Thread: China 'building runway in disputed South China Sea island'

Originally Posted by Klondyke

Fort a start, perhaps you can help to find links where Russia or China have imposed sanctions on others, blaming/accusing others...

You're a child, right? Mentally, I mean.

Oh, and to reply with your favourite; 'google it yourself'

US Navy Sends 7 Los Angeles Class Fast Attack Submarines to South China Sea


The Pacific Fleet Submarine Force took the unusual step this month of announcing that all of its forward-deployed subs were simultaneously conducting "contingency response operations " at sea in the Western Pacific--downplaying the notion that Navy forces have been hampered by COVID-19.

The sub force said the missions were mounted in support of the Pentagon's "free and open Indo-Pacific " policy aimed at countering China's expansionism in the South China Sea.

At least seven submarines, and likely more--including all four Guam-based attack submarines, the San Diego-based USS Alexandria and multiple Hawaii-based vessels--are part of the effort.

The action also highlights the Pentagon's desire to be flexible and unpredictable in "great power " competition with China and Russia.

"Our operations are a demonstration of our willingness to defend our interests and freedoms under international law, " Rear Adm. Blake Converse, Pacific sub force commander, who is based at Pearl Harbor, said in a May 8 release.

Attack submarines maintain an outsize stealth capability to sink ships with torpedoes, fire Tomahawk cruise missiles and conduct covert surveillance while keeping adversaries guessing their location.

The Navy recently has maintained a flotilla of warships in the Western Pacific as a show of force and proof that COVID-19 hasn't significantly degraded its capabilities, with the United States and China long trading barbs over military activities in the South China Sea and increasingly so over each other's pandemic response.

China has been accused of intensifying its occupation of man-made islands and bullying other nations in the region while much of the world has been focused on the pandemic.

Geopolitical intelligence platform Stratfor said that the U.S. and China have maintained a "robust operational pace in the South China Sea " amid heightening tensions and COVID-19--signs that point to continued escalation after the virus wanes.

When the Navy advertises the presence of its usually unseen submarines, it's often to make a point with an adversary. The Navy released a photo of the Los Angeles-class sub Alexandria transiting Apra Harbor in Guam on May 5.

As the U.S. military addresses COVID-19 at home, "we remain focused on our national security missions around the world, " Defense Secretary Mark Esper said the same day.

"Many countries have turned inward to recover from the pandemic, and in the meantime our strategic competitors are attempting to exploit this crisis to their benefit at the expense of others, " Esper said.

He accused the Chinese Communist Party of ramping up a "disinformation campaign " to shift blame for the virus and burnish its image. All the while, "we continue to see aggressive behavior by the PLA (People's Liberation Army ) in the South China Sea, from threatening a Philippine navy ship to sinking a Vietnamese fishing boat and intimidating other nations from engaging in offshore oil and gas development."

Esper said two Navy ships conducted freedom of navigation operations in the South China Sea the week before "to send a clear message to Beijing that we continue to protect freedom of navigation and commerce for all nations large and small."

The guided-missile cruiser USS Bunker Hill conducted a "FONOP " in the Spratly Islands, and the destroyer USS Barry sailed twice through the Taiwan Strait and through the Paracel Islands in disputed territory that China claims as its own.

"These provocative acts by the U.S. side ... have seriously violated China's sovereignty and security interests, deliberately increased regional security risks and could easily trigger an unexpected incident, " the South China Morning Post quoted a Chinese military command saying after the Barry's Paracel passage.

The aircraft carrier USS Theodore Roosevelt has been sidelined in Guam since late March after experiencing an outbreak of the new coronavirus among its 4, 800-member crew.

U.S. Pacific Fleet at Pearl Harbor has been quick to note the ongoing deployment of other assets in the region, including transits of the South China Sea by the littoral combat ship USS Gabrielle Giffords, the destroyer USS Rafael Peralta sailing in the East China Sea and the destroyer USS McCampbell passing through the Taiwan Strait on Wednesday.

Navy Sends Subs to Sea as Message to China | Military.com

Originally Posted by Klondyke
For a start, perhaps you can help to find links where Russia or China have imposed sanctions on others, blaming/accusing others..

.

Originally Posted by panama hat

You're a child, right? Mentally, I mean.
Oh, and to reply with your favourite; 'google it yourself'

A good comment and advice. I really cannot find a link to a case when the Russia or China

Navy Sends 7 Fast Attack Submarines

to America coast...

Then, I would criticize it ...

Originally Posted by Klondyke

A good comment and advice. I really cannot find a link to a case when the Russia or China

Too thick to do so? Hmm . . .

