plawolf
Lieutenant General
There were no facilities for troops to stay on that rock long term. That’s why China still holds it.
The sad reality was that China was too poor and too far away to be able to effectively garrison and patrol the SCS back then.
It was no accident that the features China do hold tended to be rocks barely above water at high tide. Because any island or feature that had serious real estate permanently above water got grabbed by other SEA nations in the area. By the time China realised they had made the land grab, they have already dug in and built permanent facilities to allow them to keep troops on the features at all times.
That meant that if China wanted its islands back, it needed to send troops into to dig those foreign troops out.
China was too poor and also too naive back then, thinking it could reason with the likes of Vietnam, and allowed too much time to lapse, and now Vietnam is claiming squatters rights.
But, so long as China doesn’t accept and recognise those islands that were illegally seized as belonging to anyone else, China can reclaim those islands whenever the opportunity arises.
If there is any sort of armed conflict between China and Vietnam for example, irrespective of where or why, I think that should automatically trigger a complete cleansing operation by the PLAN of all disputed islands held by Vietnam on the SCS.
With its newly built up island bases, the PLAN now has the ability to effectively monitor and patrol all those islands and features so that they will never fall into foreign hands again.
The Vietnamese knows this, and in a way, it is a stabilising factor as it has a considerable moderating influence on Vietnam’s behaviour.
Just think back even a few years, to before China built up its islands, and the ugly stand offs, rammings and harassment that was going on in the SCS.
The western media loves to paint China as the aggressors and heap all the blame on China. But isn’t it funny how if China were indeed the bullies who were picking the fights, that suddenly, after spending all that effort and money to build up its islands to vastly expand its presence and capabilities in the area, all the ugly behaviour suddenly just stopped?
I mean, isn’t the western party line that ‘bullies’ like Russian and China never stop pushing for more unless the ‘selflessly nobel’ westerners stand up to them and make them stop?
You would think that if China was indeed the big bad bully that the western media uniformally insist, that getting the massive boost of these new islands would make China more belligerent in bullying those poor helpless Vietnamese ‘civilian’ fishermen?
The reality that the western media will never allow its brainwashed sheeple flock to even think about is that China was never the bully or the ones looking to cause trouble. Vietnam was always the expansionist aggressor in the SCS, and the only thing that has checked their excesses is the overwhelming peaceful demonstration of power and resolve that China has done.
In terms of raw, hardpower plays, it is light years of the crude threats, sanctions and missile strikes the west seems to only know to use. And that’s before Trump.
The sad reality was that China was too poor and too far away to be able to effectively garrison and patrol the SCS back then.
It was no accident that the features China do hold tended to be rocks barely above water at high tide. Because any island or feature that had serious real estate permanently above water got grabbed by other SEA nations in the area. By the time China realised they had made the land grab, they have already dug in and built permanent facilities to allow them to keep troops on the features at all times.
That meant that if China wanted its islands back, it needed to send troops into to dig those foreign troops out.
China was too poor and also too naive back then, thinking it could reason with the likes of Vietnam, and allowed too much time to lapse, and now Vietnam is claiming squatters rights.
But, so long as China doesn’t accept and recognise those islands that were illegally seized as belonging to anyone else, China can reclaim those islands whenever the opportunity arises.
If there is any sort of armed conflict between China and Vietnam for example, irrespective of where or why, I think that should automatically trigger a complete cleansing operation by the PLAN of all disputed islands held by Vietnam on the SCS.
With its newly built up island bases, the PLAN now has the ability to effectively monitor and patrol all those islands and features so that they will never fall into foreign hands again.
The Vietnamese knows this, and in a way, it is a stabilising factor as it has a considerable moderating influence on Vietnam’s behaviour.
Just think back even a few years, to before China built up its islands, and the ugly stand offs, rammings and harassment that was going on in the SCS.
The western media loves to paint China as the aggressors and heap all the blame on China. But isn’t it funny how if China were indeed the bullies who were picking the fights, that suddenly, after spending all that effort and money to build up its islands to vastly expand its presence and capabilities in the area, all the ugly behaviour suddenly just stopped?
I mean, isn’t the western party line that ‘bullies’ like Russian and China never stop pushing for more unless the ‘selflessly nobel’ westerners stand up to them and make them stop?
You would think that if China was indeed the big bad bully that the western media uniformally insist, that getting the massive boost of these new islands would make China more belligerent in bullying those poor helpless Vietnamese ‘civilian’ fishermen?
The reality that the western media will never allow its brainwashed sheeple flock to even think about is that China was never the bully or the ones looking to cause trouble. Vietnam was always the expansionist aggressor in the SCS, and the only thing that has checked their excesses is the overwhelming peaceful demonstration of power and resolve that China has done.
In terms of raw, hardpower plays, it is light years of the crude threats, sanctions and missile strikes the west seems to only know to use. And that’s before Trump.
