China's Island Factory
An anonymous reader writes: The BBC has a lengthy investigative report about China's efforts to create and expand artificial islands in the South China Sea. They've been going to coral reefs and atolls, dredging the bottom for material, and dumping it on top of the reef to create new land. On at least one of the new islands, China will build an air base large enough for fighter jets to use. This highlights one of China's main reasons for constructing these islands: sovereignty and strategic control of the surrounding area. "The U.S. government does not acknowledge China's claim, and the U.S. Pacific fleet continues to sail regularly through the South China Sea. But the Chinese navy is beginning to grow more assertive. In December 2013 China sailed its brand new aircraft carrier, the Liaoning, into the South China Sea for the first time. Shadowing it, at about 30 nautical miles, came the U.S. Navy cruiser USS Cowpens. A Chinese amphibious assault ship approached and ordered it to leave the area. The commander of the Cowpens refused, saying he was sailing in 'international waters.'"
They're rattling an awful lot.
So apparently there is some poor town named Cowpens where a battle occured. At least it wasn't named after a person. That would be a terrible last name.
They've been going to coral reefs and atolls, dredging the bottom for material, and dumping it on top of the reef to create new land.
Destroying fisheries in the process. But hey! They can just go into international waters and fish there - it's not like the World's fisheries are in trouble or anything.
A Chinese amphibious assault ship approached and ordered it to leave the area. The commander of the Cowpens refused, saying he was sailing in 'international waters.'"
Some day, we bald apes are going stop our petty squabbles.
Nah! Who am I kidding.
So here's some trivia. How many aircraft carries to most countries have (those who have them)? Take a guess. Another guess. The answer is 1. Only two nations have more than 1 and that's India and Italy.
The United States has 11:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_aircraft_carriers_by_country
The United States is one of the most dangerous military states in the world and the largest state sponsor of terrorism in the world. An 11 carrier Navy fleet is not sustainable. It will require more war and wars that do not end.
" sovereignty and strategic control "
They really want those stupid island that's the property of Japan isn't it...
Is pretty hilarious. All countries pull their fair share of bullshit but come on.. territorial waters that just wander southward like that, cutting between vietnam and the philippines?
Oh well.. I expect a typhoon or two will swamp those attempts at man-man islands.
Liaoning is not brand new - it's a refurb of an old Soviet carrier.
Somehow, I doubt that the next typhoon that blows through there will recognize Chinese Sovereignty, either. There's a reason many of those are only reefs and not islands that stick up above the waves all the time.
Between 1893 and 1951(?) the USA conquered and anexed Hawaii.
Overthrowing a queen, destroying a nation and a culture.
In 2014 China uses some bulldozers to create a new uninhabited island.
Both to 'extend the sovereignty' and expand the territory.
In the first case thousands if not hundred of thousands of 'natives' got harmed. In the chinese case no one gets harmed.
But the Chinese are the evil ones ... caught, caught, why exactly? Ah yes, they are communists, evil devils!
Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
China's ego is gonna screw them over.
britons watching their former world empire gettin torn into pieces now even inside their own island, and now the chinese copy the technique they used to conquer the world. If it only were about those islands. The game china plays larger by far. They also invest heavily into african soil and infrastructure.
in the Chesapeake Bay, it doesn't make the Bay a part of China.
The Philippines are out gunned, but it is their jurisdiction.
They could give the Chinese a building permit, or declare the area a gunnery target range.
Their choice, not China's.
If China gets the base built, it's really hard to sink an Island.
But it's really hard to move it as well, making it a nice stable target.
What is the fundamental reason the Chinese wants the place?
Is it a distraction for domestic issues.
Is there an economic reason they actually need the place.
Is it just to show that they are powerful. Being a bully shows more weakness than strength.
And will eventually lead to a serious, unnecessary shooting match.
(See WW1, WW2, etc.)
Really a dumb, unfortunate situation.
If it works for China it should work for Vietnam, Philippines, Japan... forget countries, it should even work for billionaires.
Of course they rattle. They *were* made in China, afterall.
Man I scroll the page by dragging the scrollbar but all that does is apparently induce seizures....
Scrolling the page to scan just causes a flickering lightshow of massive pictures breaking the text apart then some more random text and another huge image flying by. I can't tell what the f*ck I'm doing.
Is there any precedent for a country to create new land like this, and claim territory around it? If international law is good for anything, it seems like this would be a good time to cite it.
