US and Philippines talk about collaborating on coast guard patrols in the South China Sea.

Joint coast guard patrols, including those in the South China Sea, are something that the Philippines and the US are talking about.

The South China Sea has become a flashpoint for tensions between China and the United States over naval operations because of overlapping sovereign claims in the strategic waterway. The Philippines has stepped up its rhetoric against what it calls China's "aggressive activities" in the South China Sea.

The likelihood of conducting joint patrols is high, according to Jay Tarriela, the Philippine Coast Guard's (PCG) spokesperson on issues relating to the South China Sea, who spoke to CNN Philippines.

The Pentagon reported this month that the United States and the Philippines had "agreed to restart joint maritime patrols in the South China Sea," but Tarriela gave no additional information regarding the scope or timing of the proposed patrols.

"There is already a clear path of possibility since the Defense Department of the United States has also supported the joint patrol with the Philippine navy and the U.S. navy so there is a certainty for this particular joint patrols to happen between the coast guard of both countries," Tarriela said.

He added that there was a chance it might take place in the South China Sea to support the American government's right to freedom of navigation.

A coast guard deployment in the South China Sea rather than the navy will "mitigate any miscalculation and prevent China from finding an excuse to escalate tension," according to Rommel Jude Ong, a former vice commander of the Philippine Navy, who spoke to Reuters on Monday.