WASHINGTON (Sputnik) – China’s seizure of an unmanned oceanographic vessel requires a strengthened US military posture in the South China Sea to deter future aggression, Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman John McCain said in a statement.
"This brazen provocation fits a pattern of increasingly destabilizing Chinese behavior…and this behavior will continue until it is met with a strong and determined US response," McCain stated Friday.
China’s navy seized the US research vessel in the South China Sea on Thursday, just as craft’s mother ship was preparing to retrieve it.
The US Department of Defense said the vessel was part of an unclassified program to map underwater channels in the sea, which is claimed by China but recognized as an international waterway by other countries.
