Chinese salami slicing strategy

China's outposts in the disputed South China Sea are often cited as examples of a "salami slicing" tactic. Map depicts 2015.

China's salami slicing (Chinese: 蚕食; pinyin: Cán shí; transl. "nibbling like a silkworm"[1]) is a geopolitical strategy involving a series of small steps allegedly taken by the government of China that would become a larger gain which would have been difficult or unlawful to perform all at once.[2][3][4] When discussing this concept, notedly debated in the publications of the Lowy Institute from Australia, some defenders of the concept are Brahma Chellaney, Jasjit Singh, Bipin Rawat or the ORF from India or the USIP, Bonnie S. Glaser (CSIS) or Erik Voeten (Washington Post) from the US, while detractors are H. S. Panag from India or Linda Jakobson. Advocates[who?] of the term have cited examples such as the territorial disputes in the South China Sea and along the Sino-Indian border.

  1. ^ Robert Barnett, China Is Building Entire Villages in Another Country’s Territory Archived 2021-08-07 at the Wayback Machine, Foreign Policy, 7 May 2021.
  2. ^ Cite error: The named reference Chellaney 2013 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  3. ^ Poker, chess and Go: How the US should respond in the South China Sea Archived 2020-11-11 at the Wayback Machine, Lowy Institute, 21 July 2016
  4. ^ China’s biggest ally in the South China Sea? A volcano in the Philippines Archived 2021-03-27 at the Wayback Machine, Quartz, 10 July 2017.