The piece says China is building and militarizing features and entering the EEZs of the Philippines, Malaysia, Vietnam, and Indonesia under a nine- then ten-dash line the 2016 arbitral award rejected, which Beijing still calls null.

It reports a PLA drill at Scarborough Shoal and a China Coast Guard block of the Philippine resupply ship M/V Lapu-Lapu at Second Thomas Shoal, with no collision or injuries; the U.S. embassy condemned the maneuvers and China called the mission provocative.

India is said to have delivered about $330 million of BrahMos to the Philippines, with talks of further sales to Vietnam and Indonesia and interest from Malaysia; the author treats missiles as insufficient without pressure to honor UNCLOS.

In the South China Sea (SCS), China is expanding its presence in disputed waters and adopting increasingly dangerous tactics against neighboring Southeast Asian states.

China has been building artificial islands and converting some of them into military bases in the SCS. As part of its grey-zone tactics, China has intruded into the exclusive economic zones (EEZs) of the Philippines, Malaysia, Vietnam and Indonesia several times.

China claims more that 80 percent of the SCS based on the controversial and illegal Nine-Dash Line (now 10-Dash) map. It has overlapping claims with Vietnam, Malaysia, the Philippines and Brunei Darussalam. 

China also claims a part of Indonesia’s EEZ in the North Natuna Sea. Indonesia is not a claimant state in the SCS dispute. Chinese vessels several times intruded into Indonesia’s EEZ and its fishing boats stolen the fish from there.

An expansionist and aggressive China is challenging the centrality of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) as the foundation of global order at sea, a decade after the Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA) rejected Beijing’s sweeping maritime claims and declared the Nine-Dash Line map and China’s claims were illegal.

Who will stop mighty China and its aggression in the SCS? 

The U.S. offered to supply weapons to the Philippines but it is not enough. To stop China’s navy, India offered to sell its BrahMos supersonic cruise missiles to Southeast Asian countries.

BrahMos missiles are long-ranged and ramjet powered and they........

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