PLAN SCS Bases/Islands/Vessels (Not a Strategy Page)

plawolf

Lieutenant General
Also keep in mind that Vietnam didn't put up any sea walls to protect their reclamation efforts. If one looks at the picture sof China's islands, you can see sea walls there.

Again, I think that's just down to raw ability.

It's not just about building a sea wall, but you also need good foundations and sunken coastal wave breakers and other defences.

Basically, once you start to build a sea wall, it will be very costly (money and time) and technically challenging to expand beyond that boundary.

Vietnam either wasn't able build the defences in time, or they took a gamble hoping they can get away with no defences during a storm season so they can crime two years' worth of reclamation in before settling on the borders.

Again, that boils down to the speed of reclaimation.

They simply lacked the technical expertise and scale of resources that China has.
 

plawolf

Lieutenant General
My question is what was Vietnam thinking when they continued widespread land reclamation after the 2002 DOC?

Surely they knew they couldn't hope to compete with China in island reclamation and base building in the South China Seas, and at the same time they set a serious precedent.

Is it Dai Viet (Great Vietnam) syndrome again?

Well I think they plainly didn't expect China to have the will or abilities to do what it did. I don't think anyone outside China did until China demonstrated it.

The western media is partly to blame, as they tend to have this wanting to have their cake and eat it too attitude towards China, where they dismiss Chinese warnings as empty words when it suits their agenda at the same time as they play the China threat card.

China put out plenty of warnings, the western media and vietnam just chose to ignore and dismiss them, and then had the cheek to imply China was being unreasonable by escalating their response from mere words to action after it has been repeatedly shown that mere words just doesn't register with them.

The Vietnamese miscalculated because they projected their own mentality on China thinking the only reason China didn't do something was because it lacked the will and/or means to do so.

Thus they mistook Chinese restraint for weakness and pressed when they should have held, which provoked China into making a reaction.

As my earlier post pointed out, because of the power dynamics involved, and also because of Chinese philosophy, when China did finally decide to act, it tend to do so in a decisive way.

The Chinese don't rate the proportional tit for tat gradual escalation western philosophy advocates, but instead prefer shock and awe grand moves that serve as examples, yet always leave itself room for further lessons to be taught should the first not have the desired effect. So I guess there is an element of gradual escalation, just on a much bigger scale than what western tacticians would work on.
 
Last edited:

AndrewS

Brigadier
Registered Member
China at the moment is building up it's strength. the navy, coast guard, islands, oil and gas equipment so in the right time if necessary it can switch from Go to Chess or from Chess to Poker. The viets and the pinoys are going to have ''interesting'' times with China in the SCS. They haven't seen nothing yet because the game has not even begun.

That is on the hard power side.

On the soft power side, remember the sheer size of the Chinese economy and how fast it is still growing. Then model the effects of economic sanctions or limitations on market access or with-holding investments that China could impose. These come at little cost to China, but with large costs to a smaller littoral state.
 

AndrewS

Brigadier
Registered Member
Again, I think that's just down to raw ability.

It's not just about building a sea wall, but you also need good foundations and sunken coastal wave breakers and other defences.

Basically, once you start to build a sea wall, it will be very costly (money and time) and technically challenging to expand beyond that boundary.

Vietnam either wasn't able build the defences in time, or they took a gamble hoping they can get away with no defences during a storm season so they can crime two years' worth of reclamation in before settling on the borders.

Again, that boils down to the speed of reclaimation.

They simply lacked the technical expertise and scale of resources that China has.

Totally agree
 

antiterror13

Brigadier
My question is what was Vietnam thinking when they continued widespread land reclamation after the 2002 DOC?

Surely they knew they couldn't hope to compete with China in island reclamation and base building in the South China Seas, and at the same time they set a serious precedent.

Is it Dai Viet (Great Vietnam) syndrome again?

This is an article regarding the typhoon, interesting to read the comments :D
Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!
 

Sweeper Monk

New Member
Registered Member
The article mentions that typhoons are rarely seen in December. From what I have been told, most typhoons first batter the Philippines, so they take the brunt of its strength, and by the time it reaches the SCS, the force is somewhat abated.

Looking at a map, Cornwallis south reef is east of Cauteron but west of Mischief. Wow. By rights it should face a weaker typhoon than that which Mischief reef will deal with.
 
Top