Vietnam is struggling to unite its Mekong neighbours against China
Vietnam moved rocket launchers into disputed territory in the South China Sea, reports recently suggested, meaning it could potentially attack land that China has controversially reclaimed. This all comes at a time of heightened tension over territorial wrangling in the region. A Pentagon report released in May 2016 described how China had reclaimed 3,200 acres of land in the disputed Spratly Islands, including 10,000 feet of runways and large ports. It also developed and fortified islands in the Paracels, where it has deployed anti-aircraft missiles on Woody Island. Similar US reports in 2015 detailed how China reclaimed 2,000 acres of land over a period of just 18 months. These activities compound concerns that China may be preparing to proclaim an “air defence identification zone” over the South China Sea in order to enforce its territorial claims over much of the ocean area, marked out on Chinese maps by the so-called “nine-dash line” with which it marks its territorial claim on maps of the region.
