Clear and present dangers from US' self-appointed role

The high-profiled dispatch of a US naval ship into the South China Sea on Tuesday is not just bullying, but also ill-advised.

The message sent by the destroyer USS Lassen is that the mighty US military and navy is not to be challenged by any other country in the world.

It was just like the Taiwan Strait crisis in 1996 when the then-US president Bill Clinton ordered two US aircraft carrier strike groups into the region as a show of force.