For all intensive purposes, "whom" is no longer a word. That begs the question, "who cares"?
Ok, I agree that China is not strong on environmental protection, specially if they are doing this in order to put a foot in the door of these disputed areas. But this is criminal!
On any country with a minimal of environmental concern, this thing wouldn't even pass the planning stage.
But being a biologist, I can't think any other way. What they are doing is a crime.
"Science is common sense with peer review"
"Is there any precedent for a country to create new land like this, and claim territory around it?"
Well, Dubai does that, leaving behind a huge carbon footprint..
Why are they not protesting the destruction of coral reefs and atolls? Oh, I forgot, the Chinese would just kill them. My bad.
Uh, Russia has had military boats in Cubans waters for 50 years.
America's ego has already screwed them over.
Yes, but he was not accurate enough in his "hypothetical". If those missile ships were delivering nuclear warheads to Cuba, we " hypothetically" would have a major problem. If they were just taking a stroll and checking out the neighborhood its a different story.
As someone mentioned earlier, the russians would regularly take cruises to say "Hi!" About 13 miles out. And we did the same to them.
This guy sure loves penis...
metaphors
What are US ships doing in the South China sea? That is obvious provocation. ....)
The United States should concentrate on its problems at home, like its lack of democratic government, US economic insolvency, state spying, torture, and the prosecuting its various resident war criminals (Kissinger, Bush,
People in the West just don't understand the history of the south China sea, at all.
The entire region is really China's, China used to be a very powerful in the region, they dominated the entire region culturally and militarily, that's why Japan was using Chinese characters. Some of the islands right next to Malaysia has Chinese temples on them, that's how far China's power was reaching.
Historian will tell you that Vietnam and Philipines's claims baseless.
For example, when you study Vietname's claim, they claimed they 'discovered' the island in the 1800s, but at that time that part of Vietnam was part of China.
But everybody just lie right out, for centuries those have been well known to be China's waters, nobody contested the waters until gas was discovered some decades ago.
Some years ago China, Vietnam and Philipines agreed to stop building anything there, but then Vietnam and Philipines cheated and built bases rapidly, now China does it better and these fuckers started crying, well fuck you.
And the US? Haha they didn't even sign the international treaties that they're quoting from?
The facts are on China's side but the western media will never tell people the facts, so at the end whoever has the power wins, that's all there is to it.
Only people with no knowledge of the history of the South China Sea will use words like "much closer"
Closer doesn't mean shit, ask UK and Argentina.
99/100 Westerners don't know what the fuck they're talking about, people in the West just don't understand the history of the south China sea, at all.
The entire region is really China's, China used to be a very powerful in the region, they dominated the entire region culturally and militarily, that's why Japan was using Chinese characters. Some of the islands right next to Malaysia has Chinese temples on them, that's how far China's power was reaching.
Historian will tell you that Vietnam and Philipines's claims are baseless.
For example, when you study Vietname's claim, they claimed they 'discovered' the island in the 1800s, but at that time that part of Vietnam was part of China.
But everybody just lie right out, for centuries those have been well known to be China's waters, nobody contested the waters until gas was discovered some decades ago.
Some years ago China, Vietnam and Philipines agreed to stop building anything there, but then Vietnam and Philipines cheated and built bases rapidly, now China does it better and these fuckers started crying, well fuck you.
And the US? Haha they didn't even sign the international treaties that they're quoting from?
The facts are on China's side but the western media will never tell people the facts, so at the end whoever has the power wins, that's all there is to it.
Vietname and Philipines are thieves and they know it.
People in the West just don't understand the history of the south China sea, at all.
The entire region is really China's, China used to be a very powerful in the region, they dominated the entire region culturally and militarily, that's why Japan was using Chinese characters. Some of the islands right next to Malaysia has Chinese temples on them, that's how far China's power was reaching.
Historian will tell you that Vietnam and Philipines's claims baseless.
For example, when you study Vietname's claim, they claimed they 'discovered' the island in the 1800s, but at that time that part of Vietnam was part of China.
But everybody just lie right out, for centuries those have been well known to be China's waters, nobody contested the waters until gas was discovered some decades ago.
Some years ago China, Vietnam and Philipines agreed to stop building anything there, but then Vietnam and Philipines cheated and built bases rapidly, now China does it better and these fuckers started crying, well fuck you.
