, integration

PLAN, CCG, CMM

INCREASING OPERABILITY WITH PLA RESERVES, PARAMILITARY & MILITIA

Key Takeaways

● Interoperability and integration between the PLA, its reserve components, and the PRC’s paramilitary forces continue to grow in scale and sophistication, including the coordination between the PLAN, the China Coast Guard (CCG), and the China Maritime Militia (CMM).

● The PRC primarily uses paramilitary maritime organizations in maritime disputes, selectively using the PLAN to provide overwatch in case of escalation.

p. 76

Internal security: MPS, MSS, PAP, PLA, Militia

Militia force/org details

p. 77

CMM often performs tasks in conjunction/coordination with PLAN & CCG

“Local maritime militia forces…perform tasks including safeguarding maritime claims, protecting fisheries, providing logistic support, search and rescue, and surveillance and reconnaissance, often in conjunction or coordination with the PLAN and the CCG.”

p. 80

CHINA MARITIME MILITIA

• CMM train with/assist PLAN + CCG
  • “CMM vessels train with and assist the People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) and the China Coast Guard (CCG) in tasks such as safeguarding maritime claims, surveillance and reconnaissance, fisheries protection, logistics support, and search and rescue.”
• Possible CMM near Natunas—ambition to expand ops
  • “These operations traditionally take place within the FIC along China’s coast and near disputed features in the SCS such as the Second Thomas Shoal, Scarborough Reed, and Luconia Shoal. However, the presence of possible CMM vessels mixed in with Chinese fishing vessels near Indonesia’s Natuna Island outside of the “nine-dashed line” on Chinese maps indicated a possible ambition to expand CMM operations within the region.”
• Often supplement CCG cutters at forefront of incident
  • 2021.09-2022.09: Iroquois Reef
  • 2020 West Capella
  • 1950s offshore island campaigns
  • Occupation of Mischief Reef 1994
    • “CMM units have been active for decades in incidents and combat operations throughout China’s [!!] near seas and in these incidents CMM vessels are often used to supplement CCG cutters at the forefront of the incident, giving the Chinese the capacity to outweigh and outlast rival claimants. From September 2021 to September 2022, maritime militia vessels were a constant presence near Iroquois Reef in the Spratly Islands within the Philippines EEZ. Other notable examples include standoffs with the Malaysia drill ship West Capella (2020), defense of China’s HYSY-981 drill rig in waters disputed with Vietnam (2014), occupation of Scarborough Reef (2012), and harassment of USNS Impeccable and Howard O. Lorenzen (2009 and 2014). Historically, the maritime militia also participated in China’s offshore island campaigns in the 1950s, the 1974 seizure of the Paracel Islands from South Vietnam, the occupation of Mischief Reef in the Spratly Islands in 1994.”

CHINA’S MARITIME MILITIA

China’s Maritime Militia (CMM) is a subset of the PRC’s national militia, an armed reserve force of civilians available for mobilization that is ultimately subordinate to the CMC through the National Defense Mobilization Department. Throughout China, militia units organize around towns, villages, urban sub-districts, and enterprises and vary widely in composition and mission.

CMM vessels train with and assist the People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) and the China Coast Guard (CCG) in tasks such as safeguarding maritime claims, surveillance and reconnaissance, fisheries protection, logistics support, and search and rescue. These operations traditionally take place within the FIC along China’s coast and near disputed features in the SCS such as the Second Thomas Shoal, Scarborough Reed, and Luconia Shoal. However, the presence of possible CMM vessels mixed in with Chinese fishing vessels near Indonesia’s Natuna Island outside of the “nine-dashed line” on Chinese maps indicated a possible ambition to expand CMM operations within the region. The PRC employs the CMM in gray zone operations, or “low-intensity maritime rights protection struggles,” at a level designed to frustrate effective response by the other parties involved. The PRC employs CMM vessels to advance its disputed sovereignty claims, often amassing them in disputed areas throughout the SCS and ECS. In this manner, the CMM plays a major role in coercive activities to achieve the PRC’s political goals without fighting and these operations are part of broader Chinese military theory that sees confrontational operations short of war as an effective means of accomplishing strategic objectives.

CMM units have been active for decades in incidents and combat operations throughout [the] near seas and in these incidents CMM vessels are often used to supplement CCG cutters at the forefront of the incident, giving the Chinese the capacity to outweigh and outlast rival claimants. From September 2021 to September 2022, maritime militia vessels were a constant presence near Iroquois Reef in the Spratly Islands within the Philippines EEZ. Other notable examples include standoffs with the Malaysia drill ship West Capella (2020), defense of China’s HYSY-981 drill rig in waters disputed with Vietnam (2014), occupation of Scarborough Reef (2012), and harassment of USNS Impeccable and Howard O. Lorenzen (2009 and 2014). Historically, the maritime militia also participated in China’s offshore island campaigns in the 1950s, the 1974 seizure of the Paracel Islands from South Vietnam, the occupation of Mischief Reef in the Spratly Islands in 1994.

The CMM also protects and facilitates Chinese fishing vessels operating in disputed waters. From late December 2019 to mid-January 2020, a large fleet of over 50 Chinese fishing vessels operated under the escort of multiple China Coast Guard patrol ships in Indonesian claimed waters northeast of the Natuna Islands. At least a portion of the Chinese ships in this fishing fleet were affiliated with known traditional maritime militia units, including a maritime militia unit based out of Beihai City in Guangxi province. While most traditional maritime militia units operating in the SCS

[continued on next page after text box below]

CMM AND LAND RECLAMATION IN THE SOUTH CHINA SEA

Since at least 2014, CMM vessels have engaged in covert small scale reclamation activity and likely caused physical changes observed at multiple unoccupied features in the Spratly Islands, including Lankiam Cay, Eldad Reef, Sandy Cay, and Whitsun Reef. Beijing likely is attempting to covertly alter these features so that it can portray them as naturally formed high tide elevations capable of supporting PRC maritime claims out to the farthest extent of the nine-dash line. In contrast to the PRC large-scale reclamation program, which was overt and where the original status of occupied features is well documented, the less well-known historical record about many of the unoccupied features makes them more susceptible to PRC efforts to shape international opinion regarding the status of the features.

p. 81

• Beihai MM: mainland based, to Spratlys/Southern SCS
• From 2014: new Spratly backbone fleet from major CMM units in Guangdong, Guangxi, Hainan.
  • With 235 or more large steel hulls; many >50 m, >500 tons.
  • Deploy to disputed Spratly waters below 12 degrees North.
• Sansha MM—light arms
  • “Starting in 2015, the Sansha City Maritime Militia in the Paracel Islands has been developed into a salaried full-time maritime militia force with its own command center and equipped with at least 84 purpose-built vessels armed with mast-mounted water cannons for spraying and reinforced steel hulls for ramming. Freed from their normal fishing responsibilities, Sansha City Maritime Militia personnel – many of whom are former PLAN and CCG sailors – train for peacetime and wartime”

continue to originate from townships and ports on Hainan Island, Beihai is one of a number of increasingly prominent maritime militia units based out of provinces in mainland China. These mainland based maritime militia units routinely operate in the Spratly Islands and in the southern SCS, and their operations in these areas are enabled by increased funding from the Chinese government to improve their maritime capabilities and grow their ranks of personnel.

Through the National Defense Mobilization Department, Beijing subsidizes various local and provincial commercial organizations to operate CMM vessels to perform “official” missions on an ad hoc basis outside of their regular civilian commercial activities. CMM units employ marine industry workers, usually fishermen, as a supplement to the PLAN and the CCG. While retaining their day jobs, these mariners are organized and trained, often by the PLAN and the CCG, and can be activated on demand.

Since 2014, China has built a new Spratly backbone fleet comprising at least 235 large steel-hulled fishing vessels, many longer than 50 meters and displacing more than 500 tons. These vessels were built under central direction from the PRC government to operate in disputed areas south of 12 degrees latitude that China typically refers to as the “Spratly Waters,” including the Spratly Islands and southern SCS. Spratly backbone vessels were built for prominent CMM units in Guangdong, Guangxi, and Hainan Provinces. For vessel owners not already affiliated with CMM units, joining the militia was a precondition for receiving government funding to build new Spratly backbone boats. As with the CCG and PLAN, new facilities in the Paracel and Spratly Islands enhance the CMM’s ability to sustain operations in the SCS.

Starting in 2015, the Sansha City Maritime Militia in the Paracel Islands has been developed into a salaried full-time maritime militia force with its own command center and equipped with at least 84 purpose-built vessels armed with mast-mounted water cannons for spraying and reinforced steel hulls for ramming. Freed from their normal fishing responsibilities, Sansha City Maritime Militia personnel – many of whom are former PLAN and CCG sailors – train for peacetime and wartime

p. 82

• Sansha MM—light arms
• “contingencies, often with light arms, and patrol regularly around disputed South China Sea  features even during fishing moratoriums.
• Tanmen MM—Xi: support SCS “island and reef development”
• 1989-95 under SSF authority
• Occupation/reclamation of PRC Spratly outposts: Subi, Fiery Cross, Mischief
• “The Tanmen Maritime Militia is another prominent CMM unit. Homeported in Tanmen township on Hainan Island, the formation was described by Xi as a “model maritime militia unit” during a visit to Tanmen harbor in 2013. During the visit, Xi encouraged Tanmen to support “island and reef development” in the SCS. Between 1989 and 1995, the Tanmen Maritime Militia, under the authority of the PLAN Southern Theater Navy (then the South Sea Fleet), was involved in the occupation and reclamation of PRC outposts in the Spratly Islands, including Subi Reef, Fiery Cross Reef, and Mischief Reef.”

contingencies, often with light arms, and patrol regularly around disputed South China Sea features even during fishing moratoriums.

The Tanmen Maritime Militia is another prominent CMM unit. Homeported in Tanmen township on Hainan Island, the formation was described by Xi as a “model maritime militia unit” during a visit to Tanmen harbor in 2013. During the visit, Xi encouraged Tanmen to support “island and reef development” in the SCS. Between 1989 and 1995, the Tanmen Maritime Militia, under the authority of the PLAN Southern Theater Navy (then the South Sea Fleet), was involved in the occupation and reclamation of PRC outposts in the Spratly Islands, including Subi Reef, Fiery Cross Reef, and Mischief Reef.

p. 119

ETC likely commands all CCG/MM ships conducting ops re Senkakus

“The Eastern Theater Command…likely commands all CCG and maritime militia ships while they are conducting operations related to the ongoing dispute with Japan over the Senkaku Islands.”

p. 121

ECS

Fishing/MM vessels, CCG escorts, PLAN overwatch

“The PRC attempts to legitimize its claims in the ECS through the continuous presence of PRC fishing and Maritime Militia vessels, escorted by CCG cutters and with PLA Navy warships nearby as overwatch.”

p. 122

STC

Track/react to U.S. ships operating within Nine-Dashed Line

“The Southern Theater Command is responsible for responding to U.S. freedom of navigation operations in the SCS by regularly tracking and reacting to U.S. ships operating within the China-claimed “nine-dash line.””

Can assume command as needed over ALL CCG/CMM ships operating within 9DL

“can assume command as needed over all CCG and CMM ships conducting operations within the PRC’s claimed “nine-dash line.””

p. 125

SCS

• 2022 deployed PLAN/CCG/civilian ships:
  • Presence near Scarborough, Thitu
  • Respond to oil/gas exploration within 9DL
• CCG/PAFMM used nets/ropes to block Philippine supply boats
• “the CCG and People’s Armed Forces Maritime Militia (PAFMM) used nets and ropes to block Philippine supply boats on their way to an atoll in the SCS and issued radio challenges and threats to Philippine ships during routine resupply missions.”
  • “The PRC states that international military presence within the SCS is a challenge to its sovereignty. Throughout 2022, the PRC deployed PLAN, CCG, and civilian ships to maintain a presence in disputed areas, such as near Scarborough Reef and Thitu Island, as well as in response to oil and gas exploration operations by rival claimants within the PRC’s claimed “nine-dash line.” Separately, the CCG and People’s Armed Forces Maritime Militia (PAFMM) used nets and ropes to block Philippine supply boats on their way to an atoll in the SCS and issued radio challenges and threats to Philippine ships during routine resupply missions.”
• 2022.11 CCG cut tow line of Philippine Navy vessel, seized PRC rocket debris
  • “In November 2022, a CCG vessel forcibly seized apparent PRC rocket debris that had fallen near Philippine-occupied Thitu Island from the Philippines by cutting the tow line of a Philippine Navy vessel as it was towing debris back to shore. PRC insisted the debris was returned to them after a “friendly negotiation,” despite the Philippines producing video evidence of the incident and issues diplomatic notes of protest.”

***

Andrew S. Erickson, ed., Maritime Gray Zone Operations: Challenges and Countermeasures in the Indo-Pacific (New York, NY: Routledge Cass Series: Naval Policy & History, 2022).

Author of:

• Andrew S. Erickson, “Introduction: Understanding Chinese and North Korean Gray Zone Operations in the Yellow Sea,” 1–18.
• Andrew S. Erickson, “China’s Coast Guard: Organization, Forces, and Yellow Sea Applications,” 54–76.

***

Conor M. Kennedy, “China’s Maritime Militia in the Bohai Gulf and Yellow Sea,” in Andrew S. Erickson, ed., Maritime Gray Zone Operations: Challenges and Countermeasures in the Indo-Pacific (New York, NY: Routledge Cass Series: Naval Policy & History, 2022), 77–99.

The People’s Republic of China (PRC) has long relied on a deep reserve of militia forces to support government and military objectives in both war and peace time. At sea, from shortly after the founding of the PRC in 1949 until even after the Cold War’s end four decades later, Beijing relied on militia forces (typically drawing on fishing fleets or other civilian mariners) to compensate for its lack of maritime power, especially naval and constabulary forces. However, after decades of investment and rapid development, the PRC now has the world’s largest Navy and Coast Guard.1 It has also retained and continues to develop the world’s largest Maritime Militia force constructed out of its vast fishing and merchant fleets. The exact size of the Maritime Militia is still unknown to foreigners and will almost certainly remain that way to preserve a key advantage, deception.

Maritime Militia development in China assumed new significance after the national strategy to become a maritime power was declared after the 18th Party Congress in November 2012. This objective is comprehensive and includes development of all elements of Chinese maritime power.2 Recent People’s Liberation Army (PLA) reforms also shifted the focus of reserve militia force construction toward the sea and high-tech sectors. General land-based militia forces and the overall number of personnel are undergoing significant reductions, whereas the construction of Maritime Militia and more sophisticated types of militia units better suited to supporting modern PLA operations are currently promoted.3 The result has been the growth of Maritime Militia forces nationwide.

Maritime Militia force development also included greater roles in the protection of PRC maritime rights and interests. Maritime rights protection is now a key focus in militia development to assert PRC presence and control in its maritime disputes. This focus was further invigorated by the highest levels of national leadership in 2013 with Xi Jinping’s visit to the little-known fishing village of Tanmen in Hainan Province shortly after coming to power.4 Xi’s visit on the first anniversary of China’s capture of Scarborough Reef from the Philippines in 2012, with the help of the village’s Maritime Militia, made it clear that the Maritime Militia will continue to be a key component in protecting maritime rights and interests. Xi is reported to have issued multiple directives on maritime rights protection and Maritime Militia construction since he assumed power.5 This demonstrates strong recognition of the success these forces had in protecting and advancing PRC claims without sparking a regional conflict.

The militia has a prominent role in protecting maritime rights and interests in the South China Sea due to sovereignty and territorial disputes between China and other regional claimants. Numerous operations and achievements by Maritime Militia forces in the South China Sea have been well-documented and acknowledged by international observers.6 Maritime Militia forces in the Bohai Gulf and Yellow Sea receive significantly less attention. However, Maritime Militia force development in this region appears to be equally as robust as in the rest of China’s coastal provinces. As a key responsibility of PLA provincial military districts, militia construction in northern coastal provinces has also shifted focus toward the sea.

This chapter provides a comprehensive review of Maritime Militia forces that could be mobilized in the Yellow Sea, how they are organized, and how the PLA envisions their use. The decentralized nature of militia development nationwide provides abundant authoritative open sources that elucidate this still insufficiently studied force. Surveying sources from various local governments, media news services, and PLA writings reveals the scale, organization, and development of Maritime Militia forces in Chinese provinces along the Bohai Gulf and Yellow Sea. Details on specific units, training, and other factors also demonstrate what capabilities may be available when mobilized, and can establish a baseline of Maritime Militia forces that commanders may draw upon in a gray zone scenario. This will be crucial to gauge potential responses by China in gray zone disputes in the region. … … …

***

Lonnie D. Henley, Civilian Shipping and Maritime Militia: The Logistics Backbone of a Taiwan Invasion, China Maritime Report 21 (Newport, RI: Naval War College China Maritime Studies Institute, May 2022).

About the Author

Lonnie Henley retired from federal service in 2019 after more than 40 years as an intelligence officer and East Asia expert. He served 22 years as a U.S. Army China foreign area officer and military intelligence officer in Korea, at Defense Intelligence Agency, on Army Staff, and in the History Department at West Point. He retired as a Lieutenant Colonel in 2000 and joined the senior civil service, first as Defense Intelligence Officer for East Asia and later as Senior Intelligence Expert for Strategic Warning at DIA. He worked two years as a senior analyst with CENTRA Technology, Inc. before returning to government service as Deputy National Intelligence Officer for East Asia. He rejoined DIA in 2008, serving for six years as the agency’s senior China analyst, then National Intelligence Collection Officer for East Asia, and culminating with a second term as DIO for East Asia. Mr. Henley holds a bachelor’s degree in engineering and Chinese from the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, and master’s degrees in Chinese language from Oxford University, which he attended as a Rhodes Scholar; in Chinese history from Columbia University; and in strategic intelligence from the Defense Intelligence College (now National Intelligence University). His wife Sara Hanks is a corporate attorney and CEO specializing in early-stage capital formation. They live in Alexandria, Virginia.

This article was cleared for open publication by the Department of Defense (DoD) Office of Prepublication and Security Review, DOPSR Case 21-S-1603. The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not reflect the official policy or position of the Department of defense or the U.S. Government. The appearance of external hyperlinks does not constitute endorsement by the DoD of the linked websites or the information, products, or services contained therein. The DoD does not exercise any editorial, security, or other control over the information you may find at these locations.

Summary

Most analysts looking at the Chinese military threat to Taiwan conclude that the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) is incapable of invading the island because it lacks the landing ships to transport adequate quantities of troops and equipment across the Taiwan Strait. This report challenges that conventional wisdom, arguing that the PLA intends to meet these requirements by requisitioning civilian vessels operated by members of China’s maritime militia (海上民兵). Since the early 2000s, the Chinese government and military have taken steps to strengthen the national defense mobilization system to ensure the military has ample quantities of trained militia forces to support a cross-strait invasion. Despite ongoing challenges—including poor data management, inconsistent training quality, and gaps in the regulatory system—and uncertainties associated with foreign-flagged Chinese ships, this concept of operations could prove good enough to enable a large-scale amphibious assault.

Introduction

Discussion of a potential Chinese military invasion of Taiwan almost always hinges on whether the PLA has enough lift capacity to deliver the would-be invasion forces across the Taiwan Strait and, to a lesser extent, whether it could sustain them once they are ashore on Taiwan. The argument centers on People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) amphibious landing ships and other over-the-shore amphibious assault assets, with most observers concluding that the PLAN has not built enough of these ships and therefore that the PLA cannot (yet?) carry out a full-scale invasion.

