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Will armed conflict begin in the South China Sea before 2019?

In August 2021, The United States and China clashed over Beijing’s actions in the South China Sea - a region recognized as one of the world’s most volatile international hotspots - at a high-level U.N. Security Council meeting on maritime security.

The sea is known by different names in the countries surrounding it, primarily China, Vietnam, Malaysia, and the Philippines. Each of the nations has asserted territorial claims over portions of the sea and its islands, claims which overlap. What is at stake is the control of the busy fishing and shipping region, as well as the vast estimated oil and gas reserves in the South China Sea floor.

The Spratly Islands compose some of the most hotly contested territory. The 14 islands and around 100 reefs and atolls are occupied by military personnel from China, Taiwan, Malaysia, the Philippines, and Vietnam.

Disputes over the South China Sea date back to the 1940s, and continue to this day. China has emerged as the most aggressive claimant, and has built military fortifications, airstrips, and artificial islands in the sea.

In July 2016, the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea ruled in favor of the Philippines that China had no historical right to its claimed territory, typically known as the "nine-dash-line" map. Neither China nor Taiwan has accepted the ruling.

And over the past five years, the risk of armed conflict has risen as various states have asserted and attacked claims to contested waters and island chains more strongly in response to China’s increasing dominance and the growing involvement of the United States and its allies. In an incident in July 2021, China’s military chased a U.S. warship from an area that it claims in the South China Sea, a statement the U.S. Navy called false.

Comments from world leaders suggest that the territorial disputes in the sea could erupt into armed conflict. U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken - at the August 2021 U.N. Security Council meeting - responded to China’s increasingly assertive claims to parts of the South China Sea, despite the ruling of an international tribunal five years ago rejecting its claims, by warning that conflict there or in any ocean “would have serious global consequences for security and for commerce.”

China’s deputy ambassador, Dai Bing, shot back by accusing the United States of becoming “the biggest threat to peace and stability in the South China Sea” and calling its “hype” in the Security Council “entirely politically motivated.” The rhetoric appears to not have escalated since this exchange, yet tensions in the region remain high.

Will there be an armed conflict in the South China Sea before 2023?

For the purposes of this question, armed conflict is defined as incompatibility that concerns government and/or territory where the use of armed force between two parties, of which at least one is the government of a state, results in at least 1 battle-related deaths in one calendar year.

This question will resolve positively if at least three credible, verified news sources report that at least 1 battle-related death in the South China Sea, between any state actors, related to enforcing territorial claims, in 2022.