inss.ndu.edu SF No. 289 1
C
hina, Taiwan, Vietnam, the Philippines, Malaysia, and Brunei all claim
some or all of the land features and maritime territory in the South
China Sea. One notable aspect of the South China Sea dispute is that
its advocates argue past one another with little reference to a common set of
facts. Another is the absence of comprehensive data on the actions claimants
have taken to advance or protect their claims. e Center for the Study of Chi-
nese Military Aairs at the National Defense University (NDU) set out to cre-
ate a comprehensive database documenting the various tactics pursued by South
China Sea claimants over an 18-year timeframe (1995–2013). is paper draws
upon that data to analyze what tactics South China Sea claimants are employing
and to present some potential considerations for U.S. and allied policymakers.
Methodology
e database was constructed using extensive open source searches of ac-
tions that South China Sea claimants took to defend or advance their territorial
claims, cataloguing more than 1,200 discrete actions between 1995 and 2013.
1
ese actions were grouped into 9 categories encompassing 39 separate tactics.
e nine categories are paramilitary actions; military actions; economic actions;
diplomatic actions, including coalition diplomacy, negotiation, and dispute man-
agement; legal actions; informational actions; and administrative actions. e
categories and tactics are described in the inset box.
Although the database allows empirical analysis of claimant behavior, it has
a number of practical limitations. First, actions included in the database were
gleaned from Open Source Center reports identied and translated by U.S. Gov-
ernment analysts; time and manpower limitations did not permit more compre-
hensive foreign language searches in the media of the claimant countries. Second,
An Empirical Analysis of
Claimant Tactics in the South
China Sea
by Christopher D. Yung and Patrick McNulty
STRATEGIC FORUM
National Defense University
About the Authors
Dr. Christopher D. Yung was a Senior
Research Fellow in the Center for
the Study of Chinese Military Affairs
(CSCMA), Institute for National
Strategic Studies, at the National
Defense University from 2009–2015.
He is now the Donald Bren Chair
of Non-Western Strategic Thought
at the Marine Corps University.
Patrick McNulty is a CSCMA Contract
Researcher.
Key Points
China, Taiwan, Vietnam, the Philip-
pines, Malaysia, and Brunei have
used a wide variety of tactics to
protect and advance their maritime
territorial claims in the South China
Sea. China is the most active user of
the nine categories of tactics identi-
ed in this paper, with the excep-
tion of legal actions, and accounts
for more than half of all military
and paramilitary actions since 1995.
Empirical data support the argu-
ment that the 2011 U.S. rebalance
to Asia did not spur disruptive
behavior in the South China Sea.
China became more active in
protecting and advancing its claims
around 2009, before the rebalance
was announced.
The unclassied database used in
this analysis undercounts military
and paramilitary actions, but cap-
tures enough activity to provide a
representative sample. A classied
version that captures more activity
would improve the potential to de-
velop the database into an Indica-
tions and Warning tool to assist in
monitoring and managing tensions
in the South China Sea.
August 2015
CENTER FOR THE STUDY OF CHINESE MILITARY AFFAIRS