This report argues that the PLA plans to rely heavily on mobilized maritime militia forces operating requisitioned civilian shipping as the logistical backbone of a cross-strait landing operation, including both the delivery of PLA forces onto Taiwan and logistical sustainment for the PLAN fleet at sea and ground forces ashore. Moreover, the PLA does not regard civilian shipping as a stopgap measure until more PLAN amphibious shipping can be built, but as a central feature of its preferred approach.

The report will examine China’s extensive system for preparing and generating this support force, the roles it will undertake in an invasion operation, and the challenges that must be overcome if the plan is to succeed.

The Scope of the Problem

Most authors looking at the Chinese military threat to Taiwan conclude that the PLA cannot land enough forces on Taiwan to make an invasion viable, that it wil not reach that capability until it builds many more amphibious landing ships, and that doing so will take at least several years even if they accelerate their efforts.2 There has been little detailed analysis to underpin that judgment, at least not in open sources, but most observers assess that the PLA would need to land 300,000 or more troops on Taiwan in total and that the PLAN amphibious fleet can only land around one division, roughly 20,000 troops, in a single lift.3 Since these constraints seem obvious, the logical conclusion is that the PLA must judge itself not yet capable of invading Taiwan.4

The PLA’s prospects appear even worse when one considers the rest of the logistical and operational requirements for a major landing operation, beyond the formidable challenge of getting enough troops ashore quickly in the face of determined resistance. The PLAN auxiliary fleet is inadequate to sustain large-scale combat operations, even if those operations were close to China’s shores as a Taiwan conflict would be. The PLAN has enlisted hundreds of civilian vessels to perform tasks ranging from over-the-shore logistics to at-sea replenishment, emergency repair and towing, medical support, casualty evacuation, and combat search and rescue, suggesting that its own inventory of support ships falls far short of what it deems necessary for a landing campaign.5 Skeptics will argue that this is more proof that the PLA itself does not take the invasion option seriously. The contrary view presented here is that the PLA does take these requirements seriously, but that it intends to rely on maritime militia support for large-scale combat operations, and specifically for a Taiwan invasion campaign.

The maritime militia (海上民兵) has attracted considerable attention in the past decade, led by the efforts of Andrew Erickson and Conor Kennedy at the U.S. Naval War College, focused mainly onits role in supporting China’s claims in the South China Sea and East China Sea.6  Kevin McCauley and Conor Kennedy have also looked at the role of civilian ships in military  power projection outside East Asia.7

What has received much less Western attention is the maritime militia’s role in large-scale combat operations, despite Chinese authors having written extensively on it since the PLA began serious consideration of a Taiwan invasion in the early 2000s. The Nanjing Military Region Mobilization Department director Guo Suqing observed in 2004 that a cross-strait island landing campaign would require large amounts of civilian shipping.8 He noted that there were many suitable ships available, some of which had already been retrofitted for wartime use, but warned that “the traditional form of last-minute non-rigorous civilian ship mobilization can no longer meet the needs of large-scale cross-sea landing operations.” Wang Hewen of the former General Logistics Department’s Institute of Military Transportation noted that efforts to strengthen the  retrofitting of civilian vessels for military use had accelerated in 2003,9 and a 2004 article from the Shanghai Transportation War Preparedness Office outlined the retrofitting work underway there.10 In 2004, Zhou Xiaoping of the Naval Command College called for overhaul of the mobilization system, arguing that “if the traditional administrative order-style mobilization and requisition methods were still followed, it would be difficult to ensure the implementation of civilian ship preparation and mobilization.”11 The government and PLA acted on these concerns, and over the past twenty years the maritime militia has evolved into a major force multiplier for the PLAN in large-scale combat operations.

Operational Roles for the Maritime Militia in a Taiwan Invasion

Kennedy and Erickson have written at length on the militia’s peacetime mission to assert China’s maritime claims, centered on fishing boats that may or may not do any actual fishing. The militia forces discussed here are very different, encompassing large-capacity commercial vessels including container ships, general cargo ships, bulk carriers, tankers, roll-on-roll-off (RO-RO) ferries, barges, semisubmersibles, ocean-going tugboats, passenger ships, “engineering ships,” and others, as well as smaller vessels.13 Authors from the Army Military Transportation University noted in 2015 that the force consisted of over 5,000 ships organized into 89 militia transportation units, 53 waterway engineering units, and 143 units with other specializations.14

Unlike the U.S. Merchant Marine model, where government officers and crews take control of leased ships, Chinese maritime militia units are composed mostly of the regular crews of the mobilized ships, what the Central Military Commission (CMC) Militia and Reserve Bureau director called the “model of selecting militiamen according to their ship” (依船定兵模式).15 The close correlation between requisitioned ships and militia units is essential for integration into military operations. There need to be clear command relationships with the supported PLA units,  and the crews need to be trained on their operational tasks, not to mention the increasingly important issue of legal rights and obligations in wartime. Local or provincial mobilization officials negotiate the requisitioning terms with the ship owners, either large shipping companies or individual owners, while the crews are inducted into militia units by a process that is not explained very clearly in the available writings. Several articles note that some militiamen are not enthusiastic about their role.16

PLA sources cite a wide range of wartime functions for the maritime militia. In a Taiwan invasion scenario, they include the following:

• Delivery of forces. The most obvious operational role for militia units is to carry forces to the battlefield, referred to as “military unit transportation and delivery” (部队运输投送). PLA sources list this as a primary role for civilian shipping, to include participating in the assault landing phase of the operation.17 There are several delivery modes contemplated, the most straightforward being through existing ports. A 2019 article on amphibious heavy combined arms brigades in cross-strait island landing operations noted that as part of the first echelon ashore, one of their most important tasks was to create the conditions for second echelon units to land through operations such as the seizure of ports and piers.18 Articles published in 2014 and 2019 on amphibious landing bases made the same point and included rapid repair of piers among the main tasks to help the second echelon get ashore.19 Other landing modes include lightering from cargo ships to shallow-draft vessels; semisubmersible vessels delivering amphibious vehicles or air-cushion landing craft;20 and RO-RO ships delivering amphibious forces to their launching point or directly to shore.21
• At-sea support. The PLAN has only a few replenishment ships, not enough to sustain the huge number of vessels that would be involved in a cross-strait invasion.22 Given the relatively short distances for a Taiwan landing, most PLAN ships would likely rely on shore-based support, but the service envisions using militia ships for at-sea replenishment as well, including fuel tankers and cargo ships fitted with equipment for alongside replenishment and helipads for vertical resupply.23 Militia ships would also provide emergency services including towing, rapid repair, firefighting, search and rescue, technical support, and even personnel augmentation to replace casualties aboard navy ships.24
• Over-the-shore logistical support. A discussion of logistical support in island landing operations noted the importance of fuel tankers laying pipelines to support forces ashore.25 The author did not specify maritime militia in this role, but given the prominence of tankers in other discussions of militia support, it seems likely they would take part in this activity as well. Requisitioned cargo ships will also play a major role in logistical support through captured ports or via lighters and barges to expedient floating docks.
• Medical support. The PLAN’s fleet of hospital ships could be overwhelmed by the casualties involved in a major landing operation. Militia would augment this force with containerized medical modules deployed on a variety of commercial ships, as well as smaller vessels providing casualty evacuation and first aid.26
• Obstacle emplacement and clearing. Several sources list emplacing and clearing mines and other obstacles among maritime militia tasks in a landing operation, without providing much further detail.27
• Engineering support. Maritime militia forces will not be passively waiting for first echelon units to open damaged ports. Tugboats, barges, salvage ships, crane ships, and dredgers will join the effort to clear obstacles, open channels, and repair docks and other facilities.28
• Reconnaissance, surveillance, and early warning. While much of this discussion has focused on large ships, the huge fleet of militia fishing boats would have a large role in a Taiwan operation as well, providing eyes and ears across the entire maritime theater.29
• Deception and concealment. One major advantage the PLAN derives from having hundreds of militia ships in the battlespace is the ability to hide its most valuable platforms among the radar clutter. Many sources list deception, camouflage, and feints among the militia’s tasks. One 2018 article explains that militia ships will “use corner reflectors, false radio signals, false heat sources, etc., to set up counterfeit ships, missiles, fighters and other targets on the sea … to cause the enemy to make wrong judgments and lure the enemy into attacking the false target.”30 Flooding the strait with false targets would severely complicate Blue efforts against the invasion fleet.
• Helicopter relay platform. The Taiwan Strait is relatively narrow, but a two-hundred-mile round trip each sortie still creates a significant strain for helicopter operations. Some militia ships will serve as “helicopter relay support platforms” (直升机中继保障平台), fitted with helipads, ammunition storage compartments, aviation fuel bladders and refueling equipment, limited repair facilities, and flight control support systems to keep the helicopters in the fight.31 … … …

***

Andrew S. Erickson, “China’s Gray Zone Strategy in the South China Sea: Emerging Trends and Deterrence Strategies,” Kwentong Mandaragat Lecture, Foundation for the National Interest and University of the Philippines Institute for Maritime Affairs and Law of the Sea, via Zoom to Manila, 25 May 2021.

CLICK HERE TO WATCH THE PRESENTATION ON YOUTUBE.

On 25 May 2021, the Foundation for the National Interest, together with the UP Institute for Maritime Affairs and Law of the Sea, with the support of the U.S. Embassy in Manila, sat down with Dr. Andrew Erickson of the U.S. Naval War College. The 8th Kwentong Mandaragat Series webinar discussed China’s gray zone strategy in the South China Sea in light of recent developments in the region. The webinar explored the finer details that reinforces China’s continuing gray zone operations such as the Chinese Maritime Militia, the militarization of civilian industries, and the patterns and strategies employed by said maritime militias. For more information on Dr. Andrew Erickson’s latest compilation of information regarding China’s maritime militia “Tracking China’s ‘Little Blue Men’ – A Comprehensive Maritime Militia Compendium,” visit his website by clicking here.

DISCLAIMERS:

1) The views expressed here by Dr. Andrew S. Erickson are his alone, in solely an individual academic capacity, and do not represent the official policies or estimates of the U.S. Navy or any other organization of the U.S. government.

2) The webinar is by-invitation only and the Open Forum is strictly off-the-record. The video has been modified to accommodate a public release of information contained herein.

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Official Music Video: 三沙海上民兵之歌 “The Song of the Sansha Maritime Militia”

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Despite coming out late in the year, the Pentagon’s 2021 China Military Power Report (CMPR)was worth the wait. Policy-makers, planners, and concerned members of the public should absorb its concerning insights without delay. Demetri Sevastopulo, the Financial Times’s U.S.-China correspondent, was the first out of the gate with one of the very best media writeups. Thomas Shugart, Adjunct Senior Fellow at the Center for a New American Security (CNAS), belted out an incisive play-by-play on Twitter. Here, I offer a comprehensive distillation—I stayed up all night reading and weighing every word so that you don’t have to!

Since the first edition in 2000, the annual CMPR issued by the Department of Defense (DoD) has offered government-verified data on China’s meteoric military rise simply unfindable or unconfirmable anywhere else. While the 2020 edition was particularly impressive, the new report has a claim to being the best one yet. Today’s top takeaways arguably fall into the categories of triad, timing, and trends. … … …

Other Revelations

Dedicated CMPR sections illuminate authoritatively two new and important forces: the PLA Strategic Support Force (SSF) and Joint Logistic Support Force’s (JLSF). Periodic updates include the latest People’s Armed Forces Maritime Militia (PAFMM) patrols; operations in Natuna Sea waters claimed by Indonesia—a concrete confirmation of Ryan Martinson’s pioneering research concerning PAFMM units from Beihai City, Guangxi; and PAFMM harassment of South China Sea neighbors’ oil and gas exploration. … … …

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The Honorable Carlos Del Toro, 78^th Secretary of the Navy, One Navy-Marine Corps Team—Strategic Guidance from the Secretary of the Navy (Washington, DC: U.S. Navy Office of Information, 8 October 2021).

Click here to download a cached copy.

 KEY CHINA-RELATED EXCERPTS:

p. 1

Since my confirmation as the 78th Secretary of the Navy, I have characterized the most pressing challenges facing the Department of the Navy as the “Four Cs”: China, Culture, Climate Change, and COVID. The People’s Republic of China represents the pacing challenge against which we must plan our warfighting strategies and investments. …

Of the four, the long-term challenge posed by the People’s Republic of China is the most significant for the Department. The People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) has radically expanded both its size and capabilities, growing to become the world’s largest fleet.

Complementing its modern surface combatants are hundreds of coast guard and maritime militia vessels that Beijing employs to compete in the “gray zone,” the contested arena between routine statecraft and conflict. For the first time in at least a generation, we have a strategic competitor who possesses naval capabilities that rival our own, and who seeks to aggressively employ its forces to challenge U.S. principles, partnerships, and prosperity. …

p. 2

The Department of the Navy will be expected to contribute our unique warfighting potential to compete in the gray zone, deter further aggression, and prepare to prevail in conflict as part of an integrated warfighting approach with our fellow Services. …

As our central governing concept, the top priority for the Department of the Navy will be to develop concepts of operations and capabilities that bolster deterrence and expand our warfighting advantages vis-à-vis the People’s Republic of China.

p. 3

1. Expand Forward Presence

We will prioritize strategic competitive advantage over China and Russia by expanding our global posture to ensure the presence of naval forces with the right mix of platforms, capability, and capacity to maintain freedom of the seas, support international law and norms, stand by our allies and continue to fly, sail, and operate wherever international law allows. We will continue to promote sustained, persistent mobile operations forward. We will make tough decisions to maximize precious resources, ensuring our future naval supremacy against the full spectrum of potential threats, while seeking additional resources to support our increasing responsibilities in the Indo-Pacific region. It will be essential for us to set our naval posture forward to be able to effectively transition from competition to crisis to conflict as needed.

2. Enhance Warfighting Readiness

The Navy and Marine Corps Team must be ready to compete, fight, and win whenever and wherever needed. To reduce the time our platforms are offline for maintenance and repairs, we will invest in sustainment, critical readiness infrastructure, and the industrial workforce, while adopting the best practices of private industry to increase overall efficiency and reduce preventable mishaps. We will integrate and streamline our combined logistics apparatus and supply chains to ensure constant readiness throughout the Fleet and FMF. We will redirect savings towards transformative modernization wherever possible to enhance future and long term readiness. We will also enhance the readiness of our warriors through targeted investments in advanced training methods, ranges, and facilities on naval installations. Warfighting readiness is critical to deterring the People’s Republic of China.

 p. 5

2. Leverage Naval Education as a Critical Warfighting Enabler

Our mission demands leaders who possess the highest intellectual and warfighting capabilities in order to confront the many dangers of a complex world. The institutions of our naval education enterprise will work together to develop leaders with the warfighting rigor, intellectual dynamism, and innovative creativity to maintain strategic advantage against competitors and global adversaries. We will create a continuum of learning that develops such leaders to serve at every level through ready, relevant education, attuned to the battle rhythm of active duty service. We will invest in the Naval War College, the Naval Post Graduate School, and the Naval Academy, and build on the creation of the U.S. Naval Community College to expand access for all personnel, ensuring all naval learning institutions provide world-class curricula, research opportunities, and partnerships, tailored and prioritized to meet our most pressing warfighting requirements. … … …

Andrew Chubb, Chinese Nationalism and the “Gray Zone”: Case Analyses of Public Opinion and PRC Maritime Policy, Naval War College China Maritime Study 16 (May 2021).

This volume examines the role of popular nationalism in China’s maritime conduct. Analysis of nine case studies of assertive but ostensibly nonmilitary actions by which the People’s Republic of China (PRC) has advanced its position in the South and East China Seas in recent years reveals little compelling evidence of popular sentiment driving decision-making. While some regard for public opinion demonstrably shapes Beijing’s propaganda strategies on maritime issues, and sometimes its diplomatic practices as well, the imperative for Chinese leaders to satisfy popular nationalism is at most a contributing factor to policy choices they undertake largely on the basis of other considerations of power and interest. Where surges of popular nationalism have been evident, they have tended to follow after the PRC maritime actions in question, suggesting instead that Chinese authorities channeled public opinion to support existing policy.

***

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Ryan D. Martinson, “No Ordinary Boats: Cracking the Code on China’s Spratly Maritime Militias,” Center for International Maritime Security (CIMSEC), 17 May 2021.

A Chinese fishing vessel appears in a sensitive location—near the Senkaku Islands in the East China Sea, a South China Sea reef, or just offshore from a U.S. military base. Is it an “ordinary” fishing boat, or is it maritime militia?

This straightforward question seldom yields straightforward answers. China does not publish a roster of maritime militia boats. That would undermine the militia’s key advantages—secrecy and deniability. Nor is it common for Chinese sources to recognize the militia affiliations of individual boats. Analysts can gather clues and make a case that a vessel is likely maritime militia, or not. That process requires painstaking effort, and the results are rarely definitive.

The People’s Republic of China (PRC) may have made that process much easier, at least in the most contested parts of the South China Sea—the Spratly Islands. Since 2014, the PRC has built hundreds of large Spratly fishing vessels, collectively called the “Spratly backbone fleet” (南沙骨干船队). As I recently suggested at War on the Rocks, most if not all of these vessels are maritime militia affiliated. This insight can help overcome the perennial challenge of differentiating wayward Chinese fishermen from covert elements of China’s armed forces. … … …

Implications

In this article, I have argued that most if not all Spratly backbone boats are militia boats. They may actually catch fish, but their militia affiliation makes them available for state and military tasking. If this conclusion is correct, it offers useful new ways to identify Chinese maritime militia forces operating in the Spratly waters. While the PRC does not publish lists of active maritime militia boats, it does share information about which boats belong to the Spratly backbone fishing fleet. This can serve as an indicator of militia status.

How might this work in practice? At the time of this writing, a team of four Chinese fishing boats is operating illegally within 200 nautical miles of Vietnam’s coast, i.e., within the country’s exclusive economic zone (EEZ). The four vessels are named Qionglinyu60017, 60018, 60019, and 60020, respectively, indicating they are registered to Hainan’s Lingao county (临高县). Vietnamese maritime law enforcement authorities could evict them, but before doing so they might ask, are they maritime militia?

My answer: “very likely.” A quick sifting of open-source materials reveals they are all backbone boats. This information appears in a March 2020 open letter posted on the website “Message Board for Leaders” (领导留言板). In it, the boat owners entreat PRC officials to restore fuel subsidies and other rewards for operating in “specially-designated waters” in 2018. Likely amounting to hundreds of thousands of RMB, the subsidies were withheld as punishment for operating in the Spratlys without the required licenses. To elicit special consideration, they emphasized that their four vessels were Spratly backbone boats. (Their ploy ultimately failed, as the Lingao County Bureau of Agriculture responded to their letter with a firm but polite refusal to change their decision.)

Southeast Asian countries can and should compile lists of known Spratly backbone boats. They can start with local newspapers, which are a great source for such information. In December 2016, for example, Zhanjiang Daily published an article about the launching of the city’s first Spratly backbone trawlers: the 48-meter (577 ton) Yuemayu 60222 and 60333. Registered to the city’s Mazhang District, the craft are owned by Zhanjiang Xixiang Fisheries (湛江喜翔渔业有限公司). With these clues in hand, one can then try to learn the identities of the company’s two other Spratly backbone boats, then still under construction.

The websites of Chinese shipbuilding companies are another useful source of information. Those with contracts to build backbone boats often issue news releases when these vessels are launched or delivered. In October 2017, for instance, the Fujian-based Lixin Ship Engineering Company launched five very large Spratly backbone trawlers built for a Guangdong fishing company, Maoming City Desheng Fisheries Limited. The five boats were delivered two months later. They included Yuedianyu 42881, 42882, 42883, 42885, and 42886. The boats were 63.6 meters in length and had the large (1244kW) engines typical of the backbone fleet. Of note, Desheng Fisheries is the same company that owns Yuemaobinyu 42881, 42882, 42883, 42885, and 42886, all spotted moored at Whitsun Reef in March. Indeed, they may be the very same boats (their names having been slightly altered in the years since they were built).

