China’s vast distant-water fishing fleets are increasingly blurring the line between commerce and coercion, turning civilian vessels into instruments of grey-zone maritime power
In December 2025, South Korean authorities seized six Chinese vessels fishing illegally inside Seoul’s Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ). In the same month, more than 350 Chinese boats were detected at the edge of Argentina’s EEZ in the South Atlantic, with at least one vessel (Lu Qing Yuan Yu 205) conducting slow, grid-pattern manoeuvres suggestive of unauthorised mapping or surveillance rather than regular fishing. Across multiple maritime theatres, fishing vessels long treated as economic actors under licensing regimes are increasingly operating as instruments of coercion in international waters. Nowhere is this transformation more consequential than in China’s distant-water fishing (DWF) fleet, given its sheer magnitude. China currently has the world’s largest such fleet, with more than 57,000 industrial fishing vessels accounting for 44 percent of the world’s visible fishing activity across the waters of more than 90 countries between 2022 and 2024.
Backed by state subsidies, legal protections, and militia integration frameworks, Chinese fishing vessels increasingly perform grey zone functions of surveillance, signalling, and coercion.
These developments are an extension of grey zone tactics — which lie just below the threshold of armed conflict — and are particularly dangerous in the maritime space, which is already unregulated, congested, and tough to govern. Backed by state subsidies, legal protections, and militia integration frameworks, Chinese fishing vessels increasingly perform grey zone functions of surveillance, signalling, and coercion.
A phenomenon that often enables grey zone activities in the high seas is dark shipping. Dark shipping refers to vessels that patrol and navigate the oceans with their Automatic Identification System (AIS) turned off, evading detection. Consequently, these vessels engage in a variety of illicit activities, including illegal, unregulated and unreported (IUU) fishing; intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR); and loitering in the EEZs of other states. The image below illustrates the contrast between observable and dark vessels: the latter require specialised satellite-based technologies, such as Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) and Radio Frequency (RF) Geolocation, to be tracked.
Image 1. Chinese Dark Vessels (in red) vs Observable Traffic (in white) in the South China Sea.
Source: Unseen Labs
Images 2 and 3. Left: Vessel Presence in the Ecuadorian EEZ with AIS; Right: Dark Vessel Presence in the Ecuadorian EEZ.
Source: Global Fishing Watch
The global footprint of these distant-water fishing fleets can be observed in large clusters of Chinese-flagged vessels that go dark just at the edges of several countries’ EEZs. In March 2025, Argentina deployed military surveillance assets to protect its EEZ from intruding Chinese vessels. These fishing fleets thus use the cloak of darkness when conducting ISR or fishing in other states’ waters.
Chinese DWFs often patrol in large numbers alongside refuelling ships, allowing them to loiter at sea for months. These fishing fleets frequently manoeuvre with the Chinese Coast Guard (CCG) and People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) warships trailing behind. In June 2025, the Philippine Coast Guard reported more than 50 Chinese maritime militia vessels “swarming” Rozul Reef within the Philippines’ EEZ. Between 2021 and 2023, Ecuador tracked around 510 Chinese fishing boats operating near the Galápagos EEZ. Many vessels went dark simultaneously, raising alarms about intelligence gathering and ocean mapping. Moreover, these fleets have been accused of damaging smaller fishing vessels, aiding in the protection of artificial islands, and disrupting licensed oil rigging activities.
These activities introduce a civilian component to maritime coercion, creating asymmetry when Chinese fishing vessels come into contact with the military or commercial vessels of other states. The sheer scale and aggression of its fleet allow China to exert persistent control over maritime spaces.
These ships are also known for their sophisticated, state-sponsored ISR or dual-use capabilities; large water cannon-equipped, reinforced hulls; and armed vessels. In 2018, Beijing provided US$7.2 billion in subsidies to these fleets, including for fishing and oceanographic intelligence gathering. Sometimes, workers stationed on these vessels are tasked solely with enforcing blockades: using intimidation tactics rather than engaging in fishing. These activities introduce a civilian component to maritime coercion, creating asymmetry when Chinese fishing vessels come into contact with the military or commercial vessels of other states. The sheer scale and aggression of its fleet allow China to exert persistent control over maritime spaces.
The Chinese state plays a decisive role in emboldening and equipping these fishing fleets, transforming them into maritime militias through three primary mechanisms:
Financial Role: Fishermen working as maritime militia personnel in state-owned fishing enterprises receive regular salaries. Government subsidies also incentivise the operation of large vessels in disputed waters, but these vessels receive no incentives for actual fishing. According to a Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) report, Chinese State-Owned Enterprises (SOEs), private companies, and provincial governments bear significant funding responsibilities. For example, the PRC Militia Operations Ordinance mandates that local governments provide subsidies to rural residents participating in maritime militia training, while companies and organisations cover lodging and travel expenses for employees attending the same. The report also identified a network of bases in China’s Guangdong and Hainan provinces supporting more than 300 militia vessels owned by at least 30 different companies. This partnership further obscures the relationship between civilian activity and state control.
