As disruptive as China’s third sea force is already today, soon the situation is likely to get still worse. Maritime Militia capabilities are poised to expand further as Beijing’s desire to “win without fighting” (coercion without killing) through calibrated South China Sea operations grows and a small but potent contingent of demobilized military forces are becoming available as a result of Xi Jinping’s three-hundred-thousand-troop downsizing to make the PLA—literally—leaner and meaner. Veterans, after all, constitute a priority recruitment target for militia organizations in China. And Beijing’s ongoing development and fortification of artificial islands in the South China Sea will further support Maritime Militia presence and capabilities.

Responding to signals from Beijing, China’s newly established National Defense Mobilization Department of the Central Military Commission is promulgating national guidelines for reserve force construction in the Thirteenth Five-Year Plan, with the Maritime Militia featured prominently and given a category of its own. These guidelines have trickled down to the provinces, with new Maritime Militia units proliferating along China’s coastline. A growing network of localities has vastly expanded the scale and scope of their Maritime Militia forces. Most prominently, the PLA Beihai City Military Command in the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region told China Daily that “the proportion of maritime militia in the city increased tenfold over the past two years, from less than 2 percent at the end of 2013 to more than 20 percent last year.” This entailed a buildup from two detachments totaling two hundred Maritime Militia in 2013 to ten detachments totaling over two thousand personnel by 2015. Such expansion enabled the sea force “to play a bigger role in drills organized by the PLA Navy,” for a total of seven in 2015. Sr. Col. Xu Qingduan, head of the command, stated that “the city’s maritime militia has been required to take part in more air and naval exercises since 2014.”

Expansion of the Maritime Militia at the expense of the land militia prompted Beihai city government and military departments “to give more favorable policies and financial support to the civilian sea force.” Xu’s command explained further that its Maritime Militia had recruited “A number of Navy veterans and experienced sailors . . . and 10 specialized teams have been established for transport, reconnaissance, obstacle clearance, medical service and equipment repair. The maritime militia recently worked with Navy warships in a joint operation drill and successfully fulfilled their designated tasks.” Meanwhile, Hainan Province’s Sansha city “is enhancing its maritime militia’s training and giving more duties to the force.” Guangdong Province’s Jiangmen city “is also organizing realistic sea operation exercises for local militiamen to strengthen their combat capability.”

High Time to Unmask China’s Third Sea Force

Clearly, the capabilities of China’s Maritime Militia are significant and growing. It has performed with distinction in war, helped augment and develop contested features, and participated in many international incidents at Beijing’s behest. These forces have appeared during U.S. freedom of navigation operations, and may well be used in the future to render such operations more complicated and risky. All the more reason that Washington needs to understand, and counter, Beijing’s Little Blue Men now.

Before another incident involving China’s Maritime Militia and American forces erupts, the U.S. government must get out in front of the problem with its own authoritative statements. Surprisingly, however, to date no U.S. government report or Washington-based official has publicly mentioned China’s third sea force. If the U.S. government, with all its resources and capabilities, has not yet begun to address this challenge openly and proactively, how can it expect its Southeast Asian partners—on the front lines of freedom to access and keep open a critical portion of the global commons—to do so? Most recently, the failure of the Pentagon’s 2016 China military power report to reference maritime militia at all was a major missed opportunity. Congress should ensure that the 2017 report has extensive coverage.

Until Washington finally seizes the initiative in the information space, the next best thing is for researchers to document and publicize the facts. Sunlight is the best disinfectant, and immediately dispels shadows in which irregular forces can lurk. Clearing up ambiguities in the identities and intentions of China’s Maritime Militia also renders void some of its advantages, possibly precluding potential incidents involving their use by convincing Chinese decisionmakers and militiamen alike that it might not be effective. To that end, we offer the following key points:

1. China’s Maritime Militia is a military force—often in disguise.

China’s Maritime Militia is designed to superficially appear “civilian” in certain respects and contexts, and to certain audiences—including by being given considerable leeway regarding when to wear the military uniforms in which they typically train. An article in China’s official military newspaper encapsulates the desired deception: “Putting on camouflage, they qualify as soldiers; taking off the camouflage, they become law-abiding fishermen.” Demonstrably authoritative Chinese sources document conclusively that members of China’s Maritime Militia are in fact state actors reporting to, and directed by, the PLA chain of command and other elements of China’s government to conduct Chinese state-sponsored activities.

