A Chinese scientific ship bristling with surveillance equipment docked in a Sri Lankan port. Hundreds of fishing boats anchored for months at a time among disputed islands in the South China Sea. And oceangoing ferries, built to be capable of carrying heavy vehicles and large loads of people. All are ostensibly civilian ships, but experts and uneasy regional governments say they are part of a Chinese civil-military fusion strategy, little concealed by Beijing, that enhances its maritime capabilities. China’s navy is already the world’s largest by ship count and has been building new warships as part of a wider military expansion.
It launched its first domestically designed and built aircraft carrier in June, and at least five new destroyers are on the way. The buildup comes as Beijing attempts to exert broader influence in the region. It is increasing its military activities around the self-governing island of Taiwan, seeking new security agreements with Pacific islands and building artificial islands in disputed waters to fortify its territorial claims in the South China Sea, which the U.S. and its allies have challenged. Also, China has several civilian vessels that do more than just augment the raw numbers of ships, performing tasks that would be difficult for the military to carry out.
In one highly publicized incident, a steel Chinese trawler in 2019 rammed and sank a wooden-hulled Filipino boat at anchor northeast of the Spratly Islands, abandoning its crew to be rescued later by a Vietnamese fishing boat. Despite a diplomatic protest from the Philippines, China denied the incident was intentional, calling it an accidental collision. In addition to about 800 to 1,000 commercial fishing boats in the Spratly fleet, China has approximately 200 other vessels as part of a professional maritime militia, according to a November study based on an analysis of official Chinese reports, satellite imagery and other sources.
The autonomously piloted Zhu Hai Yun is believed to be a ship, capable of launching airborne, surface and underwater drones “to carry out marine scientific research,” according to the Chinese state-run Global Times. The ship, which completed its first autonomous sea trial in June, could also create military maps of the South China Sea floor, including important submarine lanes around Taiwan. China’s methods drew the ire of regional rival India last month when it sought to dock the Yuan Wang 5 in Sri Lanka’s Hambantota Port, not far from India’s southeast coast, for refueling at a time that New Delhi was preparing to test a new missile.
The vessel is officially a scientific research ship equipped with sensors that can be used to track satellites, but the same equipment can be used to gather data on a missile launch. Sri Lanka, during an economic crisis and heavily reliant on aid from India, initially declined to allow the ship to dock over India's concerns. But China operates the Hambantota Port, having been granted a 99-year lease on the facility — built with Chinese money — after Sri Lanka defaulted on loans in 2017. After high-level consultations with Beijing, Sri Lankan authorities backtracked and allowed the Yuan Wang 5 to dock from Aug. 16 to Aug. 22. On Aug. 23, India successfully tested its new surface-to-air missile designed to defend a ship from close-range aerial threats.