A rather adjustable maritime incident was reported on August 13, 2025, with China indicating that it monitored and “took away” the US destroyer USS Higgins from Scarborough Shoal, which is also claimed by China, in the South China Sea. This is the first reported naval activity by the US in the region in at least six years.
China’s Southern Theatre Command characterised US destroyers’ naval maneuvers “an unreasonable act” and stated that the destroyer entered “without approval of the Chinese government” and “grossly infringed China’s sovereignty and security interests,” and “grossly undermined peace and stability” in the maritime area. At this point, the US has not made any statement and neither the Indo-Pacific Command nor the US Embassy in Beijing wanted to comment about the encounter.
The incident occurs during competing territorial interests; Scarborough Shoal has multiple regional claimants and some explanation of the Scarborough situation is warranted. In 2016 an international tribunal issued a comprehensive ruling which stated that China’s claims to historic rights lack an independent legal basis under international law and thus, as a non-party to the ruling, did not enforce and ruled against China.
