ABSTRACT
As of 2019, the PLAN is now the largest navy in the world with over 300 ships, almost two dozen more than the US Navy, although the US ships tend to be larger, including 11 nuclear-powered aircraft carriers. As a result of its modernization efforts, the PLAN has become better equipped to face up to its geographic responsibilities, especially in the Western Pacific. These include complicated territorial disputes with Japan, tensions over the Taiwan Strait, and disputed sovereignty over the South China Sea. The post-9/11 “Global War on Terror” (GWOT) also changed the geopolitical landscape in which the PLAN operated; PLAN ships even provided critical antipiracy patrols in the Guld of Aden. While China has publicly supported international efforts to resolve maritime problems, and even signed and ratified UNCLOS, it has not disavowed unilateral measures and has to date blatantly ignored the Permanent Court of Arbitration’s 12 July 2016 anti-China decision on the South China Sea, instead claiming the entire region as historic Chinese waters.
