Replicas of American warships filmed in the Chinese desert

China has built silhouettes in the middle of the desert of what appear to be replicas of American warships deployed in the Pacific, and likely to serve as training targets for missile fire, according to satellite images from American sources.

According to these images taken by the American satellite company Maxar Technologies last month and transmitted to AFP on Sunday, these life-size structures, including at least one in the shape of an aircraft carrier and another following the contours of a destroyer, have been spotted in the Taklamakan Desert in the Xinjiang region of western China.

One of them was mounted on rails, and while some appeared to be two-dimensional, others appeared to be more sophisticated, according to the United States Naval Institute (USNI).

“Analysis of the history of satellite images shows that the aircraft carrier-shaped structure was the first to be built between March and April 2019,” the institute said in a report.

Satellite image released on November 8, 2021 by the American company Maxar of a life-size structure in the shape of a destroyer in the Taklamakan Desert, in western China (Satellite image © 2021 Maxar Technologies / Handout)

“It has undergone numerous reconstructions and was partly dismantled in December 2019. The site was brought back to life at the end of September of this year and the structure was substantially complete at the beginning of October”, according to this report which quotes the intelligence company AllSource Analysis for which the area has been used in the past to test ballistic missiles.

Asked about the footage, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin replied on Monday that he was “not aware of the situation.”

According to a Pentagon report on the Chinese military released last week, Beijing is currently working on a major effort to modernize its weaponry, with weapons capable of neutralizing U.S. warships in the event of regional conflict.

The Pentagon cites the DF-21D missile with a range of over 1,500 kilometers, “capable of carrying out precision long-range strikes against vessels, including aircraft carriers in the western Pacific, from mainland China.” .

The Chinese army deployed these missiles during exercises, “an unambiguous message sent to world and regional opinions”, according to American admiral Philip Davidson.

Satellite image released on November 8, 2021 by the American company Maxar of a life-size structure in the shape of a destroyer, on rails near a hanger, in the Taklamakan Desert, in western China (Satellite image © 2021 Maxar Technologies / Handout)

In March before the US Senate, the admiral underlined how much, according to him, the use of these missiles during military exercises demonstrated the willingness of the Chinese army to counter any intervention by a third force in the event of a regional crisis. .

The US Navy regularly conducts operations in the South China Sea and around Taiwan, which irritates Beijing, which claims sovereignty over the island.

bur-qan / ser / clr / oaa