Mira Rapp-Hooper

Later this year, The Hague is expected to render its decision in a dispute over China's land reclamation efforts in the South China Sea. Most observers expect the court to rule against Beijing. Few expect Beijing to take such a verdict lightly. The case, brought by the Philippines in 2013, argues that China's Spratly Island activities violate the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea. Specifically, it maintains that Beijing has been building in and extracting resources from the Philippines' exclusive economic zone, making spurious claims to water and airspace, and that China's "historical" claims to waters within the nine-dash line are invalid.

The sands are quickly shifting in the South China Sea. New reports suggest that China may be preparing to conduct land reclamation at Scarborough Shoal, which is seized from the Philippines in 2012. And just weeks ago, satellite images revealed that China had installed sophisticated radar on Cuarteron Reef in the Spratly Islands and deployed two batteries of surface-to-air missiles on Woody Island in the Paracels. Further, following its rapid-fire island building, runway construction, and efforts to assert claims to new water and airspace, many experts agree that China could soon declare an Air Defense Identification Zone (ADIZ) in the South China Sea to match the one it has already claimed in the East China Sea. This would be yet one more attempt to interfere with air traffic over the contested waters.

On January 29, the USS Curtis Wilbur, a guided-missile destroyer, sailed within 12 nautical miles of Triton Island, a Chinese-held islet in the South China Sea that is also claimed by Taiwan and Vietnam. Like the United States' preceding freedom of navigation operation (FONOP), which took place in October, the Wilbur operation was meant to protest Chinese maritime claims that the United States and a number of Southeast Asian states consider excessive. But unlike the earlier mission, which was carried out by the guided-missile destroyer USS Lassen and which experts widely regarded as bungled, the most recent FONOP sent a clear legal message to Beijing and to the public. It also revealed important signs of support for U.S. freedom of navigation operations on the part of regional states.

After months of internal debate, the Obama administration last week finally decided to dispatch a warship to challenge China's far-reaching territorial claims in the South China Sea. But in the days since, U.S. officials have offered conflicting accounts of the operation, potentially undermining the whole point of the symbolic mission and raising doubts about whether Washington is ready to test Beijing's claims at all.

By all appearances, the U.S. Navy is poised to begin Freedom of Navigation exercises in the South China Sea. Rumors first emerged in May 2015 that the Pentagon was contemplating military operations around China's new artificial islands among the Spratly Islands. Through such exercises, the United States would aim to demonstrate that it does not recognize spurious Chinese claims to water and airspace around the islands. So far, the Department of Defense has declined to make moves near China's so-called Great Wall of Sand. The administration has, however, consistently stated that there are U.S. national interests in freedom of navigation and overflight in this vital waterway, where $5 trillion of global trade passes each year. With the presidential summit between U.S. President Barack Obama and Chinese President Xi Jinping now complete, operations seem imminent.

By all appearances, the U.S. Navy is poised to begin Freedom of Navigation exercises in the South China Sea. Rumors first emerged in May 2015 that the Pentagon was contemplating military operations around China's new artificial islands among the Spratly Islands. Through such exercises, the United States would aim to demonstrate that it does not recognize spurious Chinese claims to water and airspace around the islands.