Provincial and municipal governments may be the most valuable sources of all. In November 2020, the Guangdong Bureau of Agriculture and Rural Affairs released information about the province’s Spratly (“NS,” for nansha) fishing license quota for 2021. The document indicated that 255 Guangdong boats would receive Spratly fishing licenses this year, among which 185 would go to backbone boats and 70 would go to “ordinary boats” (普通渔船). The Bureau attached an Excel spreadsheet listing the chosen vessels. The document omitted Table 1, containing the list of backbone boats. But it did include Table 2, listing the 70 “ordinary” fishing boats. Since only two types of Guangdong boats operate in the Spratlys—i.e., ordinary and backbone—any Guangdong boat there and not found in Table 2 must be a backbone bone, and therefore presumed militia.

These data help shed light on recent events. In March and April 2021, the Philippine Coast Guard released photos of Chinese fishing boats loitering at Whitsun Reef. Thanks to the Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative (AMTI), we know the identities of 23 of them.

Both AMTI and the Philippines Coast Guard classified them as “militia.” They are right. All are from Guangdong. All are absent from Table 2. And that makes them no “ordinary” boats.

***

Andrew S. Erickson, “PRC Gray Zone Operations in the South China Sea,” Maritime Power Seminar for Changing Character of War Centre (CCW), University of Oxford, based at Pembroke College and the Department of Politics and International Relations, 12 May 2021.

PRC GRAY ZONE OPERATIONS IN THE SOUTH CHINA SEA BY ANDREW ERICKSON

PRC Gray Zone Operations in the South China Sea

Professor Andrew Erickson, US Naval War College

A component of the People’s Armed Forces (PAF), China’s Maritime Militia is a state-organized, -developed, and -controlled force operating under a direct military chain of command to conduct state-sponsored activities. Third among China’s sea forces after the Navy and Coast Guard, the PAF Maritime Militia (PAFMM) is locally supported, but answers to the very top of China’s military bureaucracy: Commander-in-Chief Xi Jinping himself. China employs the PAFMM in gray zone operations, or “low-intensity maritime rights protection struggles,” at a level designed to frustrate effective response by the other parties involved. China has used it to advance its disputed sovereignty claims in international sea incidents, particularly in the South China Sea. Publicly-documented examples include China’s 1974 seizure of the Western Paracel Islands from Vietnam;  involvement in the occupation and development of Mischief Reef resulting in a 1995 incident with the Philippines; harassment of various Vietnamese government/survey vessels, including the Bin Minh and Viking; harassment of USNS Impeccable (2009); participation in the 2012 seizure of Scarborough Reef from the Philippines and 2014 blockade of Second Thomas Shoal; 2014 repulsion of Vietnamese vessels from disputed waters surrounding CNOOC’s HYSY-981 oil rig; layered “cabbage-style” envelopment of the Philippines-claimed Sandy Cay shoal near Thitu Island; and most recently in ongoing operations in Union Banks, including Whitsun Reef. This Maritime Power Seminar will explain the nature and significance of China’s third sea force before suggesting broader implications and offering policy recommendations.

Recommended Reading, Downloadable PDFs:

• Fact Sheet: The People’s Armed Forces Maritime Militia (PAFMM)
• Records Expose China’s Maritime Militia at Whitsun Reef
• China’s Maritime Militia Ships at Whitsun Reef
• Manila’s Images Are Revealing the Secrets of China’s Maritime Militia

Dr. Andrew S. Erickson is a Professor of Strategy in the U.S. Naval War College (NWC)’s China Maritime Studies Institute (CMSI). A core founding member, he helped establish CMSI and stand it up officially in 2006, and has played an integral role in its development. CMSI inspired the creation of other research centers, which he has advised and supported; he is a China Aerospace Studies Institute Associate. Erickson is currently a Visiting Scholar in full-time residence at Harvard University’s John King Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies, where he has been an Associate in Research since 2008. He runs the research website <www.andrewerickson.com>.

Source: https://www.flickr.com/photos/defenceimages/

• Posted in Wednesday Evening Seminar

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Lieutenant General Berrier, DIA Director: Written Testimony, Senate Armed Services Committee, “Hearing: Worldwide Threats,” 29 April 2021.

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Ryan D. Martinson, “Xi Likes Big Boats (Coming Soon to a Reef Near You),” War on the Rocks, 28 April 2021.

When General Secretary Xi Jinping visited Tanmen village in April 2013, he famously urged China’s South China Sea fishers to “build big boats, charge forth on the deep sea, and catch big fish.” As recent scenes from Whitsun Reef reveal, however, very little “charging” is taking place, which means very few “big fish.” But, in one respect, Chinese fishers have clearly obeyed Xi’s command: They have built some very large boats.

Photos the Philippine government released in March show nests of Chinese fishing vessels moored in the lagoon of the disputed reef. Aside from the sheer number of craft present, one is struck by the size of individual vessels. Satellite images reveal many boats 60 meters (almost 200 feet) in length — dwarfing the Philippine Coast Guard vessel (BRP Cabra) sent to monitor their activities.

Chinese fishers did not buy these boats out of mere love for Xi. Even if that were their motive, they could not afford these expensive craft without some help. Rather, the more than 200 fishing vessels seen congregating at Whitsun Reef are largely a product of policies that China has designed to prioritize Spratly fishing vessels in a national program to modernize the country’s fishing industry. This program has provided China’s maritime militia with potent new tools with which to exert influence and control in disputed maritime space — posing significant new challenges for Southeast Asian states. … … …

Connections to the Maritime Militia

Despite being a component of China’s armed forces, the maritime militia lacks a national organization with its own leadership and budget. Most members have “day jobs” in marine industries, especially fishing. Thus, they are directly affected by policies regulating their respective industries. For instance, militiamen operating in the Spratlys receive Spratly fuel subsidies. They have also directly benefited from the Spratly fleet upgrade program discussed above.

Existing militia units have received new Spratly boats. From 2014 to 2015, for example, residents of Tanmen Village (Hainan) took advantage of the subsidy program to build over 50 steel-hulled vessels, each displacing 300 to 500 tons. Wang Shumao, second in command of Tanmen’s maritime militia company, was among the lucky recipients. The ordinarily serious Wang declared to a Chinese reporter, “Piloting my new steel-hulled fishing vessel feels awesome!” In a July 2016 essay, the Central Military Commission chief responsible for militia affairs, Wang Wenqing, highlighted the importance of additional policies to “bring maritime militia fishing vessels into local fishing vessel upgrade plans.”

In some locales, joining the militia is apparently a precondition for receiving the subsidies. For example, the fishing vessel upgrade plan for Hainan’s Yangpu Economic Development Zone clearly states that vessels receiving subsidies will enter the militia. This means that, when conducting sovereignty operations and other “national defense tasks” in the South China Sea, they “must submit to the [military’s] unified command and control.” Similar policies in Guangdong may also explain the militia affiliation of the nine large trawlers owned by Taishan’s Fancheng Fisheries Development, seven of which were recently observed operating at Union Banks.

Other sources treat the subsidized vessels as constituting an organizational whole subject to state control. A 2017 report reveals that, in the case of Guangdong, the development, training, and operations of the Spratly backbone fleet represent a joint effort by the provincial Fisheries Bureau and the Guangdong provincial military district. At the very least, this suggests a heavy militia element within the fleet, but it could also mean that every boat in the fleet is subject to military tasking.

Implications

Members of China’s maritime militia have operated in the Spratlys for over three decades. Today, they go there embedded in a brand new fleet comprising hundreds of large steel-hulled vessels — the product of a national program to modernize China’s marine fishing industry. The successful rollout of this program has enhanced the militia’s ability to perform all facets of its mission set.

In the Spratlys, the militia’s most important mission is to maintain presence in disputed space. Presence is the currency of control in the maritime domain, as the ocean cannot be occupied like land territory. Presence also allows maritime militia vessels to collect intelligence, thereby boosting the People Liberation Army’s awareness of foreign activities in these waters. The new vessels offer important advantages in this respect, as their size enables them to carry more fuel and provisions — giving them much greater endurance.

China’s maritime militia also sometimes perform more coercive operations. For instance, they provide security for Chinese civilian vessels as they operate in disputed space. The classic example of these “escort” operations involved the 2014 defense of the HYSY-981 drilling rig in waters south of the Paracel Islands. But more recently, in July 2019, members of the Sansha maritime militia — operating elements of their new fleet of 60-meter fishing vessels — flanked the Haiyangdizhi 8 as it conducted seismic surveys in Vietnam’s exclusive economic zone. Larger vessels are better able to physically block other states’ forces from approaching the vulnerable craft under their protection. The militia is also known to harass foreign vessels operating in Chinese claimed space. They do this by threatening to ram or bump their victims, forcing them to cease operations or risk collision. Clearly, the coercive capacity of a 600-ton steel vessel is much greater than that of a 80-ton wooden one.

How might Southeast Asian states respond? Because of their comparative weakness, they cannot simply build more and bigger coast guard vessels and send them out to meet steel with steel. In fact, Beijing would probably relish another major confrontation near a disputed land feature. It would give it a pretext to escalate and potentially seize a new piece of territory.

These large modern fishing vessels in the hands of China’s maritime militia pose special challenges for Southeast Asian states. They make it much more difficult for countries like the Philippines, Malaysia, Indonesia, and Vietnam to protect their exclusive rights to living and non-living resources out to 200 nautical miles from their coasts. Indeed, many boats in the new Spratly fishing fleet are larger than the regional coast guard cutters that would seek to board them. As a result, they should either accept the illegal presence of Chinese fishers within their exclusive economic zones, or use armed force to evict them — which could encourage Beijing to respond in kind. On the flip side, a better equipped maritime militia is also more capable of coercively imposing Chinas own prerogatives in disputed areas, by threatening the physical safety of foreign mariners with collision or worse. In sum, the new fleet enriches the “tool kit” used by China to assert control over vast areas of the South China Sea on the basis of its notorious — and utterly discredited — “nine-dash line.”

Instead, the best option for other Southeast Asian states may be to do as the Philippines government has done — to publicly document the activities of China’s new Spratly fishing fleet. This puts China on the defensive — forcing them to issue weak, unconvincing denials — and limits its ability to portray itself as the victim if and when an incident occurs. Ultimately, this approach could undermine Beijing’s favorite defense for new assertive behavior in the South China Sea (i.e., “they started it”). If Xi likes big boats, other Southeast Asian nations can at least create conditions in which he cannot lie.

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“Caught on Camera: Two Dozen Militia Boats at Whitsun Reef Identified,” Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative, Center for Strategic and International Studies, 21 April 2021.

Last month, the National Task Force on the West Philippine Sea, an interagency body housed within the Presidential Office in Manila, reported that more than 200 Chinese militia vessels were anchored at Whitsun Reef. The task force released photos of some of those vessels, collected during a patrol by the Philippine Coast Guard on March 7. Additional images and video were released after two subsequent patrols by the Philippine Coast Guard ship Cabra. As with other known militia deployments, the behavior of these vessels defies commercial explanation. Most have remained in the area for weeks or even months, riding at anchor in clusters without engaging in any fishing activity. Many are trawlers which, by definition, must move to fish. And blue skies have debunked the initial excuse from the Chinese Embassy in Manila that they were riding out a storm.

AMTI has identified 14 of the ships in these photos and videos. To these can be added the vessels of the Yuetaiyu fleet, numbered 18000-18999. Those nine ships have broadcast AIS from Whitsun several times, as previously reported by Andrew Erickson and Ryan Martinson. Their involvement in the militia has been well-documented and AMTI first tracked them patrolling Union Banks, which includes Whitsun Reef, in early 2019.

A photo taken during the initial Philippine patrol on March 7 shows six Chinese vessels tied together at Whitsun Reef. Only the bow numbers and the first two characters, Yue (粤) and Mao (茂), of five of the ships can be clearly seen. By cross referencing this information with vessel profiles in the commercial AIS database Marine Traffic, AMTI can identify them as the Yuemaobinyu (粤茂滨渔) 42881, 42882, 42883, 42885, and 42886.

These names will sound familiar in the Philippines. In early 2019, the Yuemaobinyu 42212—so named because it operates from the same port as these five—rammed and sank the Philippine fishing vessel F/B Gem-Ver 1 at Reed Bank. AMTI afterward discovered that the vessel had a history of government contracts and suspicious AIS activity, but could not conclusively prove that it was part of the militia.

Video shot during the Cabra’s first patrol on March 26-27 provides a clear shot of another vessel, the Yueyangxiyu (粤阳西渔) 96523:

Also visible is a vessel with the bow number 08041—almost certainly the Yuezhanyu (粤湛渔) 08041. That conclusion is supported by both AIS data from Marine Traffic and the later identification of its sister ships, the Yuezhanyu 08039, 08042, and 08043 in a video shot during the Cabra’s recent return visit on April 12-13.

This second video also captured the Yuexinhuiyu (粤新会渔) 60138 and 60139, which Andrew Erickson and Ryan Martinson recently profiled in Foreign Policy. … … …

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Ryan D. Martinson and Andrew S. Erickson, “Manila’s Images Are Revealing the Secrets of China’s Maritime Militia,” Foreign Policy, 19 April 2021.

Details of the ships haunting disputed rocks show China’s plans.

Six Chinese fishing vessels believed to be part of the People’s Armed Forces Maritime Militia, including the Yuexinhuiyu 60138 and 60139, are moored together at Whitsun Reef on March 27. PHOTO PROVIDED BY PHILIPPINE GOVERNMENT

The Philippines is regaining the initiative in the South China Sea. In an apparent policy shift, it has begun sharing unprecedented amounts of information about Chinese actions in the Spratly Islands, the archipelago of disputed rocks and reefs off the western coast of the Philippines. While Manila’s precise motives are unclear, its newfound transparency is creating fascinating new opportunities for understanding Beijing’s maritime strategy. This is especially true when it comes to China’s fleet of Spratly fishing vessels, some portion of which operates under the command of the Chinese military—units of the People’s Armed Forces Maritime Militia (PAFMM). Conceivably numbering thousands of vessels and with tens of thousands of personnel, this subcomponent of China’s armed forces is trained and equipped to support the People’s Liberation Army in advancing sovereignty claims to disputed features and sea areas.

Last week, the Philippine Coast Guard released images of Chinese fishing vessels moored at the Spratlys’ Whitsun Reef, taken by the crew of the BRP Cabra, a Coast Guard ship that approached close to the Chinese vessels. Gone are the hundreds of boats seen in March. What remains is a small number of Chinese fishing vessels, six of which are tied together in the lagoon.

One key point: The new photos and an accompanying video show that the vessels seen last week were the same six boats observed by the Cabra on its last patrol over two weeks ago. Real fishing vessels cannot afford to linger for weeks in a single spot like this, especially when the weather is perfect for fishing elsewhere. As the captains of these boats are plainly indifferent to the economic costs of inactivity, their protracted presence at Whitsun can only mean one thing: They are tasked with being there. Yes, China does sometimes pay ordinary fishers to linger in disputed space, but given the intense spotlight on Whitsun Reef it seems far more likely it has turned to the professionals. They are undoubtedly members of the PAFMM. … … …

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Brad Lendon, “Beijing Has a Navy it Doesn’t Even Admit Exists, Experts Say. And it’s Swarming Parts of the South China Sea,” CNN, 12 April 2021.

… … … Despite Chinese government denials, there is little ambiguity in Western circles about what the Pentagon calls the People’s Armed Forces Maritime Militia (PAFMM). …

Some experts have taken to referring to the militia as “Little Blue Men,” a reference to the color of their boats’ hulls and to Russia’s “Little Green Men,” soldiers in unmarked green uniforms who infiltrated Crimea before Moscow annexed it from Ukraine in 2014. …

“The Militia is a key component of China’s Armed Forces and a part of what it calls the ‘People’s Armed Forces System,’” Conor Kennedy and Andrew Erickson, two leading American experts on the subject, wrote for the US Naval War College in 2017.

It is “a state-organized, -developed, and -controlled force operating under a direct military chain of command to conduct Chinese state-sponsored activities,” they added.

The alleged militia is integrated with China’s fishing fleet, the world’s largest with more than 187,000 boats, Erickson told CNN, but the actual number of armed boats remains unclear to Western experts.

Whatever their ranks, experts say they can lead large flotillas of actual fishing boats in actions to further Chinese government policies and territorial claims — including those in the South China Sea.

“China is typically secretive about its Third Sea Force (behind the PLA Navy and coast guard), which might conceivably number in the thousands of vessels and in the tens of thousands of personnel. Possibly more,” Erickson told CNN.

A 2020 US Defense Department report on the Chinese military mentions only 84 actual maritime militia boats, all assigned to a unit operating out of Sansha City on Hainan island, in the northern reaches of the South China Sea. The unit, established in 2016, gets frequent subsidies to operate in the Spratly Islands, the report said.

“This particular PAFMM unit is also China’s most professional. Its forces are paid salaries independent of any clear commercial fishing responsibilities and recruited from recently separated veterans,” it said.

But Erickson told CNN the boats seen around Whitsun Reef in recent weeks looked different from those in the Hainan unit, suggesting full-time militia boats are greater in number than previously thought.

Erickson and colleague Ryan Martinson, writing in the journal Foreign Policy late last month, said tracking of some of the Chinese boats at Whitsun using open-source intelligence shows they came from Taishan in China’s southern Guangdong province.

At least seven “enormous” trawlers that were in the Whitsun lagoon could be part of “the most advanced PAFMM unit yet developed and deployed,” Erickson and Martinson wrote.

Using automatic identification system data, they said the boats at Whitsun had patrolled the Union Banks, where Whitsun Reef is, as well as other Spratly Islands features like the Subi and Mischief reefs, both of which have been built up and militarized by the Chinese armed forces.

“There is no evidence of fishing whatsoever during these laser-focused operations, but every indication of trolling for territorial claims,” the pair wrote.

Data that Erickson and Martinson compiled from MarineTraffic.com shows just how frequently the unit has been in the Spratly Islands chain over the past year. …

What is the purpose of a maritime militia?

The concept of a maritime militia, or an irregular naval force, allows China to make territorial claims in huge numbers without ever involving the People’s Liberation Army proper, Western experts say.

Even if lead boats like those mentioned by Erickson and Martinson are relatively small in number, they can spearhead flotillas in the hundreds — as seen in Whitsun Reef.

“These classic ‘gray zone’ operations are designed to ‘win without fighting’ by overwhelming the adversary with swarms of fishing vessels,” Derek Grossman, a RAND Corp defense analyst, wrote last year.

Jay Batongbacal, director of the Institute for Maritime Affairs at the University of the Philippines, summed up what Beijing has done in recent weeks at Whitsun Reef and recent years across the South China Sea — 1.3 million square miles of water, almost all of which Beijing claims as Chinese territory.

“They are now essentially occupying Whitsun Reef by the mere presence of their vessels,” Batongbacal said in an interview with National Public Radio.

“That’s actually the objective of the Chinese strategy, to establish de facto control and dominance over the entire South China Sea through these incremental moves.” … … …

***

Global Trends 2040: A More Contested World (Office of the Director of National Intelligence: National Intelligence Council, March 2021).

p. 104 [Situating Maritime Militia in Spectrum of Conflict]

***

Andrew S. Erickson and Ryan D. Martinson, “Records Expose China’s Maritime Militia at Whitsun Reef,” Foreign Policy, 29 March 2021.

Beijing Claims They Are Fishing Vessels. The Data Shows Otherwise.

