China is bolstering its lead in resource exploration and any conflicts in the South China Sea, a sea disputed by five other governments, by stepping up deployment of expendable, cost-effective drones, analysts believe.Last month the People’s Liberation Army exhibited an “electronic-warfare variant” of drones that had done just reconnaissance missions before, part of an effort to control information during any military movement, American research organization Center for Strategic & International Studies said.In September, a drone network operated by the Chinese Ministry of Natural Resources was sent to survey the contested sea’s waters and remote, uninhabited islets, the Ministry of Ecology and Environment said as reported by domestic media. In 2017 Chinese researchers christened a drone specifically for maritime transport and surveillance.Drones can easily spy because, if caught, operators can claim they’re being used for resource exploration, experts say. Their cheaper than radars and other intelligence-gathering tools, causing little loss if seized, they add.“The drone is of course a very ideal sort of spy,” said Alan Chong, associate professor at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies in Singapore “Drones are in a sense more expendable than aircraft. If they’re shot down, China would raise a protest, but that’s it.”Stronger position in South China SeaChina, hemmed in by other claimant states and monitored by Western powers, isn’t expected to occupy more features in the 3.5-million-square-kilometer sea that’s prized for fisheries and energy reserves.But drones along with other quasi-military technology will help it find undersea fossil fuels and know quickly if another country is expanding, especially near China’s existing maritime assets, scholars say.FILE – U.S. ScanEagle drones are lined up for the formal turnover, March 13, 2018, at Villamor Air Base in suburban Pasay city, southeast of Manila, Philippines.Vietnam and China got into a standoff earlier this year over energy exploration tracts off the Vietnamese coast, and Filipinos are growing edgier about China’s pressure on their maritime holdings despite friendliness at the state-to-state level.“People are concerned that China is using technology not only in the South China Sea but spying on the Philippine population in general,” Atienza said. Defense leaders and some legislators are starting to go public with their worries, she added.China does not disclose details about its drone deployments, but it indicated in June that it sees drones as crucial hardware in the maritime dispute.The People’s Liberation Army website China.mil then linked a U.S. plan to sell drones in Southeast Asia to containing China. The Pentagon had said that month it would sell 34 ScanEagle drones worth of $47 million to Malaysia, Indonesia, the Philippines and Vietnam.
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