The territorial dispute in the South China Sea is building towards a flash point. There is a persistent idea that it’s about nothing more than tiny islands and useless reefs.
If that’s all it is, then it’s not worth a big argument between the US and China. And it’s certainly not worth risking a war between the world’s two biggest powers, most reasonable people would agree.
China has built land area of about 800 hectares, all reclaimed from the ocean, in the last year and a half, on atolls that are also claimed by other countries in the region – the Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia and Brunei.