Accompanying slide deck: Andrew S. Erickson and Ryan D. Martinson, “Exposed! Here are China’s Maritime Militia Ships at Whitsun Reef,” China Analysis from Original Sources 以第一手资料研究中国, 29 March 2021.

Distinctively-numbered Yuetaiyu 18000, 18111, 18222, 18333, 18555, 18666, 18777, 18888, and 18999, the Fancheng Nine operate out of Shadi Bay on Shangchuan Island’s southern end. With this base of operations, 105 miles southwest of Hong Kong, they apparently constitute the core of a “Far Seas Militia Squadron.” Plans to establish a Far Seas Militia Squadron were discussed at a Taishan “Armed Forces Work Meeting” in March 2016—the same year Fancheng Fisheries was set up. In PAFMM terminology, “Far Seas” often designates remote waters within the first island chain, including the southern reaches of the South China Sea. … … …

***

Andrew S. Erickson, “China’s Secretive Maritime Militia May Be Gathering at Whitsun Reef,” Foreign Policy, 22 March 2021.

Boats designed to overwhelm civilian foes can be turned into shields in real conflict.

An obscure boomerang-shaped feature in the South China Sea may host the next phase of PRC maritime coercion. Since at least March 7, 2021, many dozens of large, blue-hulled PRC ships have been lashed together in Whitsun Reef’s lagoon. They have not been seen to do any fishing, but run powerful lights at night. Citing the presence of 220 China Maritime Militia (CMM) vessels, on March 21 Philippine Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana publicly demanded their departure from his nation’s Exclusive Economic Zone. Manila supplemented his statement with a diplomatic protest from Philippine Foreign Affairs Secretary Teodoro Locsin Jr.

But Beijing remains defiant. Spokespeople from the PRC’s foreign ministry (Hua Chunying) and embassy in Manila have denied that the vessels belong to China’s militia, defended their presence as sheltering from (unobservable) inclement weather, and deflected by making the usual PRC claim that others should not inflame the situation with irresponsible accusations. But on the morning of March 22, Armed Forces of the Philippines Chief Lt. Gen. Sobejana reports, the Philippine Air Force observed “183 CMM vessels” still present.

When it comes to South China Sea features, few things are simple. While Whitsun Reef remains undeveloped and uninhabited for now, it is claimed by the Philippines as Julian Felipe Reef, by Vietnam as Da Ba Dau, and by China as 牛轭礁 Niu’e Jiao (“Oxbow Reef”). As the easternmost feature in the Spratlys’ multi-nationally occupied Union Banks, it is strategically situated astride busy sea lanes—an ideal base for monitoring and operational dispatch. Previously a low-tide elevation, Whitsun apparently now has “a 100-meter long sand dune that has reportedly grown in area and height.” Since at least the 1990s, China and Vietnam have been playing a cat-and-mouse game of sovereignty maneuvers around Whitsun, with China attempting to stake a claim with markers such as buoys, and Vietnamese forces operating from nearby features such as nearby Sin Cowe Island and removing them.

In recent years, whenever Beijing has chosen to focus on a feature or factor, it has increased efforts to a scale and intensity that its rivals cannot directly match. Case in point: All South China Sea states occupying features enhanced them to some extent, but starting around 2014 Beijing began industrial-scale “island building” and fortification that left its rivals in the coral dust. Thus whatever exactly is happening at Whitsun Reef at the moment, it’s a good time to look at China’s well-tested approach to eroding neighbors’ sovereignty and international rules and norms in the South China Sea—and what can be done to counter it. … … …

***

Aie Balagtas See and Zoe Haver, “Manila Protests Presence of Hundreds of Chinese Ships in Contested Waters,” Radio Free Asia, 22 March 2021.

… … … According to Philippine National Security Adviser Hermogenes Esperon Jr., the 220 Chinese ships were seen moored at the “large boomerang shaped shallow coral reef” [Whitsun Reef] on March 7 – and they were not fishing.

“Despite clear weather at the time, the Chinese vessels massed at the reef showed no actual fishing activities and had their full white lights turned on during night time,” Esperon said on Saturday.

Photographs of the 220 ships indicated they were [most likely] maritime militia vessels, which were not involved in fishing activities, said Andrew Erickson, a professor of strategy at the U.S. Naval War College’s China Maritime Studies Institute.

“The photos from the Philippine Coast Guard and statement from Defense Secretary Lorenzana match verified information on China’s People’s Armed Forces Maritime Militia (PAFMM),” he told BenarNews, an RFA-affiliated online news service.

“The ships photographed look and act very much like the 84 large steel-hulled vessels purpose-built at multiple shipyards by 2016 for the leading Sansha City Maritime Militia, as documented by both the U.S. Department of Defense and Office of Naval Intelligence.”

Automatic identification system-data for the past few years had shown Sansha ships engaged in rotational forward deployments to China-claimed features and outposts throughout the South China Sea, he said.

“Crewed by well-salaried full-time personnel recruited in part from former PLA ranks, they appear not to bother fishing – the better to focus on trolling for territory,” Erickson said, referring to China’s People’s Liberation Army.

“Such vessels reportedly have weapons lockers, and official PRC [People’s Republic of China] photos depict exercises in which they are loaded with ‘light arms.’”

The presence of these vessels conforms to Beijing’s established South China Sea modus operandi, Erickson added.

“Two implications arise immediately: First, if not properly countered at Whitsun Reef, or elsewhere, PAFMM vessels could support further territorial seizure akin to what China achieved at Scarborough Shoal in 2012,” he said.

In 2012, the Chinese seized Scarborough Shoal, a traditional fishing ground within the 200-nautical-mile Exclusive Economic Zone of the Philippines, after a two-month standoff with the Philippine Navy.

“Second, if these [approximately] 220 vessels indeed belong to leading professionalized, militarized PAFMM units, they alone should significantly increase the U.S. government’s sole public estimate of total PAFMM ship numbers – which may be excessively conservative at [approximately] 84 vessels total, a number projected to remain fixed through 2030.” … … …

***

Professor Williams is a senior research scholar, lecturer, and executive director of the Paul Tsai China Center at Yale Law School. He is also a nonresident senior fellow at the Brookings Institution.

… …

Maritime Crisis Management and China’s “White Hulls” and “Blue Hulls” 

Amid an increase in the frequency and intensity of Chinese and American military operationsin maritime East Asia, an array of commentators have argued that there is an urgent need for the United States and China to work together to improve bilateral crisis avoidance and communication mechanisms. Nowhere is this need more evident than in the contested waters of the South China Sea and East China Sea. The recent history of U.S.-China military dialoguesoffers little cause for optimism about the potential for a near-term breakthrough.

Nonetheless, the Biden administration has an early opportunity to test the sincerity of China’s professed desire to prevent and manage the risks of conflict. As an initial good-faith step, Washington and Beijing should work to supplement existing maritime safety protocols to include non-naval vessels such as coast guards and maritime militias.

Recent legal developments related to the Chinese Coast Guard (CCG) have brought this issue to a head. On Jan. 21, Beijing passed a law that authorizes the Chinese Coast Guard to use “all necessary measures” to prevent foreign organizations and individuals from violating, or posing an “imminent danger” of violating, China’s “sovereignty, sovereign rights, and jurisdictional rights.” This is the first time China has spelled out in law the conditions under which its coast guard can fire weapons on foreign vessels. The new law permits the coast guard to use force under prescribed circumstances to defend China’s “jurisdictional waters” (管辖海域)—a deliberatelyambiguous term that likely encompasses China’s ill-defined claimsover nearly 80 percent of the waters in the South China Sea. …

The Coast Guard Law also implicitly concedes what American officials have long argued: Maritime accidents and encounters involving the threat or use of force are at least as likely to arise from the operation of China’s coast guard as from its naval vessels. And it’s not just the Coast Guard and the Navy. China’s People’s Armed Forces Maritime Militia (PAFMM) raises similar concerns given its function as an armed reserve force that assists the People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) and the CCG in enforcing China’s sovereignty claims. As China doubles down on these enforcement activities, all signs point to a growing role for so-called “white hull” coast guards and “blue hull” maritime militias in addition to “gray hull” naval vessels. … …

CUES and the maritime safety MOU do not expressly apply to coast guard vessels or to China’s armed fishing militia. As Andrew Erickson has explained, China uses these non-naval vessels for “gray zone operations against vessels from its maritime neighbors, as well as the U.S., at a level designed to frustrate effective response by the other parties involved.” These types of vessels are deployed to assert and defend China’s expansive maritime claims “more regularly and extensively than its navy.” Erickson and Connor Kennedy have shown that the PAFMM, which includes both fishing vessels and purpose-built vessels designed to look like fishing vessels, is organized and commanded by the PLA’s local military commands. Given the high percentage of incidents involving these forces, the absence of a CUES-like arrangement for non-naval vessels is a glaring weakness in the regional maritime safety regime. … …

This is not to suggest that CUES has been a silver bullet for safe interactions between U.S. and Chinese naval vessels. Nor could a supplemental protocol that applies to “white hulls” and “blue hulls” resolve the deeper maritime security tensions between China and the United States or other countries. But a CUES-type document for non-naval vessels could serve as a useful building block, especially if accompanied by a commitment that representatives of coast guards and maritime militia forces will actively participate in bilateral risk reduction and crisis communication talks going forward. The United States could demonstrate reciprocal good faith by subjecting its own coast guard to these safety rules and encouraging U.S. allies and partners in the region to do the same. … …

Managing Competition, Not Solving It

To be clear, this simple update to existing rules should not be viewed as a Chinese concession to be anxiously bargained over. Numerous Chinese experts have argued that strengthening risk reduction mechanisms and communication channels is critically important for China’s own interests. For dialogues on these mechanisms to be effective, they should focus on operational safety and avoid getting bogged down in grievances over differing legal and policy positions.

In an echo of the Chinese government’s erstwhile bid for a “new type of great power relationship” between China and the United States, Chinese defense officials have sought to cast the dawn of the Biden administration as a “new historical starting point” for Sino-U.S. military relations. Washington will be rightly skeptical of such rhetoric, which rings hollow to U.S. officials familiar with Beijing’s past efforts to “change the soup but not the medicine.” Moving forward, the focus in talks between the two countries must shift to achieving concrete outcomes that diminish the potential for miscalculation. A Sino-U.S. commitment to applying clear mutual safety procedures to all sea forces would be a small step toward building the confidence needed to address larger challenges such as the deployment of new capabilities in military robotics and artificial-intelligence-enabled vessels and weapons systems.

The goals of bilateral maritime risk reduction should not be held hostage to broader U.S.-China disagreements. Like their naval counterparts, coast guards and maritime militias should be subject to clear procedures for safe encounters at sea. Reaching this understanding would be a small but meaningful step toward proving that Beijing and Washington can achieve a manageable equilibrium of “competition without catastrophe.”

***

Ryan Martinson, “Catching Sovereignty Fish: Chinese Fishers in the Southern Spratlys,” Marine Policy, Volume 125 (March 2021): 1–11.

Highlights

• Each year, close to 200 Chinese fishing vessels operate in disputed space in the southern Spratlys.
• Chinese government policies play a decisive role in enabling them to operate there safely and profitably.
• Chinese policymakers see fishing vessels as instruments with which to uphold China’s maritime claims.
• China provides generous financial incentives (including fuel and other subsidies) to Chinese fishers and invests heavily in maritime law enforcement forces to ensure their security.
• Guangxi-based maritime militiamen likely operate in the southern Spratlys, but there is little documentary evidence directly connecting them with particular incidents in these waters.

In recent years, Chinese fishers have been involved in a number of incidents in disputed areas of the East and South China Seas. Their presence in contested space is due to a combination of factors, including the individual initiative of private fishing boat owners and state policies that seek to leverage Chinese fishers to achieve political aims. These factors differ depending on the area in question. This article examines the case of Chinese fishing in the southernmost sections of China’s claims in the South China Sea, in waters that fall within the exclusive economic zones of Indonesia and Malaysia. It argues that while most Chinese fishing in these waters is driven by private fishing boat owners pursuing economic gain, the Chinese government has played a decisive role in enabling and supporting their activities. This article also offers evidence that some PRC fishers operate there at the direction of the Chinese military, in their capacity as members of China’s “maritime militia.”

Keywords: South China Sea, Fisheries disputes, Spratly Islands, Chinese marine policy

Introduction

Chinese fishing in disputed waters in the East and South China Seas is a product of individual initiative and state policy. China’s coastal waters are overfished, so Chinese fishers have economic incentives to operate in areas with greater chance for profit. This includes disputed space. For its part, the central government sees value in their presence there. Aside from contributing to the marine economy, Chinese fishing in disputed space upholds China’s claims to sovereignty and jurisdiction in these areas. The People’s Republic of China (PRC) therefore crafts policies to support—and in some cases, direct—the activities of Chinese fishers operating in contested space [1].

Which of these factors—individual initiative or government policy—is the more important driver? It depends on the area in question. This article examines the circumstances of Chinese fishing activities in one particular area, the “southern Spratlys,” defined as Chinese-claimed waters in the South China Sea south of 6 degrees latitude [2].1 It argues that the Chinese government has played a decisive role in enabling and supporting Chinese fishing in these waters. Moreover, this article also offers evidence that some PRC fishers operate there at the direction of the Chinese military, serving as members of China’s maritime militia.

The southern Spratlys merit close examination for two key reasons. First, in recent years these waters have seen a number of fishing incidents involving China and Southeast Asian states, especially Indonesia. There exists an urgent, practical need to better understand the circumstances—policy and otherwise—behind Chinese actions in this area. Second, better understanding of Chinese policies in the southern Spratlys can shed light on Beijing’s South China Sea claims. While the PRC has been very clear that it claims sovereignty over all of the land features within the “nine-dash line,” it has been notoriously vague about the nature and extent of its claimed maritime rights in the vast spaces between these tiny rocks and reefs [3].2 The southern Spratlys are an interesting case because they are largely devoid of land and contain none that could plausibly generate an exclusive economic zone (EEZ). A close examination of Beijing’s policies therefore sheds light on the PRC’s treatment of the nine-dash line as a maritime boundary [4].3

This article comprises six parts. Part one outlines the known facts of Chinese fishing activities in the southern Spratlys. Part two discusses the economic incentives luring Chinese fishers to the southern Spratlys, and the costs and risks associates with pursuing commercial gain in these waters. Part three examines the factors informing Beijing’s policies for Chinese fishing in the southern Spratlys. Parts four, five, and six analyze the three main prongs of its approach. The paper concludes with a summary of key findings. … … …

8. Conclusion

Chinese fishers have operated in the southern Spratlys since the early 1990s. The first expeditions were conducted by vessels from Guangxi’s Beihai city. Beihai fishers continue to dominate Chinese fishing in this area. In 2018, at least 175 Guangxi trawlers operated in these waters, the vast majority from Beihai.

Economic motives are clearly a key driver behind the activities of Guangxi fishers in the southern Spratlys. That is, they go there to catch fish that is unavailable in the same abundance in the Gulf of Tonkin. However, this article shows that government policies have played a decisive role ensuring that these activities are safe and profitable. By implementing robust policy measures, the PRC enables and encourages Guangxi fishers to operate in this highly disputed maritime space.

PRC fisheries policy in the southern Spratlys is largely focused on the political importance of Chinese fishing in these waters. It proceeds from two key beliefs. First, that Chinese fishers have the right to operate in the northern part of the Sunda Shelf because it falls within the nine-dash line. Second, Chinese fishers should operate in the southern Spratlys because their activities serve the political function of upholding China’s claims to maritime rights in these waters. Just by being present there, they demonstrate Chinese sovereignty.

These beliefs drive Beijing’s efforts to support Chinese fishing in these waters. Chinese policymakers heavily subsidize fishing operations in the Spratlys. These subsidies include defraying fixed costs, offsetting fuel costs, and providing other monetary awards to influence the cost-benefit analysis of individual fishing boat owners. Chinese analysts have shown that these incentives are probably the biggest inducements for fishing in the southern Spratlys. Moreover, Chinese policymakers invest huge sums of money to ensure the security of Chinese fishers operating there. They have built dozens of very large law enforcement cutters and charged them with maintaining adequate presence in these waters to deter coastal state EEZ enforcement. Beijing’s efforts have been largely successful: since 2016, Chinese fishing vessels have been able to operate with impunity in the southern Spratlys.

There is some evidence that China’s maritime militia also operates in conjunction with Guangxi’s Spratly fishing fleet. In recent years, Guangxi has invested heavily in the development of maritime militia forces. Boosting the service’s ability to conduct sovereignty operations is a key driver behind these investments. All of the Guangxi ports that host Spratly vessels possess maritime militia units. Moreover, authoritative sources suggest that Guangxi militia vessels perform missions in the Spratlys. Nevertheless, there is no definitive documentary evidence connecting Guangxi militia vessels with individual incidents in these waters. This is not surprising, as China can achieve its current maritime objective without the militia, and if the militia are present they are serving presence and intelligence collection functions, which are generally not newsworthy.

***

Zoe Haver, Sansha City in China’s South China Sea Strategy: Building a System of Administrative Control, China Maritime Report 12 (Newport, RI: Naval War College China Maritime Studies Institute, January 2021).

China established Sansha City in 2012 to administer the bulk of its territorial and maritime claims in the South China Sea. Sansha is headquartered on Woody Island. The city’s jurisdiction includes the Paracel Islands, Zhongsha Islands, and Spratly Islands and most of the waters within China’s “nine-dash line.” Sansha is responsible for exercising administrative control, implementing military-civil fusion, and carrying out the day-to-day work of rights defense, stability maintenance, environmental protection, and resource development. Since 2012, each level of the Chinese party-state system has worked to develop Sansha, improving the city’s physical infrastructure and transportation, communications, corporate ecosystem, party-state institutions, and rights defense system. In effect, the city’s development has produced a system of normalized administrative control. This system ultimately allows China to govern contested areas of the South China Sea as if they were Chinese territory.

Key Findings

• Sansha is responsible for administering China’s maritime and territorial claims in the South China Sea on a day-to-day basis from the front lines of the disputes.
• Sansha’s physical infrastructure, transportation, communications, economy, party-state institutions, and defense capabilities form a unified system that continuously strengthens the city’s capacity to exercise administrative control over contested areas of the South China Sea.
• The city uses civilian-administrative means, including maritime law enforcement and maritime militia operations, rather than military force to advance China’s position in the South China Sea disputes.
• The development of Sansha is gradually civilianizing and institutionalizing China’s efforts to control the South China Sea, providing a mechanism to govern contested areas as if they were Chinese territory.
• The city’s development aligns closely with China’s broader strategy in the South China Sea, which aims to consolidate China’s claims while deterring other states from strengthening their own claims. This strategy relies on China Coast Guard (CCG) and maritime militia operations backed by the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) Navy.
• Military-civil fusion is the guiding principle of the city’s development, which ensures that all aspects of Sansha’s development ultimately serve China’s sovereignty and security interests.
• Improvements to Sansha’s physical infrastructure and transportation, including the construction of a smart microgrid on Woody Island, allow Woody Island and other occupied features to accommodate a growing number of military, civilian, and law enforcement personnel and guarantee the continuous operation of important facilities.
• The development of the city’s communications infrastructure enables local leaders to monitor and govern vast swathes of contested maritime space with ease.
• Sansha’s leaders have systematically mobilized private and state-owned enterprises in support of nearly every aspect of the city’s daily operations and long-term development.
• The expansion of the city’s party-state institutions allows municipal authorities to directly govern contested areas of the South China Sea and ensures the primacy of Chinese Communist Party (CCP) interests in local decision-making.
• To defend China’s maritime rights and interests, the city created Sansha Comprehensive Law Enforcement (SCLE), a maritime law enforcement force, and established a new maritime militia force. Sansha has integrated both forces into its military, law enforcement, and civilian joint defense system. Using these capabilities, local leaders physically assert Sansha’s jurisdiction at the expense of China’s neighbors and coordinate joint operations with the CCG.
• Sansha’s system of normalized administrative control is currently strongest in the Paracel Islands. Despite the continuing influence of the central bureaucracies, CCG, and PLA, elements of this system also exist in the Spratly Islands and show signs of expanding.

