WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The US Navy plans to conduct patrols within 12 nautical miles of artificial islands in the South China Sea about twice a quarter to remind China and other countries about US rights under international law, a US defense official said yesterday.
“We’re going to come down to about twice a quarter or a little more than that,” said the official, who was not authorized to speak publicly about Navy operational plans.
“That’s the right amount to make it regular but not a constant poke in the eye. It meets the intent to regularly exercise our rights under international law and remind the Chinese and others about our view,” the official said.
US Deputy National Security Adviser Ben Rhodes yesterday said there would be more demonstrations of the US military’s commitment to the right to freely navigate in the region.
“That’s our interest there … It’s to demonstrate that we will uphold the principle of freedom of navigation,” Rhodes told an event hosted by the Defense One media outlet.
Rhodes’ comments came a week after a US guided-missile destroyer sailed close to one of Beijing’s man-made islands in the South China Sea last week.
China’s naval commander last week told his US counterpart that a minor incident could spark war in the South China Sea if the United States did not stop its “provocative acts” in the disputed waterway.
The USS Lassen’s patrol was the most significant US challenge yet to the 12-nautical-mile territorial limit China claims around artificial islands it has built in the Spratly Islands archipelago.
China claims most of the South China Sea, through which more than $5 trillion of world trade transits every year. Vietnam, Malaysia, Brunei, the Philippines and Taiwan all have rival claims.
