The United States sends the Coast Guard away from home to confront China

In early December, the crew of the U.S. Coast Guard cutter Myrtle Hazard sailed overnight, moored off Palau Island in the Pacific Ocean, and boarded a group of Chinese boats to confiscate tens of thousands of dollars of supposedly illegally harvested sea cucumbers.

The responsive cutter operates approximately 6,600 miles from the continental United States and about 750 miles from its original port in American Guam, and is part of the Coast Guard’s newest growth area: helping counter China’s growing naval power in the Pacific.

China has taken concerted action by the fishing fleets, coast guards and the navy Stability in the South China Sea. It also has a growing presence in the South and Central Pacific. Chinese fishing fleets have spread around island countries such as Kiribati and Tuvalu, which have some of the richest tuna fisheries in the world, and the Chinese Navy has also established its presence in the region, including stopping warships in the region. Sydney in 2019 and ship visits to Fiji Maritime Hospital in 2018.

The U.S. Coast Guard is responding in the area. In the past few months, two of the most advanced new cutting tools have been installed in Guam, about 4,000 miles from Shanghai from San Francisco. Another arrival is expected in the coming months. For the first time, the Coast Guard has an attachment at the United States Embassy in Canberra, Australia, and another will move to Singapore next year.

The Coast Guard is steadily increasing its activities in the western Pacific Ocean and off the coast of China. Incisors were deployed to the Western Pacific for more than 10 months in 2019 to work with the United States Navy’s Seventh Fleet. One, USCGC Bertholf, It crossed the strait in a sign of defiance to China, The first U.S. Coast Guard ship to undertake a highly political expedition.