China’s renaming campaign part of international power play

Rahul Mishra writes for the Gatestone Institute about one of communist China’s latest dubious actions.

Just as China has been attempting to redraw maritime boundaries in the South China Sea —renaming reefs, building artificial islands and militarizing waters in defiance of international rulings — it is now exporting a similar playbook to land borders. These moves are about more than maps. They are about creating a norm of impunity, where might makes right and ambiguity is weaponized.

Over the past two decades, China has transformed contested reefs, shoals and rocks into militarily fortified islands, backed by creative “historical” narratives, domestic law, and a selective reading of international norms. The region is now a textbook case of how intangible symbolic acts, when repeated enough to become normalized, can evolve into tangible material dominance.

In 2020 alone, China, in the same way it has renamed places in Arunachal Pradesh, renamed more than 80 features in the South China Sea. These were not acts of housekeeping, but of strategic myth-making, designed to weave a narrative of historical ownership and administrative control. Each new name is backed by maps, public pronouncements and military deployments. Over time, this creates “facts on the ground” — realities that others must deal with, regardless of legality.

Finally, China employs narrative warfare, by leveraging state media and diplomatic messaging to delegitimize counter-claims and cast China as the aggrieved party.

China’s renaming campaign is a test of whether the world will allow international borders to be changed — not by war, but by quiet, obdurate manipulation. The question is not about words. It is about the survival of an international rules-based order that is being eroded by passively doing nothing to confront unyielding infiltration.

If the international community does not push back against China’s provocations — which may seem minor — it risks enabling a model of complete surrender that bypasses diplomacy, multilateralism and international law.

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