Legal Backing: Chinese ships going dark and switching off their AIS are governed by the “Personal Information Protection Law of the People’s Republic of China,” passed by the National People’s Congress on November 1, 2021. This prevents the sharing of “personal information” data with foreign non-governmental entities or organisations. In 2016, the Guangdong province established a People’s Armed Forces Department within its provincial Ocean and Fisheries Bureau. This established a joint command system that integrated fisheries monitoring authorities, provincial military command, and maritime militia battalions, thereby institutionalising civil-military fusion.
The Chinese maritime militia operates through decentralised ownership paired with centralised tasking, where subsidies, legal mandates, and PLAN/CCG coordination enable state direction without formal ownership. This decentralised ownership, paired with centralised tasking, sustains grey zone operations by preserving plausible deniability.
Composition: The Chinese government requires maritime militia personnel to train alongside the PLAN and CCG and grants them social benefits linked to sovereignty protection roles. In August 2020, the Ministry of Transport and the Ministry of Veterans Affairs jointly launched the “Spindrift Program,” a vocational skills initiative training retired army veterans. Several shipping companies joined the programme, including Guangxi Hongxiang Shipping Company Ltd, in partnership with the Guangxi provincial government. Under this initiative, 100 veterans were trained and hired, 40 of whom were employed on DWF vessels. This initiative prioritises training veterans for service in the maritime militia, potentially streamlining militia mobilisation by leveraging existing military experience. There is also a rising concern regarding the deployment of “fishermen spies” specifically trained in ISR activities, working closely with the PLAN.
While open-source data indicate that private individuals often own militia vessels, this does not preclude state control. The Chinese maritime militia operates through decentralised ownership paired with centralised tasking, where subsidies, legal mandates, and PLAN/CCG coordination enable state direction without formal ownership. This decentralised ownership, paired with centralised tasking, sustains grey zone operations by preserving plausible deniability.
Beijing’s incursions in the high seas, however, are stretching beyond furtive to furious. In the East China Sea, Chinese fishing vessels have routinely rammed Japanese Coast Guard ships near the Senkaku Islands, most notably during the 2010 collision incident that triggered a prolonged diplomatic standoff. In the Yellow Sea, years of violent encounters have been recorded, including the fatal stabbing of a South Korean Coast Guard officer by a Chinese fisherman, and a separate incident in which three Chinese fishermen were killed in a clash with the Korean Coast Guard over illegal fishing. In 2016, Argentina shot and sank a Chinese SOE-owned trawler found operating in its national waters. However, a year later, the same Chinese vessel was found in the same EEZ under an Argentinian flag.
China’s maritime footprint is not confined to Chinese-flagged vessels alone. There are growing concerns over Chinese SOEs acquiring local companies in different countries to secure access to varying EEZs under their respective flags.
Notably, China’s maritime footprint is not confined to Chinese-flagged vessels alone. There are growing concerns over Chinese SOEs acquiring local companies in different countries to secure access to varying EEZs under their respective flags. China now operates at least 250 such vessels in the waters — and under the flags of — countries including Micronesia, Argentina, Kenya, Ghana, Senegal, Morocco, and Iran, further complicating attribution and enforcement.
Therefore, China’s maritime power is distributed across professional fleets, distant-water fishing vessels, and naval militias that differ in mandate but intentionally overlap in function. Civilian-led fishing vessels are systematically integrated into state command structures, enabling coercive operations under the cover of commercial activity while sustaining ambiguity and deniability.
In the past, maritime actions were relatively easy to track, as they largely followed symmetrical and conventional patterns. However, today, the deliberate use of non-traditional actors and the ambiguous presence of armed, trained fishermen operating dark ships generate complex operational and legal challenges. The significance of this shift lies not only in China’s growing maritime reach but in the precedent it sets. As norms erode and enforcement falters, the line between peace and coercion at sea grows ever thinner. Addressing this challenge requires more than naval presence; it demands a re-conceptualisation of maritime security that accounts for hybrid actors, civilianised coercion, and the weaponisation of ambiguity. Failing to do so risks normalising a naval order in which power is exercised without accountability, and aggression is disguised as commerce.
Sweekriti Pathak is a Research Intern at the Observer Research Foundation.
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Sweekriti Pathak is a Research Intern at the Observer Research Foundation. ...
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