China's deployment of scientific research and survey vessels in waters east of Taiwan and beyond carries a military motive — to prepare to deny foreign naval vessels access to strategically important waters, a coast guard captain said yesterday.
Speaking at the Taiwan International Ocean Forum, Arthur Yang (楊献璋), captain of the Coast Guard Administration's (CGA) Sixth Offshore Flotilla, said that research vessels are one of China's tools for harassing Taiwan, along with coast guard and flag-of-convenience ships.
China has increased research vessel activity in the waters east of Taiwan since Tokyo and Manila in May announced that they would begin talks on an area — also claimed by China — where the exclusive economic zones of Taiwan, Japan and the Philippines overlap.
Photo: CNA
China extensively mapped the waters east of Taiwan and the Bashi Channel between 2023 and last year, said Yang, citing a report by the Institute for the Study of War, a US think tank.
Yang is stationed in Hualien County on Taiwan’s east coast.
From July 2023 to September last year, 41 Chinese research vessels monitored by the CGA were deployed to the second and third island chains and the Arctic and Atlantic oceans, he said, citing CGA data.
"We must be clear. This is not scientific research. This bathymetric and hydrographic data serves Beijing's anti-access / area denial strategy," Yang said.
"This global expansion confirms these missions are dual-use operations designed to support China's military strategic objectives," he said.
Asked to elaborate, Yang said that scientific research is normally conducted within a defined area, but Chinese research vessels have operated across the first island chain, which extends from Japan to Borneo, and into the Atlantic and Indian oceans, suggesting their activities have "gone beyond the scope of research."
Those "research projects" extended far beyond China's exclusive economic zone, and it is unlikely Beijing obtained consent from coastal states before operating in those waters, he said.
"It is very likely that China was covertly conducting [anti-access / area denial preparations]," Yang said.
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