Originally Posted by Klondyke

Then, I would criticize it ...

Nah, you wouldn't. You'd justify/deflect/minimise etc etc etc

Originally Posted by panama hat

Nah, you wouldn't. You'd justify/deflect/minimise etc etc etc

And waffle. Puppy follows daddy dog.

China Harvests Vegetables in South China Sea to Cultivate Territorial Claims

China’s navy recently harvested 1.5 tons of vegetables on its biggest military base and civilian center in the Paracel Islands, in what state media portrayed Wednesday as vindication of Beijing’s position that disputed land features it claims in the South China Sea can sustain human life.


The navy has completed a sand-to-soil cultivation project on Woody Island in collaboration with a top-tier Chinese research university, potentially paving the way for self-sufficient farming on China’s other occupied reefs and rocks in the South China Sea, the Global Times reported.


People’s Liberation Army Navy troops garrisoned on Woody Island, which is China’s main administrative center in the South China Sea, had harvested vegetables from a beach that had been tested with an experimental treatment that turns sand into fertile soil. The project had been set up by a research team from Chongqing Jiaotong University.


Controversially, China has undertaken massive land reclamation works on disputed features in the Paracels and Spratly Islands in recent years to establish bases and advance its sweeping sovereignty claims over the South China Sea, which are contested by five other governments.


The Global Times cited Chen Xiangmiao, an assistant research fellow at the National Institute for South China Sea Studies, as saying that the vegetable harvest on Woody Island countered international theories, including those in a 2016 arbitration case between the Philippines and China, that islands in the South China Sea could not support communities of their own.


"Now China's capability of being able to support civilians on these islands would allow more people to live on the islands," Chen was quoted as saying.

Under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), features must be capable of sustaining human habitation and an independent economy not reliant on imports of supplies from elsewhere to qualify as islands. Such features generate an exclusive economic zone around the island for the occupying state. None of China’s military bases and artificial islands in the South China Sea currently meet this standard, and as such they were ruled to be rocks or other non-island features in the 2016 Permanent Court of Arbitration ruling.


Making artificial islands and reclaimed reefs in the South China Sea habitable for human life has been a perennial problem for China, as the settlements China has built there lack freshwater and any soil to grow things in. Previous attempts to build greenhouses and import fertile soil from the mainland failed to provide enough food for the garrisons maintained on bases like Woody Island in the Paracels and Fiery Cross Reef in the Spratlys.


Zachary Haver, a Washington, D.C.-based China analyst, said Sansha City – the prefecture-level city set up on Woody Island -- is still reliant on regular deliveries of supplies from Hainan, although it is the hallmark of China’s reclamation efforts in the South China Sea.


“This being said, Woody Island is increasingly self-sufficient, at least in some respects, with robust electricity generation and seawater desalination capabilities,” Haver explained. According to him, local government officials in Sansha City have also deployed a range of incentives such as subsidies and public housing schemes to attract civilians to come live on the island.


The construction of bases and buildings on reefs and rocks has also degraded their foundations in recent years due to the tropical climate, as highlighted by Chinese researchers from the National University of Defense Technology in 2018.


While the members of the research team that set up the sand-to-soil project on Woody Island go unnamed, Chongqing Jiaotong University has previously experimented with the same methods to great success in Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region and in a partnership with the United Arab Emirates. Both of those projects’ teams were overseen by Professor Yi Zhijian, Chongqing Jiaotong University’s Vice President.


China has well-recorded problems with desertification, owing to poor farming practices and a lack of groundwater. Roughly 20% of the country is desert, lending urgency to scientific efforts to reverse the desert’s encroachment on fertile land. Professor Yi Zhijian developed and pioneered a ground-breaking cellular paste that can turn sand into fertile soil, publishing his work with it in 2016. That paste was then used on April 4 for the cultivation project on Woody Island, according to the PLA Navy.


This project could potentially have applications across other Chinese-occupied features in the South China Sea – even if it doesn’t strengthen China’s claim to sovereignty over features in the first place. China bases those claims on a notion of “historic rights” unsupported by international law.


“The development of Woody Island is often seen as the blueprint for the development of other features in the South China Sea,” Haver said. “This is currently most noticeable on Tree Island in the Paracel Islands. The Woody Island model will likely be (or is already being) expanded to China's artificial island bases in the Spratly Islands.”


China is not the only claimant in the South China Sea to insist its occupied features are islands, and experiment with ways to make them habitable under the provisions of UNCLOS.


