In the past 18 months, China has been enthusiastically dredging sand from the bottom of the South China Sea and building artificial islands in disputed waters. During that period, according to Ashton Carter, US secretary of defence, Beijing has reclaimed more land than all the other claimants put together over the history of the dispute. True, Vietnam, the Philippines, Malaysia and Taiwan have all built islands to bolster their territorial claims. Yet Beijing’s actions dwarf those efforts in both speed and scale.
過去18個月,中國一直在南中國海爭議水域熱火朝天地抽沙建造人工島。根據美國國防部長阿什頓•卡特(Ashton Carter)的說法,這一時期中國填海造地的面積,超過了其他所有聲索國自有爭端以來造島面積的總和。越南、菲律賓、馬來西亞和臺灣確實都曾人工造島,以支持它們的領土主張。然而,與中國政府的行爲相比,它們的舉動不論在速度上還是規模上都相形見絀。