Two US warships sail through Taiwan Strait in challenge to China

Destroyers William P Lawrence and Stethem transited through the waterway on Sunday as Pentagon ups the ante with Beijing

Reuters

The guided-missile destroyer USS Stethem, pictured, sailed through the Taiwan Strait with USS William P Lawrence on Sunday. 

The US military has sent two navy warships through the Taiwan Strait as the Pentagon increases the frequency of movement through the strategic waterway despite opposition from China.
Sunday’s voyage risks further raising tensions with China but will likely be viewed by Taiwan as a sign of support from the Trump administration amid growing friction between Taipei and Beijing.

Taiwan is one of a growing number of flashpoints in the US-China relationship, which also include a trade war, US sanctions and China’s increasingly muscular military posture in the South China Sea, where the United States also conducts freedom-of-navigation patrols.
The two destroyers were identified as the William P Lawrence and Stethem. 

The 180km-wide (112-mile) Taiwan Strait separates Taiwan from China.
“The ships’ transit through the Taiwan Strait demonstrates the US commitment to a free and open Indo-Pacific,” Commander Clay Doss, a spokesman for the US navy’s seventh fleet, said in a statement.
Doss said there were no unsafe or unprofessional interactions with other countries’ vessels during the transit.
Taiwan’s defence ministry said the US ships had sailed north through the strait.
“US ships freely passing through the Taiwan Strait is part of the mission of carrying out the Indo-Pacific strategy,” it said in a statement.
There was no immediate comment from China.
The United States has no formal ties with Taiwan but is bound by law to help provide the island with the means to defend itself and is its main source of arms.
The Pentagon says Washington has sold Taipei more than $15bn in weaponry since 2010.
China has been ramping up pressure to assert its sovereignty over the island, which it considers a wayward province of “one China” and "sacred" Chinese territory.
It said a recent Taiwan Strait passage by a French warship, first reported by Reuters on Wednesday, was “illegal”.
Beijing’s concerns about Taiwan are likely to factor strongly into this year’s Chinese defense budget, following a stern New Year’s speech from Xi Jinping, threatening to attack Taiwan should it not accept Chinese rule.
China has repeatedly sent military aircraft and ships to circle the island on drills in the past few years and worked to isolate it internationally, whittling down its few remaining diplomatic allies.

US warships sail through the Taiwan Strait again, putting pressure on Beijing

• Two US Navy warships — the destroyer USS Stethem and the fleet oiler USNS Cesar Chavez — conducted a routine Taiwan Strait transit Monday.
• The passage sent the message to Beijing that the US will "fly, sail, and operate wherever international law allows" and that these trips through the closely watched waterway will occur regularly.
• Monday's trip marks the fourth since October and the fifth since the US Navy restarted the practice of sending surface combatants through the strait last July.
• Chinese warships trailed the US ships.
• News of the latest transit comes as the Trump administration announces that the US and China are close to an agreement on trade.

By Ryan Pickrell

Two US Navy warships sailed through the Taiwan Strait on Monday, sending a message to Beijing, which has warned the US to "tread lightly" in the closely watched waterway.
The Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer USS Stethem and the replenishment oiler USNS Cesar Chavez navigated a "routine" Taiwan Strait transit Monday, the US Pacific Fleet told Business Insider in an emailed statement.
"The ships' transit through the Taiwan Strait demonstrates the US commitment to a free and open Indo-Pacific. The US Navy will continue to fly, sail and operate anywhere international law allows," the Pacific Fleet said.
The two US Navy vessels that passed through the Taiwan Strait were shadowed by People's Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) warships.
The passage is the fourth since October and the fifth since the US Navy restarted the practice of sending surface combatants through the strait last July.
The Taiwan Strait is a roughly 80-mile international waterway that separates the democratic island from the communist mainland, and China regularly bristles when US Navy vessels sail through. When a US destroyer and a fleet oiler transited the strait in January, the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs called the passage "provocative behavior," accusing the US of "threatening the safety" of those nearby.
Beijing considers Taiwan, a self-ruled territory, to be a renegade province, and it firmly opposes US military support for the island, be that arms sales, protection assurances, or even just the US military operating in the area. 

China has repeatedly urged the US to keep its distance from Taiwan, but the US Navy has continued its "routine" trips through the strait. 

"We see the Taiwan Strait as another (stretch of) international waters, so that's why we do the transits," Chief of Naval Operations Adm. John Richardson said in January.
The rhetoric used by the Navy to characterize the Taiwan Strait transits is almost identical to that used to describe US freedom-of-navigation operations (FONOPs) in the South China Sea.
The Navy has already conducted two FONOPs this year, angering Beijing both times.