E ven the authors of Dragon Strike, a novel that imagines conflicting claims in the South China Sea triggering World War III, couldn't have dreamed this up: A Chinese military airstrip perched atop a coral reef that's closer to the Philippines than the Chinese mainland.

"I suspect that's what they'll build on Mischief Reef," says Philippine Defence Secretary Orlando Mercado. Laying aerial-reconnaissance photos on his desk, he describes a strategic pattern. In 1995, the Chinese built octagonal structures on four sites along the reef in the disputed Spratly Islands. In October this year, construction resumed. "Now they've expanded one structure, and they'll be reclaiming land along the reef to link with another structure to build an airstrip," he said in an interview in early December.

A flight of fancy? Time will tell, but the Chinese presence on Mischief Reef is visibly becoming more concrete. The reef is more than 1,000 kilometres from China's nearest coast, but only 300 kilometres from the Philippine island of Palawan. "It will be the farthest projection of China's power, and a dagger at our underbelly," Mercado frets.

China's maritime construction project shows how much the balance of power has tipped in its favour since the onset of the region's economic crisis, which has sapped the strength and unity of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations. Since 1992, a chorus of complaints from Asean has checked Chinese assertiveness in the Spratlys. But at their December 15-16 summit in Hanoi, Asean leaders largely avoided the issue. "We have bigger problems to deal with, particularly the economy," Asean Secretary-General Rodolfo Severino told the REVIEW, explaining that the meeting's final communique would contain only a veiled reference to the South China Sea.

What's more, China has reacted coolly to a Philippine offer to develop the disputed reef jointly. This was an interim solution long sought by China but previously shunned by Southeast Asian countries, which feared Beijing would use joint development to reinforce its sovereignty claims. Now Beijing, perhaps confident that occupation is 90% of ownership, merely says that the two countries can discuss Manila's offer at their next meeting on confidence-building measures, due in January.

Outmanoeuvred and outgunned, the Philippines is trying to attract the attention of the United States, which it effectively booted out in 1992 when it let the leases on U.S. military bases expire. It is having mixed success. Admiral Joseph Prueher, commander of U.S. forces in the Pacific, said during an Asian tour in early December that the U.S. was "keeping a close eye" on Mischief Reef. "If nations feel like they have a strong card to play, they will try to do it, when they think they can get away with it," he said. "This is perhaps what China is trying to do in the Mischief Reef." 

Manila found more direct support from a less powerful American official, Republican congressman Dana Rohrabacher, a senior member of the House of Representatives' international-relations committee. He flew over Mischief Reef in a Philippine air-force C-130 transport plane on December 10. "The Chinese were frantically building these fortifications as we flew over. We saw the glitter of welding torches," says Rohrabacher. "What I saw was both alarming and sinister. The Chinese have sent warships hundreds of miles from their waters in order to steal territory from a neighbour."

Rohrabacher accuses the Clinton administration of trying to downplay the drama on Mischief Reef to head off congressional criticism of its China policy. He has vowed to support Philippine President Joseph Estrada's request for American equipment to boost the Philippines' naval forces. "I gave Estrada a great bottle of tequila," he says. "I am hoping to follow up with a Coast Guard ship." 

A drink and a promise might provide some consolation, but a strong statement from Asean would have done more for the Philippine position. In 1992, a statement of concern by Asean foreign ministers, meeting in Manila, put a temporary halt to Chinese assertiveness in the South China Sea. The statement seemed to take China by surprise: It had been installing sovereignty markers on a series of shoals in the Spratlys that are also claimed by Vietnam, which did not then belong to Asean. China and the several Southeast Asian countries that claim all or part of the Spratlys subsequently traded pledges to resolve competing claims peacefully, and to do nothing to complicate the situation.

But in February 1995, right after the stormy season, which makes the area inaccessible to reconnaissance, the Philippine military discovered that China had rapidly built and manned octagonal structures perched on stilts on the four corners of the reef, which surrounds a lagoon. Beijing claimed the structures were shelters for its fishermen. 