About the Author

Zoe Haver is a Party Watch Initiative Fellow at the Center for Advanced China Research. Her research focuses on the South China Sea disputes and Chinese economic statecraft. She has worked on Chinese security and economic issues at SOS International LLC, the Center for Advanced Defense Studies (C4ADS), the U.S. Naval War College China Maritime Studies Institute, and the Columbia-Harvard China and the World Program. Zoe received her BA in International Affairs from George Washington University. She lived in China for three years, studied Chinese in both Taiwan and China, and is proficient in Mandarin Chinese.

Acknowledgments

The author thanks Isaac Kardon and the rest of the China Maritime Studies Institute team for their encouragement and helpful feedback. Moreover, this project would not have possible without generous support from the Center for Advanced Defense Studies (C4ADS). Finally, the author thanks Devin Thorne for his valuable contributions.

***

Andrew S. Erickson, interviewed by Harry J. Kazianis, “Advantage At Sea: U.S. Maritime Strategy Focuses On China,” 19FortyFive, 22 December 2020.

• Republished in RealClearDefense.

Editor’s Note: We recently spoke with Dr. Andrew Erickson, a professor of strategy in the U.S. Naval War College (NWC)’s China Maritime Studies Institute (CMSI), to get his take on the newly released U.S. maritime strategy, Advantage at Sea.

First, give us a sense of your overall assessment of the new maritime strategy, Advantage at Sea. What does it do, why does it matter, and how could it shape future naval strategy for the United States?

The tri-service strategy offers a clear vision of the greatest challenges facing the United States and its vital interests, how the U.S. Navy, Marine Corps, and Coast Guard can best address them, and the prioritization that will be required to do so. This well-written document is exceptional in its provision of information, substantive analysis, and guidance. It explains how China poses the greatest challenges to American interests of any nation: “the most comprehensive threat to the United States, our allies, and all nations supporting a free and open system.” It explains how America’s Sea Services, front-line witnesses to this sea change, are best placed to address many of those challenges, and why this should be the top priority moving forward.

I could not help but notice the amount of attention is given to China’s maritime militia in the document. Does the new strategy, in your view, pay enough attention to this threat? Do we have the resources needed in the Asia-Pacific considering the size and scope of the threat presented by Beijing in this area?

The strategy concisely explains China’s own tri-service strategy at sea with a laser focus that no previous U.S. government document provided so directly. Through a simple but powerful graph, this latest maritime strategy document offers new data concerning the ultimate expression of Beijing’s own maritime strategy: numbers of ships in service, by service, starting in 2000 and projected out to 2030. This includes a People’s Liberation Army (PLA) Navy that has already trebled in size to as many as ~360 battle force ships today and is forecast to exceed 450 ships a decade hence. It already exceeds U.S. Navy battle force ship numbers, which have not quite reached 300.

The graph shows a China Coast Guard of ~250 ships, for which little further quantitative growth is forecast, but for which substantial qualitative development can be expected. A key area to watch is Coast Guard aviation, which will be greatly enhanced from its current limited state.

Most interestingly, the graph offers the first public U.S. government estimate of ship numbers for China’s People’s Armed Forces Maritime Militia (PAFMM). With an increase from virtually zero in 2015 to ~100 today and little further growth projected, this would seem to be the lowest, most strict-constructionist tabulation possible. The relatively low number appears to reflect only the very-most-advanced purpose-built hulls from a small subset of vanguard units: As the Pentagon’s 2020 China Military Power Report documents, the Sansha City Maritime Militia alone by 2016 received “84 large militia vessels with reinforced hulls and ammunition storage.” When one includes the many basic fishing vessels registered in the PAFMM, the total order of battle is in the high hundreds at least. Here, China draws from the world’s largest fishing fleet, which contained approximately 187,211 marine fishing vessels at the end of 2015.

Already, each of China’s three sea services is itself the world’s largest by number of ships. By the Strategy’s graphic calculus, their combined total currently stands at 700 and is projected to exceed 800 by 2030. Both numbers and quality matter, and China is growing considerably in both dimensions at sea.

We can be confident that the battle force numbers calculated for China’s Navy correspond numerically with those for the U.S. Navy battle force. The U.S. Navy is required to count PLA Navy (PLAN) ship numbers strictly according to the criteria listed in SECNAVINST 5030.8C (“General Guidance for the Classification of Naval Vessels and Battle Force Ship Counting Procedures”). It’s the closest to an “apples-to-apples” comparison that one can expect.

While U.S. forces continue to retain formidable qualitative advantages undersea, particularly in blue water and with submarines; in strike warfare; and in anti-air warfare, China has increasing advantages across the board in anti-surface warfare. Worryingly, on a ship-to-ship basis, new advanced PLAN platforms are increasingly closing the “apples-to-apples” gap with their USN counterparts in apparent hardware capabilities: equipment, weapons, and sensors. The U.S. Navy is increasingly banking on the intangibles of personnel, doctrine, tactics, and experience: being able to employ its ships better and to fight better overall. In a surface-to-surface fight, the U.S. Navy would be overmatched in surface-to-surface firepower (i.e., short-range, subsonic Harpoon missiles) against PLAN anti-ship cruise missiles that already have a range advantage, and with the new YJ-12 and YJ-18 also being supersonic. When it comes to Sino-American competition at sea, the strategy document warns starkly, the U.S. Navy is already quantitatively behind China and is rapidly losing qualitative advantages.

Overall, China has deployed far more missiles on land and at sea than has the United States. For some of these systems, reliable long-range targeting far from China’s land-based radars and other C4ISR architecture remains a work in progress. However, for the Near Seas scenarios that matter most to China, it enjoys increasingly robust overlapping sensor coverage. Beijing is rapidly expanding and enhancing its land-, sea-, and air-, and space-based C4ISR platforms. Its South China Sea outposts are making a major contribution. And reconnaissance has been a core PAFMM mission for decades, with many times the ~100 vessels documented in the strategy being potentially available to provide a rudimentary warning function—an extensive capability that would be hard to counter.

***

***

Illegal, Unreported, and Unregulated Fishing Strategic Outlook (Washington, DC: United States Coast Guard, December 2020).

p. 14

Distant Water Fishing Fleets

Distant Water Fishing (DWF) fleets, which conduct fishing activities on an industrial scale in waters far from their home countries, have been closely associated with IUU fishing. These vessels, owned both by individuals and corporate entities, are often subject to weak, negligent, or intentionally complicit management by their flag States. Many DWF fleets are heavily subsidized by their home governments, which can diminish true fishing costs and incentivize unsustainable fishing practices. Predator states can also use DWF fleets to exploit gaps between governance structures and operate in areas where there is little or no effective enforcement presence, deliberately undermining maritime rules-based order.

Some governments have demonstrated a lack of political will to fully acknowledge and address IUU fishing problems in their DWF fleets, selfishly placing their own steady supply of fish above preserving the marine ecosystems, food supplies, and economic stability of other nations. A 2019 Stimson Center research study found that in the past several decades, the practice of DWF has expanded in size and reach across the ocean and around the world. DWF is heavily dominated by just five fleets, which make up 90% of global effort. China and Taiwan represented nearly 60% of all global distant water fishing effort in other countries’ waters from 2015 to 2017. Japan, South Korea, and Spain’s DWF fleets each represented 10%. (The U.S. DWF fleet was the sixth largest and amounted to 1.4% of the global effort.6) The international community, DWF states, coastal nations, and the fishing industry must collectively improve transparency and accountability for DWF fleets while taking necessary steps to safeguard global fisheries for future generations.7

CONCERNS WITH CHINA’S FISHING PRACTICES

The People’s Republic of China has the largest distant water fishing fleet in the world. NOAA’s 2019 biennial IUU Fishing Report to Congress8 identified a troubling expanse of alleged violations by Chinese-flagged fishing vessels, describing multiple instances where they have been found illegally fishing in the EEZs of coastal states around the globe, from the Western and Central Pacific to the coasts of Africa and South America. The 2019 Report also raised concerns over the number of stateless fishing vessels in the Northern Pacific displaying characteristics of Chinese registration. Additionally, the People’s Armed Forces Maritime Militia, estimated to include more than 3,000 vessels, actively carries out aggressive behavior on the high seas and in sovereign waters of other nations to coerce and intimidate legitimate fishers in support of the Chinese Communist Party’s long term maritime strategic goals.

China must exercise more responsible flag state control over its vessels, including its DWF, and demonstrate that it is taking the necessary steps to ensure compliance with international norms and governance structures. Sovereign nations must be allowed to benefit from their own economic resources. Disregard for this sovereignty and territorial integrity by Chinese and other IUU fishing perpetrators not only threatens the stability of nations who rely on marine resources for food security and economic development, it is a direct violation of international rules-based order.

***

Andrew S. Erickson and Conor M. Kennedy, “Appendix II—China’s Maritime Militia: An Important Force Multiplier,” in Michael McDevitt, China as a Twenty-First-Century Naval Power: Theory, Practice, and Implications (Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2020), 207–29.

APPENDIX II

China’s Maritime Militia

An Important Force Multiplier

Andrew S. Erickson and Conor M. Kennedy

People’s Armed Forces Maritime Militia (PAFMM) is a state-organized, -developed, and -controlled force operating under a direct military chain of command to conduct Chinese state–sponsored activities.1 The PAFMM is locally organized and resourced but answers to the very top of China’s military bureaucracy: the commander in chief, Xi Jinping. While the PAFMM has been part of China’s militia system for decades, it is receiving greater emphasis today, because of its value in furthering China’s near-seas “rights and interests.”

Traditionally, the PAFMM has been a military force raised from civilian marine industry workers (e.g., fishermen). Personnel keep their “day jobs” but are organized and trained in exchange for benefits and can be called up as needed. Recently, the People’s Liberation Army (PLA— in this context, the military generally) has been adding a more professionalized, militarized vanguard to the PAFMM, recruiting former servicemen (by offering them high salaries) and launching formidable purpose-built vessels. This vanguard has no apparent interest in fishing.

This chapter focuses on the current organization and employment of Chinese maritime-militia organizations. It first puts this force into historical context by surveying the PAFMM’s background and its changing role in China’s armed forces. Next, it examines the PAFMM’s current contributions toward China’s goal of becoming a great maritime power, in both old and new mission areas. The remaining sections will address specific maritime-militia modes of command and control, intelligence gathering, organization and training and will suggest possible scenarios and implications.

Decades-Long History

China’s militia system originated before the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) came to power, but the system of recruiting numerous state- supported maritime militias from coastal populations was not fully implemented until the communists began to exercise greater control of the coastline in the 1950s. This segment of China’s population had been relatively isolated from the turmoil of the Civil War; these regions had been under either Japanese or Republic of China (ROC) control in the decades before CCP rule was established. The CCP targeted the fishing communities by creating fishing collectives and work units, enacting strict organizational and social controls, and conducting political education. Factors motivating and shaping this transformation included:

• The PLA’s early use of civilian vessels after Chiang Kai-shek’s Nationalist Party decamped to Taiwan.
• The fact that fishermen constituted the bulk of China’s experienced mariners.
• The requirement during the 1950s and 1960s to defend against Nationalist incursions along the coast.
• Increasingly frequent confrontations with other states’ fishing and naval vessels as China’s fishermen gradually began to fish farther offshore.
• The transformation of many shore-based coastal-defense militias to the at-sea maritime militia.

The PAFMM has played significant roles in manifold military campaigns and coercive incidents over the years:

• In the 1950s, support of the PLA’s island seizure campaigns off the mainland coast
• In the 1960s, securing of China’s coast against Nationalist infiltrations
• In 1974, seizure of the western portion of the Paracel Islands in the South China Sea from South Vietnam
• In 1976, harassment of “foreign” naval ships east of the Zhoushan Archipelago (south of Shanghai)
• In 1978, presence mission in the territorial sea of the Senkaku Islands
• In 1995, Mischief Reef encounter with the Philippines stemming from the occupation and development of that reef
• In 2009, harassment of USNS Impeccable
• In 2012, Scarborough Shoal stand-off with the Philippines
• In 2014, blockade of Philippine-occupied Second Thomas Shoal
• In 2014, repulse of Vietnamese vessels from disputed waters surrounding the China National Offshore Oil Corporation’s (CNOOC’s) oil rig HYSY 981
• In 2014, harassment of USNS Howard O. Lorenzen
• In 2016, large surge of fishing craft near the Senkaku Islands
• In 2017, envelopment of Philippine-claimed Sandy Cay in the northern Spratly Islands.2 … … …

About the Author

During his 34-year Navy career, Rear Admiral Michael McDevitt, USN (Ret.) had four at sea commands including an aircraft carrier battle group. He was a Pacific Ocean sailor with experience in all the waters he has written about. He began a 30-year involvement with U.S. security policy and strategy in Asia when he was assigned to the Office of Secretary of Defense in 1990 as Director and then as Acting Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for East Asia. This professional interest continues to this day.

Summary

Xi Jinping has made his ambitions for the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) perfectly clear, there is no mystery what he wants, first, that China should become a “great maritime power” and secondly, that the PLA “become a world-class armed force by 2050.” He wants this latter objective to be largely completed by 2035. China as a Twenty-First-Century Naval Power focuses on China’s navy and how it is being transformed to satisfy the “world class” goal.

Beginning with an exploration of why China is seeking to become such a major maritime power, author Michael McDevitt first explores the strategic rationale behind Xi’s two objectives: China’s reliance on foreign trade and overseas interests such as China’s Belt and Road strategy. In turn this has created concerns within the senior levels of China’s military about the vulnerability of its overseas interests and maritime life-lines: a major theme. McDevitt dubs this China’s “sea lane anxiety” and traces how this has required the PLA Navy to evolve from a “near seas”-focused navy to one that has global reach; a “blue water navy.” He details how quickly this transformation has taken place, thanks to a patient step-by-step approach and abundant funding. The more than 10 years of anti-piracy patrols in the far reaches of the Indian Ocean has acted as a learning curve accelerator to “blue water” status.

McDevitt then explores the PLA Navy’s role in the South China Sea and the Indian Ocean. He provides a detailed assessment of what the PLAN will be expected to do if Beijing chooses to attack Taiwan, potentially triggering combat with America’s “first responders” in East Asia, especially the U.S. Seventh Fleet and U.S. Fifth Air Force.

He conducts a close exploration of how the PLA Navy fits into China’s campaign plan aimed at keeping reinforcing U.S. forces at arm’s length (what the Pentagon calls anti-access and area denial [A2/AD]) if war has broken out over Taiwan, or because of attacks on U.S. allies and friends that live in the shadow of China. McDevitt does not know how Xi defines “world class” but the evidence from the past 15 years of building a blue water force has already made the PLA Navy the second largest globally capable navy in the world. This book concludes with a forecast of what Xi’s vision of a “world-class navy” might look like in the next fifteen years when the 2035 deadline is reached.

Reviews

“Rear Admiral Mike McDevitt delivers the definitive study on China’s ambitious quest for greatness at sea. Armed with decades of operational experience, he renders persuasive judgments about China’s nautical ascent. For those looking for an authoritative yet accessible appraisal of the Chinese navy, this is it.”

— Toshi Yoshihara, senior fellow, Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, co-author of Red Star over the Pacific: China’s Challenge to U.S. Maritime Strategy, 2nd ed.

“In order to counter China’s willful and persistent challenges against the stabilizing PAX-AMERICANA global framework, an accurate and comprehensive understanding of China’s security and naval strategies is required. In this context, RADM Mike McDevitt’s superb book is a ‘must-read’ for naval/security specialists, as well as national leaders and thinkers.”

— Yoji Koda, Former Commander in Chief, JMSDF Fleet

“Admiral Michael McDevitt has written an important book about China as a world power. Few Americans possess his knowledge of maritime strategy and China. He has combined this knowledge with his background as a historian and a sea-going officer with more thirty years’ experience. China as a Twenty-First-Century Naval Power is a must read for military officers, China specialists, and historians.”

— Captain Bernard D. Cole, USN (Ret.), Professor Emeritus, National War College, author of China’s Quest for Great Power: Ships, Oil, and Foreign Policy

“Admiral McDevitt has written the definitive book on China’s maritime ambitions and its ability to fulfill them. His years of careful research following a career of high-level Navy and Defense Department positions are blended into a carefully detailed and documented, yet practical and sensible examination of China’s security shift from land defense to control of the seas. The discussions of Taiwan and the South China Sea are especially informative and sobering. The implications are judicious and very clear – the United States must urgently and intelligently increase its own maritime and air capability.”

— Dennis C. Blair, former Commander in Chief, US Pacific Command and former Director of National Intelligence

“Rear Admiral McDevitt has studied the Chinese navy from the decks of destroyers in the South China Sea to the corridors of leading think tanks around the world. His expertise is legendary, and this new book is a commanding analysis of the course China will steer over the coming decades in their voyage to become the leading global maritime power.”

— Adm. James Stavridis, USN (Ret.), 16th Supreme Allied Commander of NATO and author of Sailing True North: Ten Admirals and the Voyage of Character

“As he explores the rationale for China’s unprecedented accretion of maritime power and quest for a ‘world-class’ navy, McDevitt provides perceptive insights into Beijing’s obsessive pursuit of sea-lane security, regional-hegemony and, eventually, global-dominance. The vivid future-scenarios, painted by this former practitioner of seapower, could prove prophetic, and deserve our closest attention.”

— Adm. Arun Prakash (Ret.), former Indian Navy Chief and Chairman, Chiefs of Staff

Product details

Publisher : Naval Institute Press (October 15, 2020)

Subject: Fall 2020 Catalog | China and the Asia Pacific

Item Weight : 2.5 pounds/40 oz

Product Dimensions: 9 × 6 × 1 in

Hardcover : 320 pages

Illustrations: 5 maps, 7 tables, 5 b/w illustrations

ISBN-10 : 1682475352

ISBN-13 : 978-1682475355

Andrew S. Erickson, “Breaking Down the Pentagon’s 2020 China Military Power Report: A Quest for PLA Parity?” The National Interest, 2 September 2020.

Office of the Secretary of Defense, Military and Security Developments Involving the People’s Republic of China 2020 (Arlington, VA: Department of Defense, 1 September 2020).

p. 29

Militia. The militia is an armed reserve force of civilians available for mobilization. It is distinct from the PLA’s reserve forces. Militia units organize around towns, villages, urban sub-districts, and enterprises and vary widely in composition and mission. The PRC’s 1997 National Defense Law authorizes the militia to assist in maintaining public order. The People’s Armed Forces Maritime Militia (PAFMM) is a component of the militia and its tasks include safeguarding maritime claims, which it often performs in conjunction with the PLAN and the CCG.

p. 34

p. 69

INCREASING INTEROPERABILITY WITH PARAMILITARY AND MILITIA

Key Takeaway

• Interoperability and integration between the PLA and the PRC’s paramilitary forces continues to grow in scale and sophistication, including the coordination between the PLAN, the CCG, and the People’s Armed Forces Maritime Militia (PAFMM).

