Contests of Initiative: Countering China's Gray Zone Strategy in the East and South China Seas

China is engaged in a widespread assertion of sovereignty in the South and East China Seas. It employs a "gray zone" strategy: using coercive but sub-conventional military power to drive off challengers and prevent escalation, while simultaneously seizing territory and asserting maritime control.

Contests of Initiative: Confronting China's Gray Zone Strategy provides three courses of action for the US and its Asian security partners to preserve regional peace, uphold freedom of the seas, and...