And the US? Haha they didn't even sign the international treaties that they're quoting from?
The facts are on China's side but the western media will never tell people the facts, so at the end whoever has the power wins, that's all there is to it.
Study the history of South China Sea before posting.
You know jack shit.
As if the world map is supposed to tell you what belongs to who.
The entire US was stolen for fucks sake and you wankers complain? Fuck off.
You morons like to talking about shit you don't know anything about don't you.
Vietname and Philipines are thieves and they know it.
People in the West just don't understand the history of the south China sea, at all.
The entire region is really China's, China used to be a very powerful in the region, they dominated the entire region culturally and militarily, that's why Japan was using Chinese characters. Some of the islands right next to Malaysia has Chinese temples on them, that's how far China's power was reaching.
Historian will tell you that Vietnam and Philipines's claims baseless.
For example, when you study Vietname's claim, they claimed they 'discovered' the island in the 1800s, but at that time that part of Vietnam was part of China.
But everybody just lie right out, for centuries those have been well known to be China's waters, nobody contested the waters until gas was discovered some decades ago.
Some years ago China, Vietnam and Philipines agreed to stop building anything there, but then Vietnam and Philipines cheated and built bases rapidly, now China does it better and these fuckers started crying, well fuck you.
And the US? Haha they didn't even sign the international treaties that they're quoting from?
The facts are on China's side but the western media will never tell people the facts, so at the end whoever has the power wins, that's all there is to it.
doesn't mean China owns it! They have, I shit you not, claimed the entire South sea, right up to the beaches of their neighbors.
See, Chinese white-washing technology and production is just as good as Western white-washing technology and production. Proof above.
How come nobody gives a shit that the CHINESE ARE DELIBERATELY DESTROYING CORAL REEFS IN THE SOUTH PACIFIC?
"China used to be very powerful in the region".
By that logic, the Babylonians own a large portion of the Middle east.
I wondered about that too. The sentence makes more sense without the word "penis" inserted into it. Do people with Tourette syndrome actually type up their occasional outbursts? Or does this person really like dick?
The Chinese love to call hypocrisy, about "Well, the US does blah blah blah..." However, look at the Gulf of Mexico, a good comparative example to the South China Sea situation. See, in the Gulf of Mexico, the United States may actually have a strong position than the Chinese, with greater amount of shoreline touching the water and greater military superiority over its neighbors. There's oil in those water, rich fisheries, and its a critical body of water for American security interests. Yet unlike the Chinese, the Americans didn't scoop up the entire region like a hollowed out grapefruit and tell its neighbors FU. Instead, they sat down, from a position of power no less, and negotiated equitable maritime boundaries, not just with friendly nations like Mexico, but with hostile states like the Cubans. However, the Chinese are different, proving quite greedy and trying to essentially annex other nations' EEZ from Malaysia and Brunei up to Korea and Japan. It's a sad state of affairs, and it only serves to unite China's neighbors against it. With actions like that, they really shouldn't question why their neighbors fear them.
China refers to the disputed area they're claiming in the South China Sea as "the 9 dotted line".
However, looking at it on a map, it appears it should be more rightly described as "the flaccid dong"
These were previously open international waters, so any nation coming along and claiming them needs to be challenged.
Just another day in Paradise
China is still here you dumb fuck, fuck you westerners are so fucking stupid and arrogant. Learn the history before you talk shit. Fucking armchair map experts talk about shit they don't know anything about.
Many of the islands in the South China Sea was named by the Chinese in 1700-1800, they were part of the Chinese map.
Read the part where no1 contested the water until the 1900s. Some of those fuckers started stealing the islands when China was too busy defending itself from the Japanese, China protested of course, but they just went there and stayed and attempted to change history.
That's like you're in hospital and someone stole your house.
You don't just ignore the past.
The US has proven that as long as your military is strong enough you can fuck around the world, the problem seems to be that China is not #1 yet, that's why all the complaining.
Things will change soon tho, when the petro-dollar collapses.
Also an "amphibious assault ship" i.e. a troop ship designed to attack land, ordering a US cruiser, the largest navel ship not a aircraft carrier now that battleships are faux pas, is pretty funny. Regardless of law or rights or superpowers, that is like me trying to threaten an Abrams tank using my station wagon, or maybe more accurately my bicycle... It is no wonder they told them to take a hike.