Small China islets in South China Sea show signs of new construction

Although they receive less attention than China’s biggest artificial islands, construction continues apace on its smaller outposts built atop tiny islets in the South China Sea, satellite imagery shows.

The work pales in comparison to the binge in Chinese land reclamation and construction between 2014 and 2017, when Beijing established its major bases on disputed features in the Paracel and Spratly archipelagoes.

But the imagery reviewed by RFA of several small land features over the past six months shows signs of new housing, power supplies, cultivation and potentially a helipad.

Here’s a look at three locations, where the construction suggests China is trying to solve persistent problems faced by some of its smallest holdings in the South China Sea: access, sustainability, and soil erosion.

At Drummond Island in the Paracel chain, where currently boats have to thread their way through a canal-like trench to reach the dock, a helipad appears to be being built.

Bigger outposts like Woody Island – China’s main base in the Paracels, which is just under two square miles -- have airfields where transport planes and fighter jets can land. That’s not feasible on islets as tiny as Drummond, which covers just one-tenth of one square mile.

But a helipad is possible. And satellite imagery shows a paved area of roughly 70,000 square feet has been laid since May.

China occupies virtually every rock and sandbar in the Paracel archipelago, a grouping of land features in the northern half of the South China Sea that is claimed by China, Taiwan, and Vietnam. Woody Island is China’s largest human settlement in the archipelago and regularly hosts warships from...



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