Pulling Back the Curtain

Gregory B. Poling, Tabitha Grace Mallory, Harrison Prétat and the Center for Advanced Defense Studies

Since completing the construction of its artificial feature outposts in the Spratly Islands in 2016, the People’s Republic of China (PRC) has shifted its focus toward asserting control over peacetime activity across the South China Sea. A key component of this shift has been the expansion of the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP’s) maritime militia — a force of vessels ostensibly engaged in commercial fishing but which operates alongside Chinese law enforcement and military to achieve Chinese political objectives in disputed waters. 

Referred to as the People’s Armed Forces Maritime Militia by the U.S. Department of Defense, this entity plays a role in Beijing’s strategy to enforce its sovereignty claims in the South China Sea and East China Sea, according to the Rand Corp. The militia uses tactics, such as swarming other vessels, to challenge the legal presence and claims of other countries. 

Enabled by the proximity of the PRC’s outposts in the Spratly Islands, militia vessels join with Chinese law enforcement to contest Southeast Asian claimants’ fishing and hydrocarbon activities in areas within the PRC’s ambiguous and widely rejected territorial claims under its so-called nine-dash line. The militia’s outward identity as a commercial fishing fleet affords Beijing a powerful degree of deniability, allowing this force to pressure claimants with little cost. 

The militia’s gray-zone tactics pose a significant challenge to those interested in preventing coercion from interfering with a maritime order based on international law or from influencing the management or peaceful settlement of disputes. Competing claimants lack the maritime capacity to match the size and quantity of China’s boats. Other powers with an interest in preventing maritime coercion are often only equipped with the blunt instrument of naval power, the deployment of which against ostensible fishing vessels would be escalatory and impractical. 

In the interest of dissuading assertive behavior and lowering the risk of conflict in disputed waters, this analysis seeks to lift the shroud of uncertainty and deniability surrounding the CCP’s maritime militia. By providing a comprehensive overview of the militia, the findings dispel any doubt that most Chinese fishing vessels operating in the disputed waters of the South China Sea are there to fulfill political rather than commercial objectives. 

But open-source Chinese language research, remote sensing data and maritime patrols conducted by actors operating in disputed waters have the power to expose the militia and diminish its effectiveness as a gray-zone force. 

CCP MARITIME MILITIA: YESTERDAY AND TODAY

The CCP’s modern use of fishing militias dates to at least 1974, when they were employed in seizing the Paracel Islands from Vietnam. Several developments in the 1980s, including the 1985 establishment of a militia force in Tanmen Township on Hainan and the establishment of the PRC’s first bases in the Spratlys in 1988, would lay the groundwork for a more active militia in the following decades. 

The militia’s involvement in aggressive operations increased in the 2000s, when militia vessels physically interfered with the navigation of multiple United States Navy ships. This continued into the early 2010s, with the militia playing a key role in the PRC’s seizure of Scarborough Shoal in 2012, as well as the deployment of a Chinese oil rig into Vietnamese waters in 2014. 

Since 2016, militia boats have been deployed to the Spratlys in greater numbers and more consistently than ever. Militia members have accompanied Chinese law enforcement at several oil and gas standoffs with Malaysia and Vietnam and have participated in mass deployments at targeted features. Nearly 100 militia boats deployed near Philippine-occupied Thitu Island in 2018, and about 200 gathered at unoccupied Whitsun Reef in early 2021. 

The militia in the South China Sea operates from a string of 10 ports in China’s Guangdong and Hainan provinces. Remote sensing data indicates that about 300 militia vessels are operating in the Spratly Islands on any given day. Chinese maritime militia vessels operating in the South China Sea mostly fall into two categories: professional maritime militia fishing vessels (MMFV) and Spratly backbone fishing vessels (SBFV). MMFVs are designed, constructed or renovated and operated using funds dedicated to maritime militia affairs. SBFVs, on the other hand, are a subset of domestic fishing vessels that meet certain requirements of length, tonnage and power and operate in the Spratly Islands to fulfill the PRC’s political goals. 

Professional vessels are generally built to specifications that include explicitly military features, although even SBFVs are steel-hulled and measure at least 35 meters, with many exceeding 55 meters. Both professional militia and SBFVs participate in large deployments aimed at asserting Chinese sovereignty, and both deny access to other countries’ ships, although statements from Chinese officials suggest that more aggressive operations would first be entrusted to professional militia vessels. 

