China Threatens The U.S., Says Will “Not Tolerate Violations Of Its Territorial Waters”
While the geopolitical posturing between the US and China over the South China Seas is nothing new, the latest and most dramatic installment started just one month ago, when as part of its celebration to commemorate the successful victory over Japan in World War II, China sailed five warships to the Bering Sea, off the coast of Alaska, just as Obama was quite literally taking selfies of himself a few hundred miles away.
Then yesterday, in the latest US attempt to one-up China despite the now long forgotten visit of China’s president to the US which clearly achieved absolutely nothing, and resolved even less, we reported that the US would retaliate to the most recent Chinese “prank” by sailing warships close to China’s artificial islands in the South China Sea as a signal to Beijing that Washington does not recognise Chinese territorial claims over the area.
A senior US official told the Financial Times that the ships would sail inside the 12-nautical mile zones that China claims as territory around some of the islands it has constructed in the Spratly chain. The official, who did not want to be named, said the manoeuvres were expected to start in the next two weeks.
The move, which is likely to raise tensions between the powers, comes amid disagreement over several issues, including US allegations that China is engaging in commercial cyber espionage.
As a reminder, this is area which is provoking so much consternation due to the location of vast commodity resource fields underneath:
Which is odd: one would think this could have been cleared up just two weeks earlier when the two presidents were having a state dinner in the White House (where Michele Obama was dressed in Vera Wang). One wonders just what the topic of conversation was if this most important aspect of geopolitical tensions was left entirely uncovered.
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