China has built seven new military bases on artificial islands in the South China Sea.
China will continue to improve and expand its dregger fleet and triple dredging capacity again over the next 15 years. China will spend $2 to 4 billion per year on better ships and on operations to build islands. China has built a 140-meter-long, 28-meter-wide dregger, the Tian Kun Hao, which has described by some local media as “Asia’s most powerful island maker”. It is expected to go into service in the summer of 2018.The Paracel Islands are a chain of some 130 tiny features. China will likely building up dozens into islands with airports, missile facilities and ports.
The 87 miles of fortifications that made up the Maginot line were completed by the 1935 cost of 7 billion francs ($8 billion in 2015 terms). This was about 60-90% of one year of France’s military budget in the final year of its completion.
The Maginot Line only had anti-tank guns and fortifications against soldiers and tanks.China is spending about $5 billion to create and fortify each large man-made island in the South China Sea. This is for five-square-kilometer military bases. The bases often have 1-2 mile long airport runways and ports. These are larger than aircraft carrier runways. This means planes can launch with full loads of fuel and weapons. This allows planes to operate with longer ranges.
The four largest military installations in the SCS have extensive facilities for the operation of military aircraft. This includes advanced fighters, but more importantly patrol, electronic-warfare and advanced early-warning aircraft. The ability to use these airfields effectively extends the reach of China’s A2/AD bubble, enabling the transmission of targeting data to missile launchers at sea and in mainland China. The fighter aircraft themselves serve to make the skies over the SCS even more lethal than they otherwise would be, as well as threaten U.S. ships at a distance with cruise missiles.
China can operate the J-20 stealth fighter which has a combat radius of about 1250 miles and firing cruise missiles with 180-600 mile range.
The islands are about 200-500 miles from China’s coast.
With 1500 to 2000 mile aircraft and missile ranges, bases on the South China Sea can cover all of southeast asia. China would have overlapping air and missile cover across China and the South China Sea bases.
If China completes fifty islands and has military bases for each then this would cost about $250 billion and would be completed in about ten years. China’s military budget is growing at about 7% per year and would likely be about $650 billion in 2027.
By 2022, China should have twenty fortified islands in the South China Sea. This will be up from about 7 to 12 today. China should have over fifty fortified islands by 2030.