Chinese militia activities violate several tenets of international law. Efforts to illegally block the lawful activities of claimant states within their exclusive economic zones are violations of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea and customary international law. Unsafe maneuvers intended to impede other ships by creating a risk of collision violate the International Maritime Organization’s Regulations for Preventing Collisions at Sea. 

IDENTIFYING MILITIA VESSELS 

Direct identification in official Chinese sources or state media remains the most straightforward and conclusive indicator of militia activity. However, it is unlikely that most maritime militia vessels can be identified in this way. This makes behavior-based identification — informed by remote sensing data and traditional on-site reporting — the most promising avenue for continued identification. 

On-site photography and video, as well as ship-to-ship automatic identification system (AIS) data collection, offer the greatest potential to directly identify militia vessels and document their behavior. This enhances opportunities for follow-up research and creates an immediate impact by revealing the militia’s size, scope and activities to a broad audience. 

Commercial satellite imagery and AIS data are important in identifying and tracking militia deployments. 

Association with known militia vessels and ports is a strong indicator that a vessel warrants further study, as are large government subsidies indicating that a ship is an SBFV. Vessels over 50 meters operating in disputed waters — especially those with fewer than 10 crew members —also deserve further scrutiny. 

By coupling continued reporting efforts from actors in the South China Sea with additional research using open-source, Chinese-language materials and remote sensing data, complete identification of the maritime militia is not only possible, but also likely.

MILITIA ACTIVITY IN THE SOUTH CHINA SEA

The CCP’s maritime militia was not a major focus of Western scholarship before international attention shifted toward the South China Sea over the past decade. The use and composition of the militia has changed and expanded over the past decade. The subsequent increase in scholarly attention, along with the militia’s involvement in multiple recent incidents widely reported in international media, may create the false impression that the militia’s existence itself is a recent phenomenon. In fact, the CCP’s first use of fishing militias in the South China Sea dates back at least four decades, and the maritime militia has played a central role in asserting Chinese claims ever since. The PRC’s unprecedented efforts to gain control over waters within its nine-dash line over the past decade — despite an international tribunal ruling in 2016 that those claims had no legal basis — have led to a corresponding expansion in the size and activities of its militia forces.

The first sign that the militia under CCP General Secretary Xi Jinping was becoming the vanguard of a more assertive Chinese strategy in the South China Sea emerged in May 2014. That month, Vietnam spotted the Haiyang Shiyou 981 oil rig and three service ships sailing past the Paracel Islands. The rig parked 120 nautical miles (220 kilometers) east of Vietnam’s Ly Son Island and 180 nautical miles (333 kilometers) south of Hainan, in what were clearly disputed waters. China’s Maritime Safety Administration announced that the oil rig would conduct exploratory drilling in the area until mid-August. Vietnam immediately dispatched six law enforcement vessels to prevent the rig from operating. Beijing responded with a mixed force of 40 People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN), China coast guard and militia vessels to protect it. They formed concentric rings, with the PLAN vessels closest to the Haiyang Shiyou and the militia farthest out, where it would have the most contact with the Vietnamese. 

No shots were fired, but there was plenty of violence from both sides, with intentional ramming and the use of high-pressure water hoses. By mid-May 2014, Hanoi claimed that the PRC had 130 vessels on the scene; Beijing said Vietnam had 60. The Vietnamese, in addition to being outnumbered, were outmatched. The Chinese coast guard ships were larger and better armed than their Vietnamese counterparts. And the CCP’s large, steel-hulled militia vessels, which made up the bulk of those involved in the standoff, dwarfed Vietnam’s wooden militia boats. A Vietnamese fishing boat was rammed and sunk, though the crew was rescued.

Chinese fishing vessels regularly cluster around the outposts of other claimants in the Spratlys without doing much fishing, if any. In March and April 2019, militia boats were regularly spotted anchoring within a kilometer of Philippine-held Loaita Island and Loaita Cay. Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative (AMTI) research with Vulcan’s Skylight Maritime Initiative also showed Chinese militia vessels frequently gathering near Vietnamese outposts, especially in the Spratly’s Union Banks section. Of these, the nine vessels of the Yue Mao Bin Yu fleet were especially visible, operating near the Chinese outposts at Hughes and Johnson reefs and approaching provocatively close to the Vietnamese facilities at Collins, Lansdowne and Grierson reefs and Sin Cowe Island. It now appears those vessels were just the vanguard of a growing Chinese militia focus on Union Banks. 

