The People's Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) and Russia's Pacific Fleet will conduct joint naval exercises in undisputed portions of the South China Sea.

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The PLAN will likely send more warships to this drill than it did to a similar Sino-Russo naval maneuver held in 2013 to send a message of strength to the United States and its Asian allies.

The naval drill will be held in September, said Senior Colonel Yang Yujun, spokesperson of the Chinese Ministry of National Defense. It will seek to deepen relations between the two navies and boost their capacity to respond to maritime threats.

Col. Yang took pains to say the naval wargames aren't targeted at any third parties, an obvious reference to the United States, Japan and its allies standing up to China's claim to own the South China Sea based on baseless "historic rights."

That claim was nullified and declared illegal last July 12 by the Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA) in The Hague. The court ruled there was no legal basis for China to claim historic rights to resources within the sea areas falling within the "nine-dash line" China uses to claim the entirety of the South China Sea.

Beijing declared the ruling null and void despite ratifying the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea that bound China to accept the legally binding ruling. The U.S. has called on China to accept the ruling that defends the rules-based international order. It has two aircraft carrier groups with 140 aircraft patrolling the South China Sea.

Russia has supported China's rejection of the move by the Philippines to bring the South China Sea case before PCA and said countries without a direct claim to territory should stay impartial, a reference to the U.S.

This won't be the first time China and Russia have held joint naval exercises in Asia. Warships from the Pacific Fleet and the PLAN's North Sea Fleet based in Qingdao held the Joint Sea 2013 bilateral naval maneuvers at the Peter the Great Bay, the largest gulf in the Sea of Japan, from July 5 to 12, 2013. This was the largest naval exercise taken part in by the PLAN.

The Russian Pacific Fleet based in Vladivostok is the strongest fleet in the Russian Navy. Its surface combatants include the cruiser Varyag and five destroyers. It commands 15 modern nuclear ballistic missile, nuclear attack and nuclear cruise missile submarines.

The North Sea Fleet is the most important of the three fleets in the PLAN as it is responsible for the defense of Beijing and any attack on Taiwan. Its surface warships include six destroyers, including the flagship, Harbin; 10 frigates and seven corvettes.

Its submarine force consists of five nuclear attack submarines and 15 diesel electric submarines.

TagsPeople's Liberation Army Navy, Pacific fleet, joint naval exercises, South China Sea, Permanent Court of Arbitration, nine dash line