Update: 1 October 2023, Canada and USA practicing for their war with China thousands of miles from home on the opposite side of the world.
Experts say violence in the South China Sea is expected at any time. Here the Arleigh Burke-class guided missile destroyer USS Ralph Johnson (DDG 114) and the somewhat geriatric Canadian destroyer (over 4000 tons) HMCS Ottawa (FFH 341) conduct a replenishment-at-sea with the USNS Yukon (T-AO-202) in the South China Sea, 25 September 2023. Ralph Johnson is assigned to the Commander of the Task Force 71/Destroyer Squadron (code DESRON) 15, the U.S. Navy’s largest forward-deployed DESRON and the U.S. 7th Fleet’s principal surface force. Photo credit: Mass Communication Specialist 1st Class Jamaal Liddell. Photo is cropped. Art, cropping, enhancement: Rosa Yamamoto / Feminine-Perspective-Magazine
Editor’s note: Four Canadian naval units have been named HMCS Ottawa. | HMCS Ottawa was a C-class destroyer commissioned as HMS Crusader in the Royal Navy before serving with the Royal Canadian Navy from 1938–1942. | HMCS Ottawa was a G-class destroyer commissioned as HMS Griffin in the RN before serving with the RCN from 1943–1945—Wikipedia
USA / Philippines attack China Islands.
In the week following the Philippines and American September 2023 destruction of a Chinese buoyed marker line marking off a 300 meter section of submerged shoal that did not qualify for any ownership by anyone under the UNCLOS law of the sea conventions in a region of the Asian Seas,
RINJ Women members in China associated with the Demilitarize South China Sea movement have been reporting increased chatter and activity related to militia and military personnel headed to the Chinese military base at Mischief Reef island which is a man-made island built by China about a decade ago.
Experts in the law of the sea say that because the shoals are barely showing terra firma in low tide and are completely uninhabitable (with the rare exception of China’s man-made islands which China indisputably owns, say scholars, but has no territorial water rights “based on current laws which are vague on this situation”), there can be no claim to this real estate. This assertion was also made in a non-binding decision by a tribunal convened in 2013 at The Philippines Request and issuing a report in July 2016.
by Katie Alsop
There are outstanding political and diplomatic issues in the South China sea enough to keep lawyers busy for decades. But when the Philippines executives of recently deceased President Benigno Aquino brought a legal action to an Arbitral Tribunal Constituted Under Annex VII to the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, the core issues were settled by the Tribunal although China disagreed.
On July 12, 2016, the ‘law of the sea’ tribunal released a decision in the Philippines’ case against China in the South China Sea. The ruling can be read here. The decision says that major elements of China’s claim to the South China Sea—including its controverted nine-dash line, militarization activities, and other malevolent actions like dumping human waste into Philippines waters, and poaching fish and other natural resources in other nations’ coastal waters—were unlawful.
China’s militarization of the South China Sea, of which China claims to own 93%, has created a dangerous situation for trillions of dollars worth of global trade in essential goods and food. South China Sea, Freedom of Navigation activities have become necessary to prevent a blockage of one third of the world’s trade flow.
That is why the globe’s largest civil society women and family rights organization is planning massive demonstrations around the world in November 2021 and spring 2022 against China’s pollution and militarization of the South China Sea.
Demilitarize South China Sea
China was upset over the 12 July 2016 Tribunal decision finding the Nine Dash Line was nonsense.
Read: China Nine-Dash-Line is not malice but likely is hysterical fanaticism
China flew into a snit over the ‘law of the sea’ tribunal ruling and began attacking Vietnamese and Philippines fisher folk, in some cases, sinking their ships and leaving crews swimming in the wreckage to fend for themselves. In other cases, Philippines and Vietnamese fishing crews have been detained and hurt; their fishing gear stolen; their catch of fish stolen; and their ability to carry out their trade destroyed.
Japanese Foreign Minister Toshimitsu Motegi said in a statement on Monday 12 July, the anniversary of the decision, that China’s failure to comply with the ruling five years ago, “undermines the rule of law as a fundamental value of the international community.”
The South China Sea is a glaring example of what not to do in the context of global pollution, climate change, and averting human disasters.
As a plastic insertion device for a tampon floated ashore among other seagoing trash near Agoo, Philippines, the fisher folk explained their plight. “We cannot afford to replace the equipment stolen from us but we somehow need to go to sea and find fish,” said a worried mom whose three little children were helping a father with the rigging of their fishing craft.
The story on how The RINJ Foundation decided to launch global demonstrations against China’s militarization of the South China Sea waterways has its roots in the small coastal villages in Vietnam, Malaysia and the Philippines, and more, where two million or more people and their families depend on living off the sea.
Those who speak English call them fisher folks. Christ and his apostles were fed from the seas, the Filipino fishing boat captains explain. They cling to the decency and respect their communities have for their work, but their boats are being ransacked by the Chinese Coast Guard, Navy and an even bigger marine militia.
These humble sea-going fishing crews feed hundreds of millions of Asians at least in small part, with fish. Their once thriving economies filtered through the ranks of commercial partners and customers to stave off poverty for centuries. That is now all gone. China’s massive navy and marine militia of thousands of vessels has raided, robbed, sunk the craft of simple fisher folk and barred their fishing in their own nation’s extended economic zones.
During the pandemic, this issue has been exacerbated. Now coastal villages are starving as the South China Sea becomes more polluted by the day.
PowerPoint Presentation Water Quality in the Spratlys, South China Sea (by simularity.com)
“Today this superpower piracy has an impact on millions of Asians and people all around the world because the waterway is crucial to global trade for a modest total estimate of $3.7 trillion USD in crucial goods, one third of the world’s trade,” according to the team organizing Demilitarize South China Sea org‘s series of global demonstrations in 2021-2022.