To date, violence between the CCP’s maritime militia and other actors has been mostly limited to dangerous maneuvering and occasional shouldering or ramming. But in June 2019, an incident nearly led to the deaths of a Philippine fishing crew. The Yue Mao Bin Yu 42212 collided with and sank the F/B Gem-Ver while it was anchored at night at Reed Bank. After the ramming, the Chinese vessel reportedly turned off its lights and fled, leaving the fishermen to drown. Luckily, they were rescued by a passing Vietnamese boat. Although it has not yet been confirmed that the Yue Mao Bin Yu 42212 is a militia vessel, an investigation by AMTI and the Center for Advanced Defense Studies uncovered considerable evidence to that effect. The findings of this analysis strengthen that case. 

The maritime militia has also taken part in recent oil and gas standoffs. It joined the Chinese coast guard in escorting a Chinese state-owned survey vessel, the Haiyang Dizhi 8, during separate monthslong operations off Vietnam and Malaysia in late 2019 and early 2020. The exact number of vessels in those episodes is unclear, but sources reported that 40 to 80 Chinese boats took part; some were coast guard and PLAN vessels, but most were likely maritime militia. 

The militia’s recent history suggests that its deployment pattern in the Spratlys has gone through several evolutions. Between late 2017 and late 2018, the number of likely militia vessels in the Spratlys rose to about 300 at any given time, most of which rode at anchor for weeks at a time in the harbors at Subi and Mischief reefs. These fleets started dispersing more widely after December 2018, with the largest concentration around Thitu Island. In early 2020, militia vessels began congregating in larger numbers around Union Banks, particularly at Whitsun Reef. Those numbers reached 100 in May 2020, dipped again and then approached 200 by the end of 2020.

Since tapering off in April 2021, the militia presence in the Spratlys has grown more fluid but no smaller. That month, most of the vessels from Whitsun moved to nearby Hughes Reef, where their numbers peaked at more than 150. A substantial contingent also headed to Tizard Bank farther north, which includes the PRC’s base on Gaven Reefs and Vietnam’s on Namyit Island. In May 2021, nearly all the ships from Hughes also moved to Tizard Banks, bringing the number gathered there to over 230. A month later, most of those moved back to Union Banks, staying around Hughes. By mid-June 2021, there were almost 240 boats around Hughes and 70 still at Gaven. The big picture is about 300 maritime militia vessels have been deployed in large groups around the Spratly Islands since August 2018, relying on the PRC’s artificial features for logistics support but no longer cloistering themselves within those harbors.

PROFESSIONAL MILITIA VERSUS SBFVs 

Professional MMFVs and SBFVs often function identically, attempting to assert PRC sovereignty in disputed waters and (especially in recent years) grouping in large numbers to deny fishing boats of other South China Sea claimants’ access to fishing grounds and reefs. 

There are, however, differences in their roles. In 2017, Taishan’s Municipal Bureau of Oceans and Fisheries met with SBFV owners to remind them of their “political responsibilities” to operate in “specially designated waters” to “defend national maritime rights and interests and declare national sovereignty.” In the same meeting, the SBFV owners were also instructed to avoid creating major foreign incidents, suggesting that more aggressive actions such as ramming fishing vessels, interfering with the navigation of foreign warships or other physical confrontation are primarily entrusted to the professional MMFVs. 

This greater responsibility is consistent with the design of MMFVs, which include features such as weapons storage facilities and large water cannons. Nevertheless, SBFVs maintain latent capacity to integrate with military operations. As disclosed by an employment contract for SBFVs owned by a fishery professional cooperative in Guangdong province, the vessels must operate and dock in special waters all year, participate in training and sovereignty defense, and assist the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) in combat when needed. Also, crew members are prohibited from photographing the ports where they dock at Chinese outposts in the Spratly Islands or the vessel’s internal structure without the captain’s permission. SBFVs qualify for different types of government support than MMFVs. 

This distinction between officially named maritime militia vessels and SBFVs lends the latter a greater degree of deniability. But given their explicit political responsibilities and role in defending the PRC’s national sovereignty, along with their charge to assist the PLA in combat, SBFVs clearly meet any reasonable definition of a militia force.