Taiwan currently occupies the largest feature in the Spratlys, called Taiping Island, which was also ruled as a rock under the 2016 arbitral ruling. The Taiwanese military claimed the existence of fresh water on Taiping back in 2019. This would further Taiwan’s argument that Taiping is a legally valid island, as a lack of a freshwater supply was cited by the Permanent Court of Arbitration as a reason Taiping could not be considered so. Taiwan has also reportedly grown various vegetation on Taiping, including bananas, coconuts, and squash, without importing soil or using the same sand-to-soil methods as China.


The Philippines has also attempted to grow a sustainable food source on Thitu Island, a feature it occupies in the South China Sea, but with less urgency and success. Desalination plants to turn sea water into freshwater are planned to be built on the island this year, Philippine media have reported.

China Harvests Vegetables in South China Sea to Cultivate Territorial Claims

Funny how the chinkies quote international laws and regulations when it suits their fucking purpose.

Bunch of fucking locusts.

Originally Posted by harrybarracuda

Funny how the chinkies quote international laws and regulations when it suits their fucking purpose.

Yes funny, although I doubt, that you would find more than a handfull, who would quote anything, that wouldn't suit their purpose.

Realpolitik

Originally Posted by misskit

Under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), features must be capable of sustaining human habitation and an independent economy not reliant on imports of supplies from elsewhere to qualify as islands. Such features generate an exclusive economic zone around the island for the occupying state. None of China’s military bases and artificial islands in the South China Sea currently meet this standard, and as such they were ruled to be rocks or other non-island features in the 2016 Permanent Court of Arbitration ruling.

Originally Posted by misskit

Sansha City – the prefecture-level city set up on Woody Island -- is still reliant on regular deliveries of supplies from Hainan,

Originally Posted by misskit

China bases those claims on a notion of “historic rights”

The PCA had no legal standing and it's "rulings" are irrelevant.

I suspect many islands require "deliveries of supplies", throughout the world.

The notion of "historic rights" is utilised by many to substantiate sovereignty.

Originally Posted by helge

Yes funny, although I doubt, that you would find more than a handfull, who would quote anything, that wouldn't suit their purpose.

Realpolitik

Well if you can find any of the other countries who claim ownership doing it, why don't you post them?

Originally Posted by OhOh

The PCA had no legal standing and it's "rulings" are irrelevant.

But of course if they came down on the side of the chinkies both they are their snivelling cohort of sycophants like yourself would be adamant that they are to be taken seriously.

Originally Posted by harrybarracuda

But of course if they came down on the side of the chinkies both they are their snivelling cohort of sycophants like yourself would be adamant that they are to be taken seriously.

Of course . . . after all, their rulings are relevant

India Voices Unusual Criticism about Beijing’s Conduct in South China Sea

India has voiced a rare note of criticism of China’s assertive actions in the South China Sea, amid a tensions between the two Asian powers on their long land border.


India is concerned over China pressuring South China Sea claimant nations that India considers partners, a New Delhi-based analyst said. India is also wary that China could seek to assert itself in the Indian Ocean.


On Thursday, India’s Ministry of External Affairs commented on the recent incidents along the Line of Actual Control – the nearly 2,200-mile unsettled border between China and India.


Chinese and Indian troops clashed on May 5 over road construction the Indian side was completing at Pangong Tso, a glacial lake bordering Ladakh and Tibet. They clashed again on May 9 near Doklam, which borders India China, and Bhutan. Soldiers were reportedly wounded on both sides in the clashes.


At the same news conference, ministry spokesman Anurag Srivastave was also asked about recent unilateral actions by Beijing in the South China Sea: the establishment of two new administrative districts for the disputed Paracel and Spratly Islands and the naming of 80 obscure geographical features over the objections of other claimants.


“(The) South China Sea is a part of (the) global commons and India has an abiding interest in peace and stability in the region,” Srivastave said. “We firmly stand with the freedom of navigation and overflight and unimpeded lawful commerce in these international waterways, in accordance with international law.”


While the statement seemed bland enough, and was consistent with India’s long-standing position on the maritime disputes in Southeast Asia, Abhijit Singh, senior fellow at the New Delhi-based Observer Research Foundation, said it was unusual for a government spokesman to make a public statement on the issue in this way.


It was a sign that India links the territorial issues it has with China at the Line of Actual Control with the situation in the South China Sea, he said.


Singh said India appeared to be warning that “if Chinese troops do not behave on the border, India isn’t obliged to adhere to the Wuhan consensus, and would reiterate its South China Sea position.”


The Wuhan consensus refers to an informal summit between Chinese General-Secretary Xi Jinping and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi in 2018. There, the two countries vowed to de-escalate tensions between each other for the sake of better bilateral ties.


