French Ships to SCS: Pushback to China.

France has been sending navy ships to the contested South China Sea (SCS) and East China Seas as a pushback against China and also against North Korean smuggling. This comes amid France's moves to increase its presence in the Indo-Pacific to back US President  Biden's call for a multilateral response to China's assertiveness.

French missions in the Pacific, from November 2020 to February 2021, included the (NATO designation French Ship (FS)) Emeraude (a Rubis-class SSN) and its support ship FS Seine. 

Also Pacific based (homeport Tahiti) Floreal-class frigate FS Prairial will patrol the East China Sea from March 2021, against ship-to-ship smuggling involving North Korea. 

The amphibious warfare LHD Tonnerre is in the middle. Stealth frigate Surcouf (with its smooth  radar deflecting sides) is on Tonnerre's bow. It might be the, light frigate Prairial? in the foreground. (Photo courtesy French Navy via India's RepublicWorld.)
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From February 2021 to early July 2021 the French Mistral-class LHD FS Tonnerre and the stealthy La Fayette-class frigate FS Surcoufwill patrol the SCS. 

[As an aside, the frigate Surcouf has been a luckier ship than the doomed heavy artillery submarine Surcouf of WWII.] 

Along the way Tonnerre and Surcouf will exercise with the Indian, Australian, Japanese and US navies in support of the Quad security dialogue.

JS Tonnerre and Surcouf are now traveling from France, through the Suez Canal, Indian Ocean, to the Pacific. On the way they will visit Egypt, Djibouti, India, Sri Lanka, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, Vietnam and Japan, before returning to France in July 2021.