Giuseppe Sandro Mela.
2020-08-30.
«The Yulin base, on the southern end of Hainan Island almost 300 miles (470 kilometers) southwest of Hong Kong, is one of China’s key facilities to protect its naval assets»
«The satellite image from American imaging company Planet Labs, first posted on the social media accounts of Radio Free Asia, shows what appears to be a Type 093 nuclear-powered attack submarine entering a tunnel to an underground berth on Yulin Naval B»
«What’s not unusual is the Chinese underground base»
«It’s how Beijing conceals a lot of its military hardware, from submarines to missile systems based far inland»
«The Chinese have tremendous experience building underground facilities …. It’s in keeping with their strategic culture.»
«They have an ingrained sense of the acute vulnerability of their coastline to attack»
«The bottom line is they have a large and growing submarine fleet which is improving in quality …. They are able to protect it with underground facilities»
«Tunnels blind potential opponents to the submarines’ operating status and patterns, denying them the ability to determine the state of China’s military preparations, knowledge critical to assessing China’s intentions and plans»