China has again rammed Philippine Coast Guard (PCG) ships in the Spratlys, belying its vow to act like a civilized human being despite its disputes with the Philippines, Vietnam, Brunei, Malaysia and Taiwan over the Spratlys archipelago, and its insistence that it holds a “historical” title all these maritime features on the basis of a calligraphy done on a map by a Chinese maritime scholar in 1947.
This scholar refused to declare that the so-called 11-dash-linbe represented the metes and bounds of Chinese territory, For the Kuomintang scholar, the drawing merely indicates “where China may lay claims on islets.” The technical term is an “islet,” not a reef, not a seamount, not a cay and certainly not a shoal. Only his students are pushing the opaque claim to extremes, positing that China has, since time immemorial, had “indisputable sovereignty” over the South China Sea (SCS.)
To buttress its claim over the Panatag Shoal, China sent a flotilla of Chinese Coast Guard (CCG) vessels, fisheries militia boats and even Navy vessels to patrol an area deep into the exclusive economic zone (EEZ) of the Philippines. These vessels are squatting on the EEZ after China agreed to withdraw from Panatag in 2012 along with Philippine ships but China violated the deal by rushing in fully-armed Navy ship to the vicinity.
China is notorious for violating agreements and refusing to respect treaties that it has signed, like the 1982 UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), which governs maritime disputes and which the Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA) invoked in trashing China false historical claim on Panatag Shoal. The civilized Chinese dismissed the decision against Beijing as a “mere scrap of paper.” China’s depredations in Hong Kong also runs smack against the handover treaty with the United Kingdom that guaranteed democratic rights to the people of the former British crown colony for 50 years or until 2047. The same is true with the Macau agreement with Portugal. China also continues to encroach into Bhutan, India, Tibet, Sikkim and other small nations in the Himalayan mountain range.
In the latest disgusting episode on Aug. 19, 2024, CCG spokesperson Gan Yu claimed on Weibo that BRP Bagacay and BRP Cape Engaño “deliberately” collided with a CCG vessel near Escoda Shoal. “At 03:24, the Philippine ship No. 4410 (BRP Bagacay) ignored China’s repeated solemn warnings and deliberately collided with China’s 21551 boat, which was normally safeguarding its rights and enforcing the law in an unprofessional and dangerous manner, resulting in a collision,” Gan said. Big words from a bully who has already memorized the talking points CCG playbook as regards the dispute with the Philippines. Common sense dictates that smaller Philippine boats would not gain anything by “deliberately” smashing into the CCG ships.
The Philippines immediately accused the CCG of performing “unlawful and aggressive maneuvers” in the WPS, resulting in collisions that damaged two PCG vessels. “This morning, PCG vessels BRP Bagacay (MRRV-4410) and BRP Cape Engaño (MRRV-4411) encountered unlawful and aggressive maneuvers from Chinese Coast Guard vessels while en route to Patag and Lawak Islands in the WPS,” said the National Task Force for the West Philippines Sea (NTF-WPS.) “These dangerous maneuvers resulted in collisions, causing structural damage to both PCG vessels.”
But the Chinese are, like Donald Trump, incapable of telling the truth. They are very much bullies who like lie 13 times in one sentence. As Rev. William Barber II said, “nothing is worse than being loud and wrong.” The Chinese foreign ministry also does its daily, humdrum press briefings that repeat the “solemn” statements on their “indisputable sovereignty” over Panatag and 90% of the SCS. That “indisputable sovereignty” wasn’t evident in the 1602 Ricci-Li map that delineated the “territory” of the Ming empire, which showed that anything beyond the 12th parallel was not Chinese territory. Three ancient Philippine maps also proved that Panatag Shoal was within Philippine territory.
To compound the wild behavior of the Chinese, they even had the gall to protest, pretending that the CGG ships that rammed the PCG boats were right to make a repeat of their recent brutish attack on boats resupplying the BRP Sierra Madre marooned on Ayungin Shoal. This is the case of an attacker blaming the victim for “intruding” into Chinese territory, thus “inviting” a “lawful response” like bashing the starboard and portside of BRP Bagacay and smashing BRP Port Engano. This is the same China that had used water cannons against wooden boats and smaller ships, the same thing they are doing in confronting the Japanese Coast Guard in the uninhabited Senkaku islands. China is engaged in asserting its ambition to be the SCS police and pushing its revanchist plans. No wonder China has become a pariah in the community of nations.
