Name: Why the South China Sea is a time bomb
Uploaded: 2025-05-01T09:28:44.000Z
Duration: 11 min 8 s
Description: Thousands of YouTube videos with English-Chinese subtitles! Now you can learn to understand native speakers, expand your vocabulary, and improve your pronunciation...

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In June 2024, this ship from the Philippines Navy was rammed by two ships from the Chinese

China's Coast Guard is seen brandishing axes and knives.

It happened at a shallow reef called Second Thomas Shoal, where the Philippines have a few soldiers stationed on a grounded ship.

China also claims the reef, and in early 2024 began to prevent the Philippines from reaching

When the Philippines made another attempt in June, the Chinese Coast Guard rammed them.

This would be a minor incident if it weren't in one of the most contentious places on earth.

And a storm is brewing in the South China Sea.

Another confrontation has taken place between Chinese and Philippine vessels.

These giant ships are essentially playing chicken.

A high seas confrontation that could ignite a war.

These countries claim parts of the South China Sea.

You have fishers, you have these militia actors, you have multiple nations.

There's a lot more variables and there's a lot more chance that something unintended happens that you cannot de-escalate.

So what's driving up tensions in the South China Sea?

In the South China Sea, the stakes couldn't be higher.

Tens of millions of barrels of oil and gas sit below it.

Shipping routes that carry $3.4 trillion in annual trade run through it.

And its dwindling fisheries sustain millions of people.

The Philippines, Malaysia, Brunei, Taiwan, and Vietnam are each claiming rights to waters roughly up to 200 nautical miles off their shores.

These exclusive economic zones are prescribed under international law.

It illustrates its claim with this nine-dash line, something its government drew over 70 years ago.

They claim some form of historic rights, but what exactly they're claiming within that line has never been clarified.

I called Harrison Praetette, an expert on the territorial disputes in the South China

I want China's identity now to be a strong nation that does not cede its territory to others.

In fact, in 2023, China added a 10th dash next to Taiwan.

But the problem with this line is that China's the only country that recognizes it.

In 2016, an international court ruled that it has no legal basis.

But that hasn't stopped China from trying to take control of it anyways.

It's been occupying rocks and reefs all over the South China Sea, and even building new islands.

In the Spratly Islands, three other countries have claims.

But over the last decade, China piled sand onto reefs to build bases, complete with airstrips, weapons, and harbors for its ships.

China uses them to extend its claim, and support a huge fleet of vessels to enforce it.

In 2014, it placed an oil rig within Vietnam's EEZ and sent dozens of ships there, to prevent

And as the Vietnamese protested, China didn't back down.

In 2021, it ordered more than 200 fishing boats to dock at the unoccupied Whitsun Reef, leading the Philippines to worry that China was preparing to build on it, sparking a standoff that lasted for months, until the boats left.

If it does not occupy, control, and exclusively exploit the South China Sea, then it should have the say over who does.

But today, its neighbors are fighting back.

So I've covered the South China Sea before, but this time when I dove in, everything had changed.

New players, new locations, and the stakes were higher than ever.

Thankfully, I was able to stay organized thanks to Ground News.

That's a website and app that gathers stories from all over the world.

And I love using it for complex stories just like this one.

Take China's own efforts to expand its maritime boundaries.

Thanks to Ground News, I'm able to see that over 70 outlets reported on it and filter them by political bias, recency, location, even government affiliation.

Personally, I focus on sources with very high factuality in order to understand the deeper national interests and biases shaping the headlines.

These tools tag every story and headline so you have all the context you need to dig deeper.

And I love the interactive map feature that lets you explore news from anywhere in the world.

With the second Trump administration starting, global hotspots like the South China Sea are more important than ever.

So I use Ground News as my go-to for breaking news stories.

And I also use it to keep track of my own media blind spots.

If you're a fan of Search Party, this is the kind of thing you're into.

Go to ground.news.searchparty or use this QR code and you'll get 40% off their Vantage

It's great for anyone, again, who wants a clear understanding of the world.

And I'll take you back to the South China Sea.

So China's essentially been trying to overrule the claims of the other countries in the South

And each has been reacting to that in a slightly different way.

I thought it'd be useful to rank them from the least to the most aggressive.

Taiwan and Brunei have essentially surrendered.

Taiwan doesn't want to risk further conflict with China, while Brunei depends on China for most of its trade.

Malaysia is typically quiet too, except for when it explores for oil and gas, whereas

EEZ overlaps with China's Nine-Dash Line.

China protests, but Malaysia refuses to stop.

It claims a number of reefs and islands, and has begun to copy China's tactics.

It's built this reef into an island base, and greatly extended the size of two others.

In fact, since 2022, Vietnam's reclaimed more land than China has.

But for some reason, China hasn't stopped it.

Maybe they're putting a premium on those kind of party-to-party, communist party ties in

To be honest, there has to be a Chinese response at some point.

It could be that China's too busy dealing with an even more aggressive adversary, the

This country will not lose one inch of its territory.

When Ferdinand Bongbong Marcos Jr. took power in 2022, he reversed the Philippines' strategy.

His predecessor had mostly avoided talking about China's island-building and activities in the South China Sea, but Marcos ordered his navy to start publicizing them.

It began releasing videos showing how the Chinese Coast Guard shadows its ships, cuts them off, and even blasts them with water cannons.

By publicizing China's actions, the Philippines hopes to form a common front with its neighbors and get sympathy from abroad.

Sabina Shull was claimed by both countries, but neither has built any permanent structures.

When the Philippines docked a ship there in April 2024, Chinese ships surrounded it, then rammed it over and over until it was forced to leave.

China's kind of faced with an interesting decision, is like, well, do we lighten up so that we don't look so bad in the international media?

Or do we try to punish them harder because now they're trying to make us look bad?

Essentially, they've sided on the second option every time.

That's exactly what happened in June 2024, when the Philippines sent a boat to resupply its men on Second Thomas Shull, then China refused to let them.

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