China Tries to Build Sand Bases, Again || Peter Zeihan

TL;DR

China is repeating its failed artificial island strategy in the South China Sea, despite all previous sand-dredged bases sinking and cracking within years.

Key Points

• 1.China's artificial islands are structurally doomed by sand physics. The South China Sea has a sandy bottom, so China dredges coral and sand into piles, but the resulting islands are unstable — runways became unusable and reinforced hangars cracked open within 12–48 months.
• 2.Xi Jinping lost his last honest adviser 7 years ago, enabling the restart. Advisers who warned the program was wasteful and embarrassing were dismissed, leaving Xi consuming only his own propaganda — directly causing the resumption of island-building in the Paracels.
• 3.Zeihan is unconcerned, predicting the larger new island will fail even more spectacularly. He argues that scaling up a fundamentally flawed sand-base concept only produces a bigger disaster, and hopes China bases military plans on it.