Security analysts poring over satellite photos of China have shared a surreal image: There's a detailed, full-scale replica of a US Navy destroyer in the middle of a remote stretch of Chinese desert. It's a vivid indication of the seriousness with which the Chinese government takes preparations for a potential war with the United States, perhaps over Taiwan.
Thousands of miles from the nearest ocean, the mockup sits amid the sands of a missile-testing range near Ruoqiang in Xinjiang Province. It's an exceedingly precise replica of a 510-foot-long US Arleigh Burke-class destroyer. That type of vessel is a core workhorse of the US Navy, and is involved in air defense, anti-submarine warfare, surface warfare and attacks on land-targets. A main player in Trump's Israel-allied war on Iran, it was likely an Arleigh Burke-class destroyer that fired the Tomahawk missiles on Feb 28 that devastated a girls' elementary school in Minab, killing 168 people, mostly schoolgirls. Here's video of an Arleigh Burke-class destroyer, the USS Michael Murphy, in action:
Adding to the mockup's realism, analysts told CNN that that it's bristling with antennas that are used to reproduce the destroyer's radar signature. The same area of China is home to several flat, 2-D mockup of other US ships, portraying the outlines of destroyers and aircraft carriers as seen from above. Those mockups are mounted on tracks so they glide along the desert sea at the same speeds real US warships would use.
As with any well-resourced military, mockups have long been a part of Chinese readiness training, to include building fake airstrips, highway interchanges and even an Eiffel Tower in their desert. The country has also built a 3D mockup of central Taipei, to include Taiwan's presidential office. However, according to open source intelligence analyst Joseph Wen of the Taiwan Inspiration Association, this is the first known instance in which China has built a detailed, 3-D replica of a warship. Wen is credited with being the first to discover the new mockup several weeks ago, while it was still being built