What Is This World Coming To?

Chinese vessels “shadowed and aggressively maneuvered in dangerously close proximity” to the USNS Impeccable, an unarmed ocean surveillance vessel, with one ship coming within 25 feet, a U.S. Defense Department statement said.

At one point during the incident Sunday the unarmed USNS Impeccable turned fire hoses on an approaching Chinese ship in self defense, the Pentagon said. At another point a Chinese ship played chicken with the Americans, stopping dead in front of the Impeccable as it tried to sail away, forcing the civilian mariners to slam on the brakes.

Tropical Hainan, less than 100 km 60 miles south of the mainland, hosts a Chinese naval base that houses ballistic missile submarines, according to independent analysts.

An unnamed spokesman for the Chinese embassy in Washington earlier denied the Chinese ships had violated maritime rules and said U.S. ships had been conducting illegal surveying, the website of Hong Kong-based Phoenix Television news.ifeng.com reported.

It said the incident happened 120 km 70 miles south of the island.

via China says U.S. naval ship broke the law | Reuters.