China Shocked: U.S. guidedmissile destroyer sailed through the Paracel Island amid tension SCS.

The United States contested these illegal limits imposed by the PRC, Taiwan, and Vietnam by participating in innocent passage without notifying or requesting permission from any of the claimants in advance. As the US established, such limitations do not apply to innocent transit. It was also during this operation that China's assertion of a strait baseline over the Paracels—the Xisha Islands in Chinese—was put to the test. Warships transiting the island group, according to Beijing, require advance warning before entering.