China’s military spending has surged. So have the purges

The grey-painted vessels were a sight to behold. Out of the fog of a late March morning in southern China’s Guangdong province, three giant metal barges, each one larger than the other, stood out of the water on what look like legs to form an 800-metre-long bridge from the deep water to a public beach.

Locals and tourists alike stopped to stare. A nine-second video was posted to Chinese social media, where it fleetingly caused a stir before being disappeared. But it was there long enough to catch the attention of Western defence analysts, who could scarcely believe what they were seeing.

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