China will not swallow bitter pill of humiliation

China's announcement on Sunday that it will hold military drills around the Xisha Islands in the South China Sea in the coming week has naturally drawn a lot of media attention, given an arbitration tribunal in The Hague is due to deliver its ruling in the Philippines' case on July 12. The ruling is widely anticipated to go against China.

Despite China rightly rejecting the arbitration case on the grounds that the court has no jurisdiction, the Philippines and its main ally the United States have pushed to internationalize the issue.

They see the upcoming ruling as a chance not only to invalidate China's territorial claims in the South China Sea, but also an opportunity to reinforce their portrayal of the country as an outcast from a rules-based international community.