The failure of the Obama administration to defend the Philippines in early 2012, in a confrontation similar to today's, emboldened China's regime to adopt an even more aggressive posture in its peripheral waters. China claims all the waters inside the dashes are sovereign as well, terming them "blue national soil." There is no legal basis for an assertion of sovereignty of this sort. Whitsun, which Manila calls Julian Felipe Reef, is 175 nautical miles from Palawan, an island of the Philippines. The feature is within the Philippine "exclusive economic zone"....