WHAT is the motive behind the 10-dash line? Is it sheer chutzpah on the part of China whose nine-dash line is already proving to be stranger than fiction? Why incur the ire of the world yet one more time?

What China basically did was to take the base dash in the U-shaped nine-dash line situated near Natuna island and slap-cut-and-paste it to the southeast of Taiwan and then for good measure, added another dash northeast, and accordingly, adjusted the rest of the dashes to encroach even closer on the shorelines of Southeast Asian countries.