People’s Armed Police (PAP). The PAP is a paramilitary police component of the PRC’s armed forces and an armed wing of the CCP. Its primary missions include internal security, maritime security, and assisting the PLA in times of war. In early 2018, the CMC assumed direct control of the PAP after the CCP ended the previous CMC-State Council dual-command system. As part of this reform, the PAP also assumed control of the China Coast Guard (CCG) in July 2018 from the PRC’s State Oceanic Administration. In addition to these changes, the PAP has undergone a comprehensive reorganization and shed missions and some specialized forces for border defense, firefighting, natural resource protection (forests, gold mines, and hydropower), allowing the PAP to focus more on internal security. The PAP is comprised principally of the Mobile Corps, the Internal Security Corps, and the CCG. …

p. 70

China’s Coercive Approach

China’s leaders use tactics short of armed conflict to pursue China’s objectives. China calibrates its coercive activities to fall below the threshold of provoking armed conflict with the United States, its allies and partners, or others in the Indo-Pacific region. These tactics are particularly evident in China’s pursuit of its territorial and maritime claims in the South and East China Seas as well as along its border with India and Bhutan.1 In recent years, the PLA has also increased patrols around and near Taiwan using bomber, fighter, and surveillance aircraft to signal Taiwan. China also employs nonmilitary tools coercively, including economic tools during periods of political tensions with countries that China accuses of harming its national interests.

China Coast Guard (CCG). The CCG is subordinate to the PAP and is responsible for a wide range of missions under the umbrella of maritime rights protection, including enforcement of the PRC’s sovereignty claims, surveillance, protection of fisheries’ resources, anti-smuggling, and general law enforcement. In July 2018, the CCG completed its merger into the CMC command structure through its subordination to the PAP, which itself is under the CMC like the PLA. This could facilitate closer coordination between the CCG and the PLAN. The PRC primarily uses paramilitary maritime law

p. 71

enforcement agencies in maritime disputes, selectively using the PLAN to provide overwatch in case of escalation.

The CCG’s rapid expansion and modernization has improved China’s ability to enforce its maritime claims. Since 2010, the CCG’s fleet of large patrol ships (more than 1,000 tons) has more than doubled from approximately 60 to more than 130 ships, making it by far the largest coast guard force in the world and increasing its capacity to conduct simultaneous, extended offshore operations in multiple disputed areas. Furthermore, the newer ships are substantially larger and more capable than the older ships, and the majority are equipped with helicopter facilities, high-capacity water cannons, and guns ranging from 30 mm to 76 mm. A number of these ships are capable of long-endurance and out-of-area operations. These characteristics give CCG vessels the ability to intimidate local, non-PRC fishing boats, as occurred in an October 2016 incident near Scarborough Reef.

In addition, the CCG operates more than 70 fast patrol combatants (more than 500 tons), which can be used for limited offshore operations, more than 400 coastal patrol craft, and approximately 1,000 inshore and riverine patrol boats. The CCG is likely to add another 25-30 patrol ships and patrol combatants by the end of the decade before the construction program levels off.

People’s Armed Forces Maritime Militia (PAFMM).

The PAFMM is a subset of China’s national militia, an armed reserve force of civilians available for mobilization. Militia units organize around towns, villages, urban sub-districts, and enterprises, and vary widely in composition and mission. In the South China Sea, the PAFMM plays a major role in coercive activities to achieve the PRC’s political goals without fighting, part of broader Chinese military theory that sees confrontational operations short of war as an effective means of accomplishing political objectives. The militia has played significant roles in a number of military campaigns and coercive incidents over the years, including the 2009 harassment of USNS Impeccable conducting normal operations, the 2012 Scarborough Reef standoff, the 2014 Haiyang Shiyou-981 oilrig standoff, and a large incursion in waters near the Senkakus in 2016.

A large number of PAFMM vessels train with and assist the PLAN and CCG in tasks such as safeguarding maritime claims, surveillance and reconnaissance, fisheries protection, logistic support, and search and rescue. The government subsidizes various local and provincial commercial organizations to operate militia vessels to perform “official” missions on an ad hoc basis outside of their regular civilian commercial activities.

The PAFMM often rents fishing vessels from companies or individual fishermen. However, China has also built a state-owned fishing fleet for at least part of its “maritime militia” in the South China

p. 72

Sea. The Hainan provincial government, adjacent to the South China Sea, ordered the building of 84 large militia fishing vessels with reinforced hulls and ammunition storage, which the militia received by the end of 2016, along with extensive subsidies to encourage frequent operations in the Spratly Islands. This particular PAFMM unit is also China’s most professional. Its forces are paid salaries independent of any clear commercial fishing responsibilities and recruited from recently separated veterans.

p. 95

EASTERN THEATER COMMAND

Key Takeaway

• The Eastern Theater Command is oriented toward Taiwan and the East China Sea.

The Eastern Theater Command likely executes operational control over national defense matters related to Taiwan and Japan, including contingencies in and around the Taiwan Strait and the Senkaku Islands. In 2019, the Eastern Theater Command focused on a series of training and exercises to improve joint operations and combat readiness, organizing exercises and drills consisting of longdistance training and mobilization, aerial combat, and live-fire training. PLA units located within the Eastern Theater Command include three group armies, a naval fleet, two marine brigades, two Air Force bases, and one missile base. The Eastern Theater Command also likely commands all China Coast Guard (CCG) and maritime militia ships while conducting Senkakus-related operations.

p. 99

SOUTHERN THEATER COMMAND

Key Takeaway

• The Southern Theater Command is oriented toward the South China Sea, Southeast Asia border security, and territorial and maritime disputes.

The area of responsibility of the Southern Theater Command covers mainland and maritime Southeast Asia, including the South China Sea. This geographic area implies that the Southern Theater Command is responsible for securing the South China Sea, supporting the Eastern Theater Command in any invasion of Taiwan, responding to territorial disputes, and assuring the security of sea lines of communication (SLOCs) seen as vital to China’s global ambitions. PLA units located within the Southern Theater Command are two group armies, a naval fleet, two marine brigades, two Air Force bases, and two Rocket Force bases. The Southern Theater Command is responsible for responding to U.S. freedom of navigation operations in the South China Sea, and likely commands all CCG and maritime militia ships conducting operations within China’s claimed “nine-dash line.”

p. 165

Taiwan Strait Military Balance, Naval Forces

Note: In the event of a major Taiwan conflict, the PLA’s Eastern and Southern Theater Navies would participate in direct action against the Taiwan Navy. The Northern Theater Navy (not shown) would be responsible primarily for protecting the sea approaches to China, but could provide mission-critical assets to support the other fleets. In conflict, China may also employ China Coast Guard (CCG) and People’s Armed Forces Maritime Militia (PAFMM) ships to support military operations.

***

 

 

 

Alice DU Liangliang, “The Sino-British Maritime Frontier, 1950–1957,” in Mary Ann O’Donnell, Jonathan Bach, and Denise Y. Ho, eds., “Forum: Transformation of Shen Kong Borderlands,” Made in China 3 (September–December 2020): 102–07.

The area that is today known as the Pearl River Delta in fact comprises two deltas, which were historically referred to as the Pearl River and the Lingding Sea. The Pearl River is formed by the confluence of three rivers, the West, North, and East. It runs through the city of Guangzhou and discharges at Humen, the Bocca Tigris. The Lingding Sea extends from the mouth of the Pearl River through the corridor between Macau and Hong Kong and ends (more or less) near Outer Lingding Island in the Wanshan Archipelago (Zong et al. 2009). Westerners may have heard of the Lingding Sea indirectly through ‘Lintin Island’, the common name for Inner Lingding Island (内伶仃岛), which historically marked the gateway to Guangzhou from the South China Sea. In Chinese, the Lingding Sea was made famous in the poem ‘Crossing Lingding Sea’ by the Song loyalist Wen Tianxiang. The poem imaginatively recounts the flight of the boy emperor Zhao Bing (r.1278–79) from Lin’an (present-day Hangzhou) to Yamen. The poem’s pathos is figured by the Song’s defeat at Yamen, where, despite being outnumbered 10 to one, the Yuan navy won a decisive maritime battle, ending the Song dynasty. However, the two landmarks in the poem, Huangkong Shoals and the Lingding Sea, are what suggest how northern armies experienced southern landscapes at the end of the thirteenth century. Huangkong Shoals translates as ‘Terror Shoals’—a reference to a famously difficult passage on the Gan River in Jiangxi Province. Lingding Sea means ‘Lonely Sea’, referring to the vast and underpopulated edges of the empire.

Five hundred years later, the Lonely Sea was no longer an underpopulated frontier. Instead, pirates, privateers, and foreign navies were competing to seize control of the gateway to Guangzhou. Coastal villages and towns occupied both coasts of the Lingding Sea, while islands and bays had been claimed by smaller groups of fishermen and boat-dwellers, who were pejoratively known as Tanka (疍家). Living at the edge of agrarian society, these water-dwellers nevertheless controlled local waters and earned their living working for the highest bidder (Antony 2016). The 1898 Convention for the Extension of Hong Kong Territory made maritime borders explicit; the United Kingdom did not simply lease territory from the Qing, but also (and more importantly) secured maritime access to Guangzhou. The convention did not, however, change the status of coastal, island, and water-dwellers, who were granted traditional water rights. During the war against Japan (1937–45) and the Civil War (1945–49) in southern China, the allied forces of the Kuomintang (KMT) and the United States relied on local water-dwellers to obtain intelligence and supply arms via ports in Hong Kong and Macau (Hou 2019).

The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) rose to power on the strength of its ground forces, only forming the People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) in May 1950, a month before the Korean War broke out. Unsurprisingly, the joint navies of the United States and KMT easily embargoed coastal China. Knowing that ground forces could not hold the coastline, Mao Zedong instructed People’s Liberation Army (PLA) leaders:

The army must leave the coastline, stay in appropriate places to conveniently annihilate the enemy … They should train rather than guard the coastline. It is the responsibility of security teams and local armed forces to monitor spies and kill bandits. Many Communists, after fighting for more than 20 years, have suddenly forgotten their experience, building fortifications everywhere [because] they fear the enemy like tigers. (Hou 2019: 248)

Instead, another strategy—one based on CCP experience in guerilla warfare and local organising—was necessary if the CCP was to wrest control of Chinese coastal waters from the United States and the KMT. Over the next few years, the CCP would rely on its experience of land reform (in 1950–52) and the campaign to suppress counterrevolutionaries (December 1950– October 1951) to integrate water-dwellers into its maritime defence strategy, just as peasants had been integrated into its ground war strategy. This entailed resettling water-dwellers, while blockading Hong Kong via the islands of the Wanshan Archipelago. In turn, the consolidation of the coastal frontier occurred via the transplanted fishermen and islanders. Their bodies, settlements, and labour made the Sino-British border visible, asserting Chinese claims to the coastline.

The story of Fishing One Village (渔一村) highlights how these larger processes not only transformed the cultural geography of the Lingding Sea, but also laid the foundation for the establishment of the China Merchants Shekou Industrial Zone in 1979. On the one hand, through the stories of Fishing One, we see how the so-called democratic fishing reform (alternatively known as 渔民民主改革 or 渔业 民主改革) reshaped the cultural geography of the Lingding Sea. Previously, mobile ‘fishing despots’ (渔霸) had patrolled the water, but, after the fishing reform, boat-dwellers could no longer freely sail the seas. Instead, they worked out of fixed ‘fishermen villages’ (渔村), which the state could mobilise as necessary, effectively landlocking water-dwellers without giving them full status onshore. On the other hand, these stories also highlight how the region’s fluid borders were first consolidated through revolutionary methods. Once the borders were secured, later development of the coast became feasible precisely because the coastline was de facto located within Chinese—and not British—territory. When Yuan Geng decided to establish the China Merchants Shekou Industrial Zone, for example, the port, industrial park, and its factories not only incorporated the coastline from the high-tide mark, but also extended the coastline through land reclamation into what (at the time) were acknowledged to be British waters.

Reorganising the Lingding Sea

In 1949, the Central Committee of the CCP entrusted the task of securing China’s southern coast to Ye Jianying, head of the South China Branch Bureau. The situation was daunting. More than one million people, including boat-dwellers, inhabited the coastal waters of Guangdong Province. Historically, these people had formed groups based on language and labour, enjoying relative autonomy from state oversight. Fishing reform in coastal waters (1951–54) and policy consolidation during the following three years (1955–57) allowed the CCP to occupy the southern coastline, pushing back against the historical frontier. The organisation of fishermen and territory was contemporaneous with the Socialist Transformation Movement (December 1951 to the end of 1956). Drawing on the ideas of the Agricultural Cooperative Movement, the Bao’an County Government encouraged fishermen to come ashore, aiming to enclose them within prescribed boundaries that simultaneously secured the coastline and improved the lives of the poorest fishermen. Once the fishermen were onshore, the government set up mutual aid groups, which were the embryonic form of fishermen’s villages (渔民村).

In 1950, the leading organisation in Bao’an County was the Shashenbao branch of the Guangdong Military Administrative Commission (广东军事管理委员会沙深宝分 会), with Qi Feng as director. There was debate over whether islands should be administered by the Bao’an Government or by the Military Commission. Ma Lun, the Bao’an County Secretary, for example, maintained that the Bao’an County Government should only administer the territory within its land borders, while the management of waters and islands fell under the purview of the Shashenbao Committee. As a result, local fishermen’s groups were not placed within the Bao’an County Government (as Qi Feng had hoped), but within the Island Administration Bureau. The two fishermen’s groups in Bao’an County became the East Island and West Island offices, corresponding to the county’s eastern and western coasts. That year, there were about 600 people living on Inner Neilingding Island, including more than 120 fishermen. Due to military necessity, the PLA was stationed on the island and the islanders were relocated to Shekou and Xixiang.

In January 1951, Guangdong Province set up the Pearl River District Commission Office, Island Administration Bureau, and Post Reform Management Office (珠江区专员公署海岛管理局后改管理处). Responsibility for organising fishermen’s work was transferred from the Shashenbao Border Committee to the Island Administration Bureau. Jurisdiction over Inner Lingding Island, the islands of the Wanshan Archipelago and coastal islands from Zhongshan, Dongguan, and Bao’an counties was transferred to the new bureau. The Island Administration Bureau’s office was set up in Tangjiawan, Zhuhai (珠海唐家湾), a coastal subdistrict (乡) in Zhongshan County. In practice, this meant that, although Inner Lingding Island fishermen had been resettled in Bao’an and their cadres were considered part of the Bao’an Government, they were nevertheless to make annual trips to Zhuhai to report on their work.

The reorganisation of previously scattered islands under one administrative entity was an important step to organise fishermen. Zhou Enlai, first premier of the People’s Republic of China, and Liao Chengzhi, the Hong Kong–based official in charge of the United Front and overseas Chinese, asked the relevant departments to help fishermen establish their homes on land. Once ashore, fishermen could be assigned a political identity, land resources, and finally be organised into villages, which was the most basic unit of rural administration. To this end, the Fishermen’s Association Committee (渔民协会委员会) was established in 1951. Status in the Fishermen’s Association was based on physical residence. Fishing families with a fixed residence on land were defined as ‘fishermen’ (渔民) and would ultimately receive hukou (户口; ‘household registration’) based on that settlement. Fishing families who had no fixed residence on land and travelled between harbours in Bao’an, Hong Kong, and Macau were defined as ‘itinerant fishermen’ (流动渔民), ultimately receiving identity cards in Hong Kong. The organisation of fishermen was also a mobilisation of resources. The local Party committee established a democratic reform committee, which worked with local cadres to organise a work team to develop and train activists among fishermen, teaching them to distinguish between the ‘enemy and ourselves’ (敌我问题). In the first stage of the fishermen’s democratic reform (1951–52), local political groups dealt with the smuggling of intelligence and weapons to the United States, Taiwan, and Hong Kong.

In July 1952, during the second phase of the fishermen’s democratic reform, the Island Administration Committee transferred the governance of islands to Zhongshan County—an administrative shift from party to government. This shift emphasised location (rather than a specific mission) as the principle for governance. On this basis, on 19 November 1952, the CCP Central Committee issued a set of ‘Instructions on Fishermen’s Work’, stating: ‘Coastal fishermen should also divide fishermen’s counties and districts according to their fishing areas, with a port as the centre’ (Chen 2019: 100). According to the relevant materials, the boundaries of the fishermen’s county referred to the southern Lingding Sea and included most of the islands therein. The new county would be called Zhuhai, with its county seat at Tangjiawan. In July 1953, Bao’an County designated West Sea, East Sea, Nantou, and Yantian as pilot areas to carry out the local fishermen’s democratic reform. Significantly, fishing areas crossed the maritime border. The West Sea, for example, included waters near Shekou and islands in the Wanshan Archipelago, as well as near Tsing Shan, Tuen Mun, on the northeastern coast of the Hong Kong New Territories. Similarly, East Sea waters included those near Yantian and Yazhou Bay as well as near Sai Kung on the northeastern coast of the New Territories. At this time, Bao’an County became responsible for the fishermen who had been relocated from Inner Lingding and Dachan islands to Shekou and Xixiang. This was the first appearance of ‘Shekou’ among Chinese administrative placenames.

From 1953 through to 1954, local Party representatives organised fishermen through campaigns in democratic struggle, democratic unity, and democratic construction. Fishermen were also encouraged to join the fishing trade union, the Fishing Association, the Communist Youth League, militia, and other organisations. Organisers united fishermen according to the logic under which peasants had been united, encouraging better-off fishermen to employ poor fishermen. Although fishermen could not be classified as ‘poor’ or ‘middle-income’ based on how many tools they owned (as was the criteria for classifying peasants), some fishermen owned boats and others did not. Fishermen with boats could work alone or were encouraged to employ one or two people. During the 1954 fishery cooperative movement (渔业合作化运动), whether or not one maintained ‘fisherman’ or ‘floating fisherman’ status was based on joining the cooperative and the sharing of boats. Most residents in the Shekou area, for example, joined friends and family in the fishing cooperative, while those who chose not to join became itinerant fishermen, taking up residence in bays along the coasts of Hong Kong and Macau. In contrast to the West Sea area, there were more floating fishermen in Mirs Bay in the East Sea area.

The differences between fishermen and itinerant fishermen were not immediately consolidated but were settled over the course of the decade. Shekou, for example, is home to two fishing villages, the aforementioned Fishing One and Fishing Two (渔二村). The root of Fishing One was the Inner Lingding Island mutual aid group. Fishermen Wu Jindi, Zhou Dezai, and several others who had lived on Inner Lingding Island and owned houseboats (罟仔艇 or Kwu Tzu boats) became core members of the Inner Lingding Island mutual aid group after their relocation to Shekou. Their status allowed them to receive interest-free or low-interest loans from the Bao’an County Government to update their fishing equipment. Funds were also used to set up marketing cooperatives to help these fishermen sell their products. By 1954, cooperation and a guaranteed market meant that organised fishermen could expand their enterprises. In contrast, activist Zhang Meitou set up Bao’an County’s first fishery production cooperative in Shekou with resettled boat-dwellers. With government help, the cooperative purchased new fishing equipment and began deep-sea fishing. However, unlike Fishing One, which comprised members from the same linguistic group and a shared home island, fishing cooperative members came from Haifeng and Panyu. Due to the differences in customs and languages, the cooperative dissolved in less than two years. Some of the Teochew-speaking fishermen opted to return to Haifeng and become farmers, while some of the Cantonese-speaking fishermen moved to Hong Kong, becoming itinerant fishermen. In fact, it was not until 1957 that the cooperative was successfully reorganised as Fishing Two Village (Shekou Museum of Reform and Opening Up 2019).

