Bad news! China is a bully and hegemon!
"... Satellite imagery shows that the [China] appears to have completed construction on an artificial island in Antelope Reef that could serve as the [China]’s largest naval base in the South China Sea. The base would strengthen the PLA’s militarized presence and positioning in the South China Sea. ...
completing a roughly 1490-acre artificial island on top of the reef and dredging the lagoon to make a large harbor. The [China] began the island construction in late 2025. Satellite imagery also shows piers, a helipad, and various buildings on the reef as of August 2026. ...
The [China] will likely use environmental monitoring as a pretext to enhance and automate maritime domain awareness and enforcement of [China] territorial claims in the South China Sea. The South China Sea Institute of Oceanology (SCSIO), an institute of the ... state-run Chinese Academy of Science (CAS), announced on August 18 that the [China] approved plans for a marine environmental observation station in the South China Sea that would monitor the “Zhongsha Islands.” The “Zhongsha Islands” is [China's] name for the grouping of the Scarborough Shoal, which the [China] seized from the Philippines in 2012, and the underwater Macclesfield Bank. The SCSIO said that the new station will establish a “three-dimensional marine observation network” covering the entirety of the “Zhongsha Islands” and collaborating with existing monitoring stations in the [China]-occupied Paracel and Spratly Islands. ..."