OPEN-SOURCE CONFIRMATION OF MILITIA ACTIVITY

The findings of this analysis should put to rest many of the doubts that have, until now, precluded a shared public understanding of the PRC’s maritime militia. The militia is no secret. A wealth of publicly available Chinese government documents, media reports, academic articles and other materials openly discuss its affairs. It consists of professional militia — uniformed crew operating vessels built with military features such as weapons storage facilities — as well as large and powerful civilian fishing vessels either recruited and renovated or purpose-built as SBFVs to fulfill CCP political objectives in disputed waters. Their operations are funded by the Chinese government through subsidies that incentivize local actors to build vessels meeting military specifications and to operate them in disputed waters, ready to assist Chinese law enforcement and naval forces when necessary. The corporate structures behind militia vessels are not complex creations designed to obfuscate the ultimate owners, but are simple and direct, and they correspond to the localities where the vessels are homeported. Except for professional fleets operated by dedicated companies in Hainan, the ownership of militia vessels is diversified among many companies. This phenomenon reflects the overall decentralized nature of the militia, which involves local entities and businesses responding to funding signals sent by larger policy initiatives over the past decade. 

Although corporate connections to Chinese government entities proved inconclusive as a means of identifying militia vessels outright, ships that do have such connections, especially on top of other militia indicators, are worth investigating.  

This report, originally titled “Pulling Back the Curtain on China’s Maritime Militia,” was published in November 2021 by the Center for Strategic and International Studies’ Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative and the Center for Advanced Defense Studies. It has been edited to fit FORUM’s format. To access the report in its entirety, visit https://www.csis.org/analysis/pulling-back-curtain-chinas-maritime-militia. 

Veiled voyages, past and present

FORUM Staff

Today’s maritime expansion by the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP’s) military evokes the 15th century voyages of Zheng He during the Ming dynasty that sailed across the Indo-Pacific and into Africa. Zheng is the most famous person in Chinese naval history, born in Yunnan region on the frontier of the Mongol empire to a Muslim family of Central Asian ancestry likely related to contemporary Uyghurs. 

The Ming dynasty army captured Zheng as a boy, made him a eunuch and placed him in the service of the future Yongle emperor. The emperor rose to supreme power in a coup by overthrowing the rightful emperor — his nephew — and claiming the throne himself. This led to a legitimacy problem, and the new emperor used censorship and propaganda to solve it. He ordered the purging of the previous emperor’s records and introduced propaganda to advocate his legitimacy. 

The best-known propaganda spectacle of this era came in the form of the baochuan “treasure ships” — some of the most amazing and enormous wooden vessels ever built. Chinese records show that the ships exceeded 120 meters — longer that a soccer field. A fleet of hundreds of vessels supported these treasure ships, including horse transports, water supply ships, armory ships and ships that had soil laid on the decks with orchards of citrus trees to ensure a healthy diet for the crew of thousands of soldiers and sailors. 

CCP propaganda portrays the Zheng expeditions as a prime example of China’s benevolent international friendship and win-win cooperation — like a 15th century One Belt, One Road campaign — but the truth is more complicated. 

The real purpose of Zheng’s voyages was to secure political legitimacy for the emperor. In Chinese history, political legitimacy was entwined with the tribute system. The Chinese tribute system would be better translated as trade by the rest of the world, where tributaries would humbly present gifts of foreign luxury products and exotic animals to the emperor, who would in turn grant benevolent gifts such as valuable Chinese products of silk, tea and porcelain. The Chinese government regarded the tribute system as international acknowledgment of the superior political authority of the emperor, while other nations usually viewed this as an odd ritual for trade with China. 

Many comparisons have been made between the ancient tribute ceremonies and the modern Belt and Road Forum for International Cooperation hosted by CCP General Secretary
Xi Jinping, which is also a propaganda event designed to
build credibility for the regime in Beijing and its One Belt,
One Road policies.

The Zheng fleet was a dazzling, colorful sight when it pulled into ports and presented the emperor’s gifts. On its return, the fleet brought local products, government officials or royal family members back to China to bow before the emperor and show his court that people from around the world acknowledged the Yongle emperor as the legitimate ruler of “all under heaven.” 

Zheng sought out regional rulers who had paid tribute to previous emperors such as Kublai Khan. But when some Indo-Pacific leaders did not want to participate, the treasure fleet came out in force to engage in military conflicts and political interference, including capturing rulers from Indonesia and toppling the ruling kingdom in Sri Lanka.  

Zheng’s fleet also showcased Chinese technological, navigational, economic and military power, but China ultimately scrapped the ships because they were extremely expensive, and Chinese bureaucrats argued the propaganda benefit did not live up to the cost. The ships, however, are a reminder that China is capable of producing amazing wonders, but the gifts sometimes come with hidden risks. And what might be considered trade or diplomacy in most of the world has, at times, been viewed as tribute or submission in China.