Onshore but Not of the Land

Although islanders, fishermen, and boat-dwellers were assigned ‘villager’ status, they did not enjoy the same treatment and historical rights as farmers. Specifically, while farmers continued to have rights to cultivated land and housing plots via collectives that were based on historical settlements, fishermen lost their historical rights once they were relocated. In Shekou, for example, islanders were given berths only at local typhoon shelter wharfs and were not permitted to build housing on land. The question of where Inner Lingding Islanders were entitled to land arose because their jurisdiction had not been settled. In 1952, when Zhuhai was split from Zhongshan and redistricted as the fishermen’s county, it was given jurisdiction over Inner Lingding Island. However, islanders were already residents of the Shekou and Xixiang areas of Bao’an County since their resettlement in 1950. Neither Zhuhai nor Bao’an was willing to take responsibility for giving the islanders onshore plots. In Shekou, the islanders’ housing situation was only resolved in 1970, when Shekou Commune allocated a section of coastal land belonging to Wanxia Village (湾厦村) to the islanders. In Xixiang, those who came on land did not remain ‘fishermen’. Instead, housing plots were created through reclamation of coastal fishponds and polders, which were known as jiwei (基围). Islanders, fishermen, and boat-dwellers on the western Bao’an coast (from Xixiang to Shajing) who received these plots became ‘jiwei people’, living in shacks at the edges of landed villages. The main livelihood of jiwei villagers was raising fish, shrimp, and crab in coastal polders. As land reform deepened, jiwei people were divided into village units; however, because they did not have a traditional land residence, these new villages were given revolutionary names, including Turn Over (翻身村), Labour (劳动村), Freedom (自由村), Settled Happily (安乐村), Peace (和平村), Happy Together (共 乐村), and Democracy (民主村) villages.

In 1979, China Merchants established the Shekou Industrial Zone, which was set up for logistics and basic manufacturing. The new entity inherited not only the reorganised coastline, but also the rights to plan and develop it. Fishing One Village took advantage of Reform and Opening Up to pursue private enterprise, including selling seafood in Hong Kong and Shekou. That same year, Inner Lingding Island was reassigned to Shenzhen City. In 1989, based on its historical relationship with Inner Lingding Island, Fishing One raised 13 million yuan and borrowed 9 million yuan to invest in the construction of a resort on the island (Shekou Museum of Reform and Opening Up 2019). However, due to the unclear jurisdiction, there were frequent conflicts among Zhuhai, Shenzhen, and Fishing One over what residual rights villagers had. During a provincial survey meeting in 1993, Fishing One’s head, Zhou Dezai, angrily exclaimed: ‘We were born and raised in Bao’an for generations, and all of a sudden we have become Zhuhai people. What is the basis of this claim? I’ll die with eternal regrets’ (Shekou Museum of Reform and Opening Up 2019). His words proved prophetic and he died soon after. Unfortunately, it was not until his death that the Guangdong Provincial Government made greater efforts to clarify administrative oversight over Inner Lingding Island. It did not, however, return the islanders’ native holdings and the resort project was ultimately abandoned. 

***

Christian Vicedo, “China’s PAFMM Grey Zone Maritime Challenge to the Philippines,” East Asia Forum, 13 August 2020.

China’s People’s Armed Forces Maritime Militia (PAFMM) is key to understanding Beijing’s grey-zone operations in the South China Sea (SCS). The PAFMM is organised and linked to the People’s Liberation Army chain of command through the People’s Armed Forces Districts. PAFMM members are trained in maritime claims enforcement, logistics support, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance and sabotage. Operating about 84 large vessels with reinforced hulls and water cannons, the PAFMM serves as China’s third force in the SCS.

The Philippines currently occupies nine features in the SCS. But through its PAFMM, China can prevent the Philippines from exercising sovereignty within and surrounding these features. Given precedents such as the seizure of the Paracels in 1974 and the occupation of Mischief Reef in 1995, the PAFMM may be employed to seize any of the Philippine-occupied features and to construct artificial islands and facilities on them. … … …

***

David R. Stilwell, Assistant Secretary, Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs, “The South China Sea, Southeast Asia’s Patrimony, And Everybody’s Own Backyard,” Remarks at Center for Strategic and International Studies (Virtual), 14 July 2020.

Remarks as prepared

INTRODUCTION

Thank you, Greg. I’m honored to join you. I commend CSIS for regularly convening leading thinkers on the Indo-Pacific and on the South China Sea in particular. Your work is an invaluable resource to us all.

This is a timely and important discussion. In recent months, while the world has focused on the fight against COVID-19, the People’s Republic of China (PRC) has doubled-down on its campaign to impose an order of “might makes right” in the South China Sea. Beijing is working to undermine the sovereign rights of other coastal states and deny them access to offshore resources – resources that belong to those states, not to China. Beijing wants dominion for itself. It wants to replace international law with rule by threats and coercion.

In recent months, Beijing has sunk Vietnamese fishing vessels, sent an armed flotilla to harass Malaysian offshore energy exploration, and wielded maritime militia to surround Philippine outposts. Beijing has further militarized its artificial islands in the Spratlys with new aircraft deployments. It has announced unilateral fishing bans. It has conducted destabilizing military exercises in contested waters around disputed features. And it increasingly uses its artificial islands as bases for harassment operations – to curtail access of Southeast Asian coastal states to offshore oil, gas and fisheries.

We all know why this matters. By claiming “indisputable sovereignty” over an area larger than the Mediterranean and trampling the rights of others, Beijing threatens the existing order that has given Asia decades of prosperity. That order has been based on freedom and openness, ideas that Beijing opposes.

Nearly $4 trillion in trade transits the South China Sea each year. More than $1 trillion of that is linked to the U.S. market. The sea is home to an estimated $2.6 trillion in recoverable offshore oil and gas. It also has some of the world’s richest fishing grounds that employ an estimated 3.7 million people in coastal Southeast Asian states.

These resources are the birthright of Southeast Asian nations, the lifeblood of their coastal communities, and the livelihood of millions of their citizens. They are the inheritance of each nation’s children and grandchildren. Beijing’s behavior is an assault on the people of Southeast Asia today, and from generation to generation.

ANNIVERSARY OF TRIBUNAL RULING

This week marks the anniversary of a historic statement on international law in the South China Sea: the 2016 Arbitral Tribunal ruling.

This case of peaceful arbitration was brought – with real courage – by the Philippines. And the verdict was unanimous: Beijing’s Nine-Dash line maritime claim has no basis in international law. The tribunal sided squarely with the Philippines on the bulk of its legal claims.

Beijing has since tried to delegitimize and ignore the verdict, despite its obligations to abide by it as a party to the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea. Beijing likes to present itself as a champion of multilateralism and international institutions, but it has dismissed the verdict as “nothing more than a piece of paper.”

Only the gullible or the co-opted can still credit Beijing’s pretense of good global citizenship. Today we are hearing more and more voices raised against Beijing’s aggressiveness and unilateralism.

We welcome the clear insistence last month by Leaders from the Association of Southeast Asian Nations that South China Sea disputes should be resolved on the basis of international law, including UNCLOS.

The wider world is also speaking up and taking action, in recognition that Beijing’s actions pose the greatest threat to freedom of the seas anywhere on the planet. South China Sea issues have direct bearing on the future of the Arctic, the Indian Ocean, the Mediterranean, and other vital waterways. What is at stake in the South China Sea has a direct impact on every nation and person who relies on freedom of the seas and the free movement of maritime commerce to ensure their nation’s prosperity.

U.S. POLICY IN THE SOUTH CHINA SEA

The United States has strengthened our own approach to the South China Sea.

Our policy is to champion a free and open Indo-Pacific in which all the region’s diverse nations can live and prosper in peace. Our policy appreciates the diversity of those nations. It defends sovereignty, independence, and pluralism. A free and open Indo-Pacific means a region where countries are secure in their sovereignty and equal in their shared use of the global commons. No hegemonic power dominates others or turns international waters into a zone of exclusion.

Our approach builds on America’s long record in the Pacific of preserving the peace, upholding freedom of the seas in line with international law, maintaining the unimpeded flow of commerce, and supporting peaceful settlement of disputes. These are important and abiding interests we share with our many allies and partners.

In recent years we have deepened our collaboration across the region. We have increased our maritime capacity-building support for Southeast Asian partners, reaffirmed alliances, and maintained a robust tempo of military activities to keep the peace. These include freedom-of-navigation operations, including five in the South China Sea so far this year; presence operations, including dual-carrier operations earlier this month; strategic bomber patrols; and combined operations and exercises with our allies and partners.

The United States continues to be the largest source of commercial investment in the region, by far. Our nearly $300 billion in annual trade in goods and services with the 650 million people of ASEAN help ensure the growing prosperity of that dynamic region. ASEAN nations now produce almost $3 trillion of annual GDP. Living standards have improved tremendously, thanks to ASEAN’s incredible energy, and a global system that has long sustained stability, security, and prosperity.

Yesterday, Secretary Pompeo announced an important step to strengthen our policy, and to stand firmly with our Southeast Asian partners in defense of their sovereign rights. The Secretary issued a statement of policy on maritime claims in the South China Sea, on the occasion of the anniversary of the 2016 tribunal ruling. Since that ruling, we have said that it is “final and legally binding” on both parties, China and the Philippines. This announcement goes further, to make clear: The PRC has no right to bully Southeast Asian states for their offshore resources.

Specifically, Secretary Pompeo said three main things:

First, the PRC has no lawful maritime claim vis-a-vis the Philippines over waters determined by the Tribunal to be in the Philippines’ Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) or on its continental shelf. Within those areas, Beijing’s harassment of Philippine fisheries and offshore energy development is unlawful, as are any unilateral PRC actions to exploit those resources. Nor does the PRC have a legal claim to Mischief Reef or Second Thomas Shoal, both of which are under Philippines jurisdiction.

Second, because Beijing has failed to put forth a lawful, coherent maritime claim in the South China Sea, the United States rejects any PRC claim to waters beyond a 12 nautical mile territorial sea derived from islands it claims in the Spratly Islands. This means that the United States rejects any PRC maritime claim in the waters surrounding Vanguard Bank (off Vietnam), Luconia Shoals (off Malaysia), Natuna Besar (off Indonesia), or in the waters of Brunei’s EEZ. Any PRC action to harass other states’ fishing or hydrocarbon development — or to unilaterally carry out such activities on its own – is unlawful. Period.

Third, the PRC has no lawful territorial or maritime claim to James Shoal, off Malaysia. This one deserves a moment of study. James Shoal is a submerged feature on the sea floor some 20 meters beneath the surface. It is also only 50 nautical miles from Malaysia – and over 1,000 nautical miles from the Chinese mainland. Yet Beijing claims it as the “southernmost point of China”! The claim is absurd – appearing to derive from an erroneous old British atlas and a subsequent translation error, suggesting the underwater shoal was actually a sandbank above the waves. But it isn’t. And yet Beijing’s propaganda touts James Shoal as PRC territory and PLA Navy ships deploy there to stage ostentatious oath-swearing ceremonies. International law is clear: An underwater feature gives no rights. James Shoal is not and never was Chinese territory, nor can Beijing assert any lawful maritime rights from such spurious claims.

In all these cases, the United States stands with our Southeast Asian allies and partners in upholding their sovereign rights, and with all the rest of the law-abiding world in defending the freedom of the seas. As the Secretary has said, the world cannot – and will not – allow Beijing to treat the South China Sea as its maritime empire.

BEIJING’S PLAYBOOK

Let me briefly raise four other important aspects of the South China Sea issue: (1) the role of Beijing’s state-owned enterprises (SOEs); (2) the negotiations between China and ASEAN over a Code of Conduct; (3) Beijing’s push for “joint development” of Southeast Asian resources; and (4) Beijing’s campaign for a seat on the International Tribunal on the Law of the Sea (ITLOS).

First, on state-owned enterprises: In the South China Sea, as elsewhere, Beijing has used state-owned enterprises as tools of economic coercion and international abuse.

They have been used to dredge, construct, and militarize the PRC’s artificial island fortresses in the Spratlys, from which Beijing now violates the exclusive economic zones of Southeast Asian states. One of Beijing’s leading infrastructure contractors that works all around the world – China Construction & Communications Corporation, or CCCC – led the dredging for Beijing’s South China Sea military bases, with terribly destructive effects on the marine environment and regional stability.

State-owned enterprises have been used as battering rams to attempt to enforce Beijing’s unlawful “Nine Dashed Line.” China National Offshore Oil Corporation, or CNOOC, used its mammoth survey rig HD-981 to try intimidating Vietnam off the Paracel islands in 2014. It is telling that CNOOC’s chief executive touted that oil rig as “mobile national territory.” The implications of such a statement should give pause to every nation that relies on the freedom of the seas for prosperity and security.

Other PRC commercial survey ships and rigs have been sent repeatedly into Southeast Asian waters in which China has no rights. Numerous PRC state-owned tourism, telecom, fisheries and banking firms invest in ways to enable Beijing’s unlawful claims and bullying. PRC fishing fleets in the South China Sea often operate as maritime militia under the direction of  China’s military, harassing and intimidating others as a tool of violent state coercion.

These state-owned enterprises are PRC instruments of abuse, and we should highlight their improper behavior. We should also shine light on how these companies operate around the world, including across Southeast Asia and in the United States. In all our societies, citizens deserve to know the differences between commercial enterprises and instruments of foreign state power. These state enterprises are modern-day equivalents of the East India Company.

Second, on Code of Conduct talks: There are clear red flags about Beijing’s intentions. For years Beijing has insisted that ASEAN states keep silent on the proceedings. Press reports have shown why: Behind closed doors, the PRC has pushed ASEAN states to accept limits on core matters of national interest.

These include limits on who ASEAN states can partner with for military exercises and offshore oil and gas work. Beijing is also pressuring ASEAN nations to cut ties with “outside” states and to dilute references to international law. These are demands of a bully, not a friendly neighbor. Beijing may have backed off its arbitrary 2021 deadline for concluding the talks, but its hegemonic goals remain.

U.S. interests are clearly at stake in the Code of Conduct process, as are those of all states who value freedom of the seas. A Code of Conduct that in any way legitimates Beijing’s reclamation, militarization, or unlawful maritime claims would be severely damaging, and unacceptable for many nations. We urge greater transparency in the Code of Conduct process to ensure a positive outcome that is fully consistent with the principles enshrined in the U.N. Convention on the Law of the Sea.

Third, on “joint development” deals: The PRC seeks to dominate the South China Sea’s oil and gas resources. To achieve this, Beijing is pursuing a campaign to deny Southeast Asian states access to desperately needed oil and gas resources except through “joint development” deals that disadvantage the smaller parties – that is, the non-Chinese parties.

The PRC gambit works like this. By aggressively deploying military forces, maritime militia, state-directed oil rigs and the like, Beijing tries to drive up risk for energy firms that want to operate in the South China Sea, in hopes of pushing out foreign competition. Once accomplished, Beijing pushes other states to accept “joint development” with its own state-owned firms, saying “if you want to develop those resources off your coast, your only option is to do so with us.” These are gangster tactics.

The United States supports nations in standing up for their sovereign rights and interests, and in resisting pressure to accept any deal whereby the PRC pushes its way into a share of offshore resources it has no right to claim.

Fourth, on the International Tribunal on the Law of the Sea: Beijing is running an uncontested candidate for a judge’s position on this tribunal at an election currently slated for late August/early September.

Like the Arbitral Tribunal that ruled against Beijing in 2016, the International Tribunal is established under the U.N. Convention on the Law of the Sea. Electing a PRC official to this body is like hiring an arsonist to help run the Fire Department.

We urge all countries involved in the upcoming International Tribunal election to carefully assess the credentials of the PRC candidate and consider whether a PRC judge on the Tribunal will help or hinder international maritime law. Given Beijing’s record, the answer should be clear.

THE GLOBAL SCOURGE OF PRC BULLYING

There are lessons here that apply well beyond the Western Pacific. When Beijing uses coercion, empty promises, disinformation, contempt for rules, bad-faith diplomacy, and other underhanded tactics in the South China Sea, it is drawing on a playbook that it uses worldwide.

We see it in the East China Sea and around Taiwan, where Beijing has expanded its maritime provocations and threatening sorties. We see it in the Himalayas, where Beijing recently took aggressive action on its frontiers with India. We see it along the Mekong River, where Beijing has used its massive cascade of dams to hold back water from downstream neighbors in Southeast Asia, contributing to the worst drought in the Mekong’s recorded history. I urge everyone to read the recent report from the Stimson Center, “New Evidence: How China Turned Off the Tap on the Mekong River.”

But Beijing’s aggressive mode of operation is visible not only in other disputes over territory and natural resources.

It is also visible in Hong Kong, where Beijing’s new national security law flouts its commitments under the Sino-British Joint Declaration of 1984 – an agreement now derided by PRC officials as nothing but a scrap of paper.  Just as they said about the 2016 Arbitral Tribunal ruling on the South China Sea.

Aggressive behavior is Beijing’s general approach to international organizations. When the South China Sea came up at an ASEAN meeting in 2010, Beijing’s top diplomat thundered at his Southeast Asian counterparts: “China is a big country and other countries are small countries, and that’s just a fact.” This sort of contempt helps explain Beijing’s subversion of international institutions from the World Health Organization to Interpol, the World Trade Organization and beyond.

A few years ago, many believed that Beijing’s South China Sea abuses were mostly a local phenomenon, a kind of limited indulgence for a rising power finding its way in the world. Today we know that the Chinese Communist Party’s neo-imperial ways aren’t incidental to its character but are an essential feature of a nationalist and Marxist-Leninist mindset. Beijing wants to dominate its immediate neighborhood – and eventually impose its will and its rules on your neighborhood too, wherever you may be.

You could be a university student in Australia, a book publisher in Europe, or the general manager of an NBA franchise in Houston. You might work for an international hotel chain, a German car company, or a U.S. airline. You could be a 5G customer in Britain – or anywhere else in the world. Wherever you are, Beijing increasingly wants to stake claims, coerce, and control. By its nature, it cannot accept a pluralistic world with fundamental freedoms of choice and conscience.

The South China Sea, then, is less a faraway exception and more a sign and a threat of how the Chinese Communist Party will seek to act – unless it faces pushback. So it is good to see a wide range of countries increasingly stand against Beijing’s abuses, on a range of fronts including the South China Sea.

At the United Nations, a succession of formal declarations by Southeast Asian coastal states show clear resolve to uphold international law and reject pressure to accept Beijing’s unlawful claims. These include Vietnam, Indonesia, and Malaysia in the past months alone.

Likewise, the United States and other countries have raised concerns for the first time in the U.N. Security Council and General Assembly over the dangers of PRC actions in the South China Sea.

Australia, Britain, France, Germany and India have all recently issued statements of unprecedented concern over South China Sea activities by Beijing that put regional stability and international law at risk. Meanwhile we see promising new defense and security arrangements among allies and partners from Australia to Southeast Asia, Japan and India.

As mentioned, all the Leaders of ASEAN last month insisted that South China Sea disputes must be resolved on the basis of international law, including UNCLOS.

I’ll close by citing the statement put out Sunday by the Philippines on the fourth anniversary of the Arbitral Tribunal ruling. “The arbitration case initiated and overwhelmingly won by the Republic of the Philippines versus the People’s Republic of China is a contribution of great significance and consequence to the peaceful settlement of disputes in the South China Sea and to the peace and stability of the region at large. . . . The arbitral tribunal’s award of 12 July 2016 represents a victory, not just for the Philippines, but for the entire community of consistently law-abiding nations.”

For our part, the United States is resolved to protect our vital interests and those of our allies and friends. We are building our military capabilities. We are vigilant. We are exercising and operating wherever international law allows. We are strengthening ties with our friends. We stand ready to help bolster the military capabilities of concerned nations. We support multilateral diplomatic efforts to resist PRC encroachments. And we are providing economic options to underscore that nations need not depend on initiatives from Beijing that are fundamentally predatory.

