The warm waters of the South China Sea are rich, which make them highly contested fishing grounds. China is the largest littoral state around this body of water, and it has a huge population to feed. It has built several supporting harbors and infrastructure in the last few years in the area, enabling it to deploy the largest fishing fleet in the South China Sea. The Chinese Maritime Militia (CMM) leads and protects China’s huge armada of fishing vessels. The CMM’s purpose is to keep Chinese aggression at sea below the level of naval operations, thus complicating the littoral states’ responses to China’s maritime expansion. It hides behind a civilian facade, which allows it to hide behind the cloak of deniability. This gives China a powerful incentive to dissemble and deny the evidence of the militia’s invisible role of asserting Chinese maritime claims in the East and South China Seas. The CMM is not a maritime law enforcement agency even as it supports China’s goal of gaining control over the whole of the South China Sea through gray zone operations.

De Castro, R. C. (2019, July 3). The June 9 Reed Bank Incident: Chinese gray zone operation in action?. BusinessWorld, p. S1/8.