In fact, in such international skirmishes as the Paracels Battle of 1974, the Impeccable incident of 2009 and the HYSY-981 oil rig incident of 2014, members of China’s Maritime Militia have been clearly observed integrating with, and operating in close coordination with, China’s other two sea forces. During the harassment of USNS Impeccable, a crew member on a fishing trawler registered to a Maritime Militia organization and piloted by a militia cadre infamously attempted to snag Impeccable’s towed array with a grappling hook after the American ship was forced to a halt by dangerous maneuvers from the trawler, another trawler and two coast guard vessels acting together, as a PLAN warship watched nearby. Nor was this an isolated attempt. In 2011, a Chinese trawler snagged itself on the towed cable of Vietnam’s Viking 2 survey vessel, halting its operations.

To incentivize such risky state service, localities such as Danzhou in Hainan Province (home to the militia that helped China seize the western Paracels from Vietnam in 1974) provide militia personnel with a “pension” of 56,400 yuan ($8,636) a year if they are disabled in the line of duty—the same benefits that other government employees receive, and solid motivation in a rural Chinese fishing village. This is in addition to a slew of other subsidies, as well as political indoctrination and glorification, bestowed upon citizens furthering China’s maritime sovereignty claims and interests.

Moreover, official Chinese sources document unambiguously that some of China’s most advanced Maritime Militia units—precisely the sort that would be entrusted with “rights protection” and other missions potentially requiring hazardous interaction with U.S. and other foreign forces—are receiving training directly from uniformed PLAN personnel while wearing their own Maritime Militia uniforms. Maritime Militia units are typically linked to the PLA chain of command directly through People’s Armed Forces Departments (PAFDs), their direct managers for recruitment, planning, organization, training and policy execution.

2. China’s Maritime Militia forces do not deserve civilian protections during conflict.

At a “mandatory wicket” level, through which Maritime Militia communications and directives—such as mobilization and mission orders—must typically pass, county-level PAFDs are staffed by active duty PLA personnel. This direct Chinese military and government chain-of-command linkage should disqualify China’s Maritime Militia members from the special treatment accorded true civilians.

China’s current approach thus puts in danger its Maritime Militia personnel and any other individuals and vessels around them, as it imposes a risk of force being used against them by U.S. or other forces in legitimate self-defense or to otherwise legally ensure legitimate passage of vessels or other operations. The engagement in potentially escalatory behavior by China’s Maritime Militia members, with the implicit assumption that such activities are purely civilian and therefore should not be regarded as escalatory, in fact greatly raises the chances of miscalculation on the part of American, Chinese and other forces—and hence for dangerous escalation.

To increase transparency and mutual awareness concerning an important area for crisis avoidance, crisis management, escalation control, and the highlighting and use of de-escalatory off-ramps in the event of any use of force or other destabilizing incident, it is therefore extremely important for the United States to fully and publicly acknowledge the existence and nature of China’s Maritime Militia—and to discuss in detail its attributes, its potential employment, and the consequences that may be faced by it and other Chinese government actors in certain contingencies. Beijing would not allow random fishermen to harass foreign vessels in sensitive sea areas; any elements that ignore repeated warnings by U.S. Navy vessels to desist from disruptive activities should be treated as military-controlled and dealt with accordingly.

3. Uncovering the truth about China’s Maritime Militia is the best way to deter it.

Even if Chinese interlocutors profess ignorance or decline to discuss these matters initially, they will bring American messages with them back to Beijing. Those messages need to be clear and consistent, starting with “We’re wise to your game” and moving to “It won’t stop our legal efforts to ensure access and keep the peace.” Adm. Scott Swift, commander of the U.S. Pacific Fleet, has taken the extremely positive initial step of raising the issue of the Maritime Militia with PLAN Commander Adm. Wu Shengli. Swift emphasized the importance of “ensuring that regional naval forces, including coast guards and maritime militia, continue to behave professionally and in accordance with international norms, standards, rules and laws.” But far more needs to be done; by far more U.S. officials, especially high-ranking Washington-based civilians; with far more public communication; and with clear, explicit emphasis from President Obama and his administration.