The community of law-abiding nations will indeed stand together. For a free and open South China Sea, a free and open Indo-Pacific, and a free and open world.

Many thanks for your time. I welcome your questions.

***

Derek Grossman and Logan Ma, “A Short History of China’s Fishing Militia and What it May Tell Us,” Maritime Issues, 6 April 2020.

If history is a good indication of what to expect in the future, then Beijing is likely to double down on the Maritime Militia in virtually any scenario imaginable. That means it should be a force to be reckoned in the years to come.

China’s armed fishing militia—officially called the People’s Armed Forces Maritime Militia (PAFMM) by the U.S. Department of Defense—plays an instrumental role in Beijing’s strategy to enforce its sovereignty claims in the South China Sea and East China Sea. PAFMM is a government-supported armed fishing force of unknown strength that resides under the direct command and control of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA). It has existed for decades and augments Chinese Coast Guard (CCG) and PLA Navy (PLAN) operations in the region.

PAFMM plays a particularly important role in establishing a de facto Chinese operating presence in disputed areas—in effect, changing the facts on the ground, or at sea, as it were—to challenge counter-claimants’ ability to maintain control over disputed features. These classic “gray zone” operations are designed to “win without fighting” by overwhelming the adversary with swarms of fishing vessels usually bolstered from the rear together with CCG, and possibly PLAN ships, depending on the contingency, in escalatory concentric rings.

But the very existence of maritime militia in China is highly unique, given that the only other country that has one for sovereignty disputes is neighboring Vietnam. Indeed, Hanoi officially created its own maritime militia force in 2009 for the singular purpose of competing directly with PAFMM in an ongoing “people’s war at sea.”^[1] It is therefore worth asking: why did Beijing create a maritime militia to begin with and how has PAFMM evolved over time? What does this history suggest about its future? … …

“Little Blue Men” At Work

What began as a coastal patrol and surveillance force eventually evolved into a maritime sovereignty support force by the 1970s. The PRC’s “little blue men” increasingly acquired the roles of maritime rescue, combat operations, anti-smuggling, and, ultimately, sovereignty enforcement.

Regarding Chinese sovereignty enforcement operations, early PAFMM forces demonstrated their significant contributions to island seizure campaigns starting in January 1974 with the Battle of the Paracel Islands against South Vietnam. In truth, Beijing did not have much of a PLAN to speak of in 1974, and perhaps the PAFMM was more capable of amphibious operations than the navy itself. Either way, the presence of Chinese fishing vessels around the Paracels slowed down South Vietnamese decision-making on the use of force against PAFMM as well as their response times to counter PLAN maneuvers. Additional time allowed Beijing to coordinate more effectively. When two fishing trawlers delivered 500 PLA troops to the Western Paracels, it resulted in the immediate surrender of the South Vietnamese soldiers defending the disputed features.

A key lesson learned for Beijing was that leveraging fishing militia forces was far less likely to trigger U.S. intervention in the matter even when the threatened neighbor was a U.S. ally. It is fair to say that this was the genesis of Beijing’s strategy to routinely employ irregular forces in gray zone operations in the East China Sea and South China Sea. PAFMM’s debut on the world stage was a resounding success, elevating the narrative that fishing militia forces were essential to the success of China’s maritime strategy in the South China Sea. Following the Battle of the Paracel Islands in 1974, the PAFMM has been observed in nearly every major PLAN and CCG operation to harass maritime counter-claimants at disputed features or to seize the features from them.

Andrew S. Erickson and Conor M. Kennedy have carefully catalogued PAFMM activities in support of the CCG and PLAN since 1974.^[4] Among these incidents, the PAFMM in 1978 engaged in swarming operations at the Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands in the East China Sea, disputed with Japan, and since 2016 the militia ramped up their presence there. Erickson and Kennedy note the proliferation of incidents in the South China Sea since the Battle of the Paracels, to include PRC seizure of Mischief Reef and Scarborough Shoal from the Philippines in 1995 and 2012 respectively. Beijing also attempted to blockade Manila’s resupply mission of Second Thomas Shoal in 2014, and since 2017, has harassed Filipino fishermen at Sandy Cay and nearby Thitu (Pagasa) Island. PAFMM has also routinely bothered Vietnamese vessels, and in May 2014 helped enforce Beijing’s emplacement of the Haiyang Shiyou-981 oil rig in disputed waters by ramming Vietnamese fishing and coast guard vessels. Separately, Beijing appears confident that PAFMM harassment of the U.S. naval ships is below the threshold of a forceful and escalatory response. It has consequently employed fishing militia against the USNS Impeccable in 2009 as well as the Howard O. Lorenzen in 2014.

What Might the Future Hold for PAFMM?

PAFMM has evolved from being a small and near seas force to a robust and critical element of China’s national maritime strategy. The fact that PAFMM has not only survived, but thrived, during the PRC’s naval modernization beginning in the 1980s, implies that further modernization prioritizing increasingly advanced systems will not necessarily reduce PAFMM’s value over time. Actually, the opposite seems to be the case—that is, PAFMM’s role will likely grow in parallel with the PLAN and CCG to better support their operations. PAFMM’s humble origins as a product of collectivization and the Soviet “Young School” also suggest that if China experiences slowing military modernization due to economic or other circumstances, Beijing could instead rely more heavily upon PAFMM as a cheaper and lower technology alternative to sovereignty disputes and coastal defense. If history is a good indication of what to expect in the future, then Beijing is likely to double down on the PAFMM in virtually any scenario imaginable. That means it should be a force to be reckoned in the years to come.

***

Andrew S. Erickson, “Office of Naval Intelligence Just Published Latest China & Russia Maritime Ship Recognition Guides,” China Analysis from Original Sources 以第一手资料研究中国, 19 February 2020.

Check them out! Click here to access the China and Russia government naval/maritime ship recognition guide graphics that the U.S. Office of Naval Intelligence just published!

***

アンドリュー・S・エリクソン (編集), ライアン・D・マーティンソン (編集), 五味 睦佳 (翻訳), 大野 慶二 (翻訳), 木村 初夫 (翻訳), 五島 浩司 (翻訳), 杉本 正彦 (翻訳), 武居 智久 (翻訳), 山本 勝也 (翻訳) [Andrew S. Erickson (Editor), Ryan D. Martinson (Editor), Gumi Mutsuka (Translator), Ohno Keiji (Translator), Kimura Hatsuo (Translator), Goto Koji (Translator), Sugimoto Masahiko (Translator), Tomohisa Takei (translator), and Katsuya Yamamoto (translator)]; 中国の海洋強国戦略:グレーゾーン作戦と展開 (日本語) [China’s Maritime Power Strategy: Strategy and Deployment in Gray Zone (Japanese translation of China’s Maritime Gray Zone Operations)] (Tokyo: 原書房 [Hara Shobo Press], 2020).

アンドリュー・S・エリクソン (編集), ライアン・D・マーティンソン (編集), 五味 睦佳 (翻訳), 大野 慶二 (翻訳), 木村 初夫 (翻訳), 五島 浩司 (翻訳), 杉本 正彦 (翻訳), 武居 智久 (翻訳), 山本 勝也 (翻訳)

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中国の沿岸警備隊に相当する海警局、そして海上民兵による軍事力や戦略・組織について、米海軍大学など世界の専門家がはじめて体系的に分析・紹介。日本にとっても注意が必要な中国の「グレーゾーン」戦略を知る最高の一書といえる。

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東シナ海・南シナ海に展開する準海軍「中国海警局」や「中国海上民兵」の実態と係争海域の実効支配を視野に入れた展開のすべて。米海軍大学の専門研究機関があらゆる角度から分析・詳述した決定版!

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5つ星のうち5.0 日本ではほとんど知られていない中国海上民兵の実態を明らかにしている貴重な本。

2020年3月27日に日本でレビュー済み

グレーゾーン作戦は、戦争状態と平時の状態の間をうまく利用して、本格的な軍事行動を敵国にとらせないために実施されるものということらしい。中国共産党は、米国海軍と正面から戦っても勝てないことを良く理解している。戦争に至らないグレーゾーンで正規海軍が手が出せないように行動し、少しづつ権益を確保して、最終的には領土をかすめ取ろうという中国共産党のやり口が理解できた。
日本の領土である尖閣列島も、常時中国海警局の艦船が領海を脅かす活動を実施している。中国海警局と言っても組織的には人民解放軍海軍と密接につながっており、ほとんど海軍といってもいい組織である。
中国共産党は、中国海警局を諸外国には沿岸警備隊と称しているが、装備的には戦闘艦と同じである。
また、その下部組織に中国海上民兵という組織があり、彼らは、通常普通の経済活動（漁業や海運）を実施していて上から指示があれば、中国海警局と連携して行動することにはあまり知られていないことだ。お笑いともいえるのは、ベトナムへの嫌がらせ行為を行う中で、漁船の場合には迷彩服を着て威圧する、しかし海軍が出てくると漁民の作業服を着て相手を騙す手法である。
敵をうまくだまして勝とうとする戦略は、まさに孫氏の兵法にのっとったものだろう。日本も学ぶべきだ。

2人のお客様がこれが役に立ったと考えています

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Chris Rahman, Australian National Centre for Ocean Resources & Security; review of Andrew S. Erickson and Ryan D. Martinson, eds., China’s Maritime Gray Zone Operations(Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2019); Marine Policy 110 (December 2019).

China’s Maritime Gray Zone Operations is the seventh edited volume in the Studies in Chinese Maritime Development series published in collaboration with the U.S. Naval War College’s China Maritime Studies Institute. In common with its predecessors this book has been produced to a consistently high standard. Collectively the series represents some of the leading available scholarship on China’s maritime power. This most recent volume is both focused and timely, addressing China’s strategy of coercively manipulating changes to the geopolitical status quo in East Asian waters via the employment of maritime operations in the ‘gray zone.’ The book comprises 16 concise chapters plus an introduction and conclusion, and is divided into five parts. The first part conceptualizes the gray zone itself. The next two focus on the primary instruments used in the strategy: the white hulls of the China Coast Guard (CCG) and the ‘blue hulls’ of the People’s Armed Forces Maritime Militia (PAFMM), respectively. Part four addresses possible scenarios for the next stage of gray zone operations based on analysis of China’s tactics in the two seas thus far. The final part comprises three short analyses: the temporal factor in gray zone operations, deterrence and the gray zone, and the different approaches taken by Vietnam and the Philippines in response to China’s strategy. Well-conceived maps and diagrams complete the whole.

The ‘gray zone’ is one of those trendy terms which periodically take hold within defence circles and associated strategic studies institutions. The intent is to describe situations of political and strategic competition which fall into the gray area separating peace and war; or, more accurately, between ‘normal’ peacetime conditions and outright armed conflict. Like much trendy terminology, the ‘gray zone’ describes a phenomenon which is hardly new, even in the maritime environment: the so-called ‘Cod Wars’ between Iceland and the United Kingdom are obvious examples. However, China’s strategy over the past decade to consolidate, and stretch, its claims to disputed territories, marine resources and maritime jurisdiction in both the East China Sea and South China Sea, has taken the practice of maritime gray zone operations to an unprecedented level of effort and scope of objective. China’s public rationales are couched in terms of safeguarding rights and interests at sea or ‘maritime rights protection.’ At face value, such rationales are neither unreasonable nor illegitimate objectives for any coastal state. The reality of Beijing’s expansive vision of its maritime rights, however, in practice exceeds any reasonable test of legitimacy; and indeed, following the Arbitral Tribunal’s July 2016 decision in the Philippines-China South China Sea case, lawfulness. Beijing’s objective in pursuing ‘maritime rights protection’ is nothing short of total political, strategic and economic control of the seas abutting mainland China’s coastline, to transform those seas into a veritable Chinese lake.

In the first chapter of Part I Michael B. Petersen thus defines the gray zone strategy employed by China to accomplish its objective as emphasizing ‘the nonlethal diplomatic, informational, economic, financial, intelligence, law enforcement, and irregular force means of compellence’ (p. 17). Michael Mazarr’s chapter on the role of deterrence in countering China’s strategy further elaborates on the concept, arguing that gray zone campaigns are attempts at strategic revisionism which avoid ‘crossing key thresholds that would prompt escalation’ (pp. 256–257). Mazarr identifies four key characteristics of gray zone campaigns: an aggressive pursuit of objectives, gradual in implementation, avoidance of escalation thresholds, and a preference for utilizing ‘nonmilitary tools’ (p. 257). Ambiguity and a difficulty in easily attributing responsibility for individual actions also are elements of gray zone operations. That is why China has demonstrated a preference for using the PAFMM as the vanguard of its maritime gray zone operations, supported, often from a distance, by coast guard vessels, which in turn are often supported, at a minimum implicitly, by naval forces usually positioned further away over the horizon from the operation in question.

In Part II Lyle J. Morris explains how four separate maritime law enforcement agencies were combined in 2013 into the CCG under the civilian State Oceanic Administration. He argues that integration has not been fully effective and many limitations remain, although, as the book as a whole demonstrates, this has not impeded the success of the gray zone strategy. Ryan D. Martinson further demonstrates how the CCG has become increasingly militarized, however, with one of the four agencies, China Maritime Police, part of the People’s Armed Police (PAP – an arm of China’s armed forces), taking a more prominent role. That process of militarization was completed in 2018 with the transfer of the CCG to PAP command.

The development of the People’s Armed Forces Maritime Militia into the frontline force for China’s gray zone operations in East Asian seas is established in Part III. Whilst the PAFMM is not new, with militia playing an integral role in the national defence mobilization system throughout the Communist era, China has placed far more emphasis upon it in asserting its maritime claims over the past decade. Morgan Clemens and Michael Weber explain how the PAFMM operates under a dual military-civilian structure. On the civilian side this corresponds to the Communist Party administrative structures at different levels of government; and on the military side to the People’s Liberation Army’s (PLA’s) counterpart territorial administrative arrangements. At each administrative level ‘the two halves are bound together’ by national defence mobilization committees (p. 136). With the maritime militia, especially, this structure sometimes encompasses individual enterprises, such as fishing companies or other maritime industry. The use of fishing boats sometimes tasked to the PAFMM for maritime rights protection thus exacerbates the ambiguity and attribution problem, and places the onus on other parties to escalate an incident, in which case China can respond with ever greater levels of coercion. The attribution issue has been particularly difficult in incidents involving Chinese fishing vessels in the East China Sea, as Katsuya Yamamoto’s later chapter explains: ‘ … if a vessel does not display any definitive symbol of militia activities, it can be difficult to determine instantly whether it is an ordinary fishing boat or a PAFMM unit’ (p. 237). Elsewhere, on the other hand, certain PAFMM units are increasingly recognizable, such as the unit from Sansha City in the disputed Paracel island group in the South China Sea, which operates 84 purpose-built vessels exclusively for rights protection duties; not for fishing or other economic activities.

Conor M. Kennedy establishes in more detail the types of operations performed by the PAFMM: presence, in large part to assert China’s claims; harassment and sabotage; escort of purely civilian vessels operating in disputed waters; and intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance. The PAFMM also exists to support the PLA in more intense warfighting missions. However, as Clemens and Weber argue, it is poorly equipped and trained for such tasks; and actions to remedy the situation would paradoxically ‘degrade those very … attributes … that make the maritime militia so useful and effective in prosecuting gray zone missions … ’ (p. 150). Jonathan G. Odom’s chapter assesses the status of the PAFMM under international law. Importantly he concludes that PAFMM actions are ‘legally attributable to the PRC’ and are often inconsistent with several aspects of international law (p. 67). The U.S. Navy seems to be listening, with its chief reportedly warning his Chinese counterpart in January 2019 that U.S. forces would treat PAFMM or CCG actions no differently to those of the PLA Navy itself.

While some chapters identify many weaknesses in both the PAFMM and CCG, as well as in the joint command and coordination effectiveness linking China’s three maritime forces, the book tells an overarching story of the success of China’s maritime gray zone operations in fulfilling its regional objectives thus far, especially in the South China Sea. This collection is without doubt the most comprehensive source available on the subject, providing a uniformly excellent quality of scholarship. As with any work that makes extensive use of foreign language materials, there is the occasional minor inconsistency in transliteration between chapters. And, as is common in dealing with mainland Chinese sources on sensitive issues, it is not clear just how authoritative much of the source material actually is. On the other hand, China’s well-documented actions in disputed waters provide ample evidence to support this volume’s arguments. Given the very recent changes outlined in the book, this is a story that will continue to unfold, but as a guide to understand the slow-burning crisis in East Asian seas so far, China’s Maritime Gray Zone Operations is highly recommended.

Chris Rahman, Australian National Centre for Ocean Resources & Security (ANCORS), University of Wollongong, NSW 2522, Australia E-mail address: crahman@uow.edu.au.

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RECENT HIGH-LEVEL OFFICIAL STATEMENTS:

Vice President Pence deserves great credit for becoming the highest U.S. official ever to publicly call out China’s Maritime Militia! A most welcome capstone to five-plus years’ CMSI research on China’s Third Sea Force.

“Remarks by Vice President Pence at the Frederic V. Malek Memorial Lecture,” sponsored by Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, Conrad Hotel, Washington, DC, 24 October 2019.

Click here to watch the video on C-SPAN.

“…Beijing has stepped up its use of what they call ‘maritime militia’ vessels to regularly menace Filipino and Malaysian sailors and fishermen. And the Chinese Coast Guard has tried to strong-arm Vietnam from drilling for oil and natural gas off of Vietnam’s own shores.”

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Statement of Assistant Secretary David R. Stilwell, Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs, U.S. Department of State, Before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee Subcommittee on East Asia, the Pacific, and International Cybersecurity Policy, Washington, DC, 16 October 2019.

“We remain skeptical of the PRC’s sincerity to negotiate a meaningful Code of Conduct that reinforces international law. While claiming that they are committed to peaceful diplomacy, the reality is that Chinese leaders – through the PLA navy, law enforcement agencies, and maritime militia – continue to intimidate and bully other countries. Their constant harassment of Vietnamese assets around Vanguard Bank is a case in point. If it is used by the PRC to legitimize its egregious behavior and unlawful maritime claims, and to evade the commitments Beijing signed up to under international law, a Code of Conduct would be harmful to the region, and to all who value freedom of the seas.”

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David R. Stilwell, Assistant Secretary, Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs, Testimony Before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Washington, DC, 18 September 2019.

… …

Beijing’s Malign Conduct

Finally, while the U.S. Indo-Pacific Strategy has made significant progress to reinforce and advance the free and open order in the Indo-Pacific region, we are increasingly concerned that some are actively seeking to challenge this order. We are committed to working with any country that plays by the rules, but we will also stand up to any country that uses predatory practices to undermine them.

As the President’s National Security Strategy makes clear, we are especially concerned by Beijing’s use of market-distorting economic inducements and penalties, influence operations, and intimidation to persuade other states to heed its political and security agenda. Beijing’s pursuit of a repressive alternative vision for the Indo-Pacific seeks to reorder the region in its favor and has put China in a position of strategic competition with all who seek to preserve a free and open order of sovereign, diverse nations.

Since early July, Chinese vessels have conducted maritime surveys near Vanguard Bank with armed Coast Guard escorts and maritime militia in order to intimidate Vietnam and other ASEAN states away from developing oil and gas resources in the South China Sea. Through repeated illegal actions and militarization of disputed features, Beijing has and continues to take actions to prevent ASEAN members from accessing over $2.5 trillion in recoverable energy reserves. … …

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Humphrey Hawksley, Asian Waters: The Struggle Over the South China Sea and the Strategy of Chinese Expansion (New York: Harry N. Abrams, 2018), 194-97.

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