Then in late October this year, after Typhoon Zeb had ripped through Southeast Asia, Philippine military-reconnaissance aircraft found that more construction was under way. Several Chinese vessels--including four that Manila says are military supply ships--were spotted around the reef, loaded with construction materials. Some 100 workers were photographed days later, apparently building frames for concrete foundations alongside two earlier installations. Upping the ante, the Philippines detained 20 Chinese fishermen nearby for illegal fishing.

China maintains that it's merely repairing the fishermen's shelters, and says it informed the Philippine embassy in Beijing in advance of the work. But the aerial photos tell a different story. "It certainly looks like it will be fortifications, similar, and even bigger, to those they have in Chigua and Fiery Cross reefs," says Mercado, referring to Chinese military installations elsewhere in the Spratlys. These installations are permanent, concrete structures, complete with anti-aircraft gun emplacements, that were built before 1995. 

China's push has triggered a flurry of speculation about its motives. "Beijing has been very mischievous in sending warships to disputed territory in open violation of the bilateral code of conduct it signed with Manila," says B.A. Hamzah, director of the Malaysian Institute of Maritime Affairs. "It was very irresponsible and intimidating. China's recent action does not bode well for confidence-building and regional security."

Hamzah believes reinforcing the Spratlys was a Chinese government decision. A Western diplomat in Beijing, however, speculates that it could have been pushed by the People's Liberation Army. The PLA has been forced to give up ground on the domestic front in recent months, turning its business operations over to the civilian administration.

But looking back over the past quarter-century, a pattern emerges. China has consistently moved to reinforce its claims in the South China Sea--which it maintains is historically Chinese territory--at times when other claimants were weak. For example, in 1974 it seized the Paracel Islands from the embattled South Vietnamese regime, knowing that neither it nor North Vietnam, which was receiving Chinese military aid, was in any position to argue. In 1988, as Vietnam started trying to project a less warlike image and open to the world, China seized a handful of Spratly islets in a naval clash. Conversely, when it has encountered concerted resistance, as it did from Asean in 1992, China has eased off.

Right now, Asean is clearly vulnerable. The strains caused by the economic crisis have exposed old fault lines between members, and have left them with little cash to spare for an arms race. Asean countries are also reluctant to strain their bilateral relations with China. Some experts, such as Hamzah, argue that China may have been further emboldened by its warming relations with Washington.

Whatever the reason, Beijing has paid little heed to Manila's protests. Recounts Foreign Secretary Domingo Siazon: "We told them to leave Mischief; they said no. We asked them if they'd be willing to have the dispute settled through international arbitration. They said no. We told them if they'd be willing to have a joint-development arrangement for Mischief. They said they'll think about it." 

No one knows whether the Spratlys are rich in gas and oil, but the claimants--China, Taiwan, Vietnam, the Philippines, Malaysia, Indonesia, Singapore and Brunei--aren't taking any chances. China is aware that its fuel needs will dramatically outstrip domestic supplies by early next century. A base in Mischief Reef would provide military protection for Chinese economic interests--both mineral exploration and fishing. Even more than the Spratlys is at stake: China has evoked historical claims stretching as far south as Indonesia's Natuna islands, the site of major natural-gas fields. For the U.S. and Japan, the South China Sea's vital shipping lanes are the main concern.

Manila says Mischief Reef is located within Philippine waters and within its exclusive economic zone extending 200 nautical miles (370 kilometres) from its coast. That seems to matter little at the moment. "We just don't have access to the area," Siazon says. The Philippine navy consists of only a dozen patrol boats that have been ordered to keep their distance from the Chinese so as not to provoke an incident.

China, according to Mercado, has warned the Philippines that its reconnaissance planes should fly no lower than 1,500 metres above the reef, and that its naval vessels should venture no closer than five nautical miles, in order "to prevent an accidental confrontation." Perhaps some Chinese official has read Dragon Strike: Its plot involves a Philippine air-force jet crashing into a Chinese navy ship at Mischief Reef.