Over the South China Sea, Increasingly Close Encounters

A U.S. Navy EP-3E electronic eavesdropping aircraft with its 24-person crew was forced to land in China after colliding with a Chinese Jian-8 fighter over the South China Sea March 31. The incident is part of a recent pattern of increasingly close encounters between American and Chinese military aircraft. There are reasons to believe Chinese commanders are ordering their jets to fly dramatically closer to American surveillance flights. In the long term, however, Washington and Beijing are likely to avoid a crisis and seek a diplomatic solution.