China and India are widely viewed as strategic competitors and fought a border war in 1962. China has historically close ties with India’s archrival and neighbor, Pakistan.


China’s recent pressure campaigns in the South China Sea against other claimants are beginning to affect India’s interests in the region. According to Singh, India is principally concerned with its deepening economic and commercial ties to Southeast Asia under the new Act East Policy – especially with Indonesia and Vietnam. China has infringed on exclusive economic zones of both of those nations in the past year.


India is also worried about the balance of power in Southeast and South Asia, where China’s growing naval presence threatens India’s standing in the region.


“When Delhi defends nautical norms and the right to access common maritime spaces, it is usually part of messaging to Beijing to keep clear India’s sphere of interest and influence in South Asia and the Indian Ocean,” Singh said.


“India knows it must take a principled stand on the territorial disputes, so that it can contribute to the restoration of strategic equilibrium in the Indo-Pacific,” he added.


Singh said there was uncertainty in India over China’s ambitions in the South China Sea, which could be “destabilizing for maritime Asia.”


Singh said India’s government was concerned that the playbook China employs to harass claimants in the South China Sea, using survey vessels, maritime militia and its coastguard, could be repeated in the Indian Ocean, closer to India’s shores. Singh cited the presence of Chinese maritime militia off the coast of Natuna, in waters close to the eastern edge of the Indian Ocean, and a December survey by China near the Andaman Islands which was within India’s exclusive economic zone.


He said India was taking note of such incidents and China’s increasingly large fleet of deep-sea mining vessels. It’s also watching to see if China establishes outposts in the Maldives.


Delhi is wary that “as China gets stronger in the South China Sea, these kinds of provocations in the Andaman Sea and more broadly in South Asia will grow,” Singh said.

https://www.benarnews.org/english/ne...020181019.html

Originally Posted by misskit

India Voices Unusual Criticism about Beijing’s Conduct in South China Sea

Originally Posted by misskit

India is also worried about the balance of power in Southeast and South Asia, where China’s growing naval presence threatens India’s standing in the region.

Perhaps India should help about the balance of power as they have experienced to balance the power in Kashmir...

Not surprised India are getting concerned when the chinky locusts are enviously nibbling away at their borders as well.

Originally Posted by OhOh

I suspect many islands require "deliveries of supplies", throughout the world.

Manhattan ?

Originally Posted by Klondyke

Perhaps India should help about the balance of power as they have experienced to balance the power in Kashmir...

Perhaps China could release the one million muslims they are keeping in concentration camps . . . you know, for the sake of balance of power

Originally Posted by panama hat

they are keeping in concentration camps

As alleged by some "experts".

Originally Posted by OhOh

As alleged by some "experts".

Can't trust expert testimony unless it's in China Daily, can you, you snivelling sycophant?

Originally Posted by OhOh

As alleged by some "experts".

Umm . . . no. As confirmed by Chinese authorities . . . who confirm it and then lie again in an infantile attempt at obfuscation - and apologists like you simply gobble it up

China Uighurs: Detainees 'free' after 'graduating', official says - BBC News

A senior Chinese official has said that all of the people sent to detention centres in the western region of Xinjiang have now been released.
Regional government chairman Shohrat Zakir told reporters those held in what Beijing say are "re-education camps" had now "graduated".

^You obviously never attended Oxford and lived under the Quad gate Keepers "watchful eye".

Aaaaaaaaaaaand a-waffling he goes.

Originally Posted by panama hat

Perhaps China could release the one million muslims they are keeping in concentration camps

Originally Posted by OhOh

As alleged by some "experts".

Originally Posted by panama hat

Umm . . . no. As confirmed by Chinese authorities . . . who confirm it and then lie again in an infantile attempt at obfuscation - and apologists like you simply gobble it up

China Uighurs: Detainees 'free' after 'graduating', official says - BBC News

A senior Chinese official has said that all of the people sent to detention centres in the western region of Xinjiang have now been released.
Regional government chairman Shohrat Zakir told reporters those held in what Beijing say are "re-education camps" had now "graduated".

Originally Posted by OhOh

Why can't you accept that you're wrong instead of acting like an adolescent? Are you unhappy that your CCP overlords make you look the utter fool?

Originally Posted by panama hat

accept that you're wrong

Unfortunately for you your allegations have not convinced me.

Originally Posted by OhOh

Unfortunately for you your allegations have not convinced me.

So, when you reply to a link that clearly attributes statements about imprisoned Uighurs by a Chinese official with a photo of Oxford . . . that means you are wrong. You're simply far too bigoted, even in the face of facts, to accept anything . . . that means you are wrong