Editing South China Sea (section)

==Geology==
{{See also|Tectonics of the South China Sea}}
[[File:Mui Ne4.jpg|thumb|Sunset on the South China Sea off [[Mũi Né]] village on the south-east coast of [[Vietnam]]]]
The sea lies above a drowned [[continental shelf]]; during [[Quaternary glaciation|recent ice ages]] global sea level was hundreds of metres lower, and [[Borneo]] was part of the Asian mainland.

The South China Sea opened around [[Eocene|45 million years ago]] when the "[[Dangerous Ground (South China Sea)|Dangerous Ground]]" rifted away from southern China. Extension culminated in [[seafloor spreading]] around 30 million years ago, a process that propagated to the southwest resulting in the V-shaped basin we see today. Extension ceased around 17 million years ago.<ref>{{cite book|url=http://idm.gov.vn/Nguon_luc/Xuat_ban/Anpham/Tracuu_PVDC/B3.htm#BienDong|title=Lexicon of Geological Units of Viet Nam|publisher=Department of Geology and Mineral of Việt Nam|author1=Trần Tất Thắng |author2=Tống Duy Thanh |author3=Vũ Khúc |author4=Trịnh Dánh |author5=Đào Đình Thục |author6=Trần Văn Trị |author7=Lê Duy Bách|year=2000}}</ref> 

Arguments have continued about the role of tectonic extrusion in forming the basin. [[Paul Tapponnier]] and colleagues have argued that as India collides with Asia it pushes [[Indochina]] to the southeast. The relative shear between Indochina and China caused the South China Sea to open.<ref>{{cite book|author1=Jon Erickson|author2=Ernest Hathaway Muller|title=Rock Formations and Unusual Geologic Structures: Exploring the Earth's Surface|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=DvlP-P7xctEC|year=2009|publisher=Infobase Publishing|isbn=978-1-4381-0970-1|page=[https://books.google.com/books?id=DvlP–P7xctEC&pg=PA91 91]}}</ref> This view is disputed by geologists who do not consider Indochina to have moved far relative to mainland Asia. Marine geophysical studies in the Gulf of Tonkin by [[Peter Clift]] has shown that the [[Red River Fault]] was active and causing basin formation at least by 37 million years ago in the northwest South China Sea, consistent with extrusion playing a part in the formation of the sea.{{cn|date=September 2024}} Since opening, the South China Sea has been the repository of large sediment volumes delivered by the Mekong River, Red River and Pearl River. Several of these deltas are rich in oil and gas deposits.{{cn|date=September 2024}}