322 { China’s Quest
the Paracel Islands was ripe in 1974, as described below. And seizure of the
Paracels would show CCP leaders how realistic and pragmatic moves, rather
than extreme ideology, could strengthen China’s international position.
Hanoi, for its part, believed that most of the islands in the South China
Sea belonged to Vietnam, but it kept silent about those beliefs during North
Vietnam’s long and desperate war with the United States—in other words,
while Hanoi needed China’s help. Starting in 1959, small confrontations
occurred between Chinese and South Vietnamese personnel on islands in the
South China Sea, leading the Chinese MFA to issue a protest against South
Vietnam’s violations of China’s territorial sovereignty. On these occasions,
Hanoi said nothing. US military forces also conducted intense operations
in the South China Sea as part of the long war with North Vietnam. The
fact that China believed those activities were conducted on Chinese territory
deepened the “contradictions” between Washington and Hanoi. Hanoi would
have gained nothing by asserting its own ownership of these territories. Thus
Hanoi stayed silent—until the Americans had been defeated.
Before that happened, however, and while the US-DRV war was still un-
derway, in 1970 the PLA navy began sending ships to the Paracels to collect
meteorological and oceanic data. PLA forces then proceeded to set up small
but permanent stations on islands in the eastern Amphitrite group of the
Paracels. At that time, there were also a small number of South Vietnamese
forces on several tiny islands in the western group of the Paracels. In 1972, the
Saigon government began to contract blocks of the South China Sea floor to
international oil majors for petroleum exploration.^18 In the Chinese account,
in mid-January 1974 South Vietnamese forces fired on Chinese soldiers in
the western Crescent group, leading PLA forces to return fire in self-defense.
In response, on January 18–20, 1974, Ye Jianying and Deng Xiaoping’s lead-
ership small group ordered the occupation of the South Vietnamese–held
islands. Several hundred PLA soldiers were shifted quickly from Woody
Island in the eastern group to overwhelm the small South Vietnamese gar-
risons on islands in the western group.^19 The confrontation culminated in a
thirty-seven-minute clash on January 19 in which a South Vietnamese cor-
vette was sunk and other South Vietnamese ships retreated from the scene,
leaving the contested islands under full Chinese control. An American
advisor captured with the South Vietnamese was quietly repatriated to US
custody in Hong Kong several weeks after Chinese forces took the islands.
The PLA then moved to consolidate control over the entire Paracel group,
using Woody Island as a base for a push from to the Spratlys a decade later.
Figure 12-1 illustrates the Paracel and Spratly Islands.
January 1974 was an opportune time for Beijing to take the Paracels. Hanoi
was still locked in confrontation with the Saigon regime. Not until October
1974 (two months after Richard Nixon’s resignation as president) would the
VWP decide to launch the offensive that would begin in December and end