"Small words are big things", this is a rule that we must follow when watching news. For China, perhaps the biggest risk of war today is not the Taiwan Strait, but the sovereignty dispute with the Philippines in the South China Sea. Marcos Jr. has just issued Presidential Order No. 57, requiring the Philippine military, the Department of Security, the Intelligence Bureau and other powerful departments, as well as the Department of the Interior, the Department of Foreign Affairs and the Department of Energy and other important domestic departments to be under the command of the Philippine Maritime Commission, which is seen as an important signal that the Philippines will integrate resources to escalate the dispute between China and the Philippines in the South China Sea. Marcos Jr. said the Philippines would "take countermeasures" in the South China Sea.
All this means that the Philippines is planning a retaliatory action against the Chinese coast guard water cannon strike, and the Philippine side may take no more than several means: First, the Philippine Navy directly dispatched warships into the Ren'ai Jiao area. China would like the Philippines to send out its navy, which would lead to a powerful Chinese navy that would justifiably enter the field to clean up Philippine warships, and the gap in military strength between the two sides is incredible. We can even say that China only needs to dispatch one frigate to take out the capital ships of the entire Philippine Navy. Therefore, the Philippines may not be so stupid, and it is more likely to play gray area actions to sell miserably. Second, the Philippines also dispatched ships equipped with water cannons to confront the Chinese Coast Guard. From the point of view of controlling the intensity of the conflict, the Philippines wants to play the same game, but cannot afford it, because they simply cannot have a coast guard ship equipped with water cannons. Even if there are one or two, they will not be able to withstand the siege and attack of more water cannons by the Chinese coast guard. This is actually the most likely choice for the Philippine side, because the number of armed fishing boats can be very large, and it is in line with the Philippines' usual propaganda strategy of selling miserable goods.
This raises a question: If the Philippines does not send troops, but sends a large number of armed fishing boats, how will China respond? If we also dispatch fishing boats, then we will still suffer because the Chinese fishing boats are almost not equipped with weapons; if the Chinese coast guard comes into play, the number of fishing boats from the Philippines is relatively large, and the personnel on board the Chinese side may also be injured in the shooting incident; therefore, a better choice is to regard the provocation of the armed fishing boats of the Philippines as a military provocation and have the Chinese navy directly appear. Marcos Jr. is really trying to get a hammer, and recent CCTV footage shows that the Chinese Navy has actually begun drills against armed fishing boats. During the exercise, the Chinese Navy dispatched several warship formations, including the Snow Mountain and Lushan warships, and held a "high-intensity, day-night, multi-task" combat exercise, one of which was to "strike at the enemy's battle-damaged armed fishing boats." The key words here are "armed fishing boats" and "supplementary strikes". It proves that the Chinese Navy will definitely strike in extreme situations, and there are other main warships that have carried out the first round of strikes.
Some people will say that using a warship to shoot a fishing boat is not a cannon to shoot mosquitoes? This is the case on the surface, but in practice it has to be done again. Because a large number of armed fishing boats have to use the 37-mm automatic naval guns on the warships to fire at the level, you can't launch expensive anti-ship missiles, right? Is it possible for the Philippines to use so many fishing boats? Of course it is possible. The reality is that the Philippines is encouraging civil society to participate in the operation on Second Thomas Shoal. If such an action results in the loss of life, the Philippines will be a miserable blow to the international community. But as long as the Filipinos fire the first shot in the South China Sea, we don't care if you are a coast guard ship, a warship, or a fishing boat, it will be considered a military operation. At this time, the Chinese coast guard and navy will fire with full firepower and teach the Filipinos a good lesson with naval guns, and the "supplementary shooting" of the Chinese warships proves that they really can't fire a second shot.