The full report can be downloaded here.
It was delayed for months to tone down the rhetoric to avoid
antagonising the Chinese. Very substantial increase in military
expenditure and strong focus on C4ISR (信息化)
(but how good are they at it?).
Exactly. There is no way the Spratlys can belong to China
given its geographic proximity with Philippines, Indonesia, Brunei
and maybe Malaysia. However, Chinese claims are based on
historical ownership.
1. They say some of their dudes were sailing around, found those
islands and drew them on their maps two thousand years ago, thus
they owned the islands historical.
2. They also say that China lost the islands because the
Europeans who came in and took advantage of them.
3. They also claim to have found Chinese pottery and coins on
those islands proving that the Chinese were there and the island
belong to them.
In other words, they are saying that they "drew it on the maps
first", and the Europeans (pretty much the people who run the
international community) owes it to China for what they've done to
China, AND that wherever their coins are, belongs to them.
So it seems the recipe for claiming islands on the part is to
draw first, make ppl guilty for not giving to them, and to "chope"
the place with tissue paper or coins (whichever is the argued
predominant currency).
Oh, as for the Chinese embassy bombing. If the Chinese
embassy had been relaying Serbian military signals, which is the
premise of the "conspiracy", then the Chinese pretty much made
themselves legitimate MILITARY targets for their actions. So
good show by the Pentagon planners for hitting it!
Of course, i guess its just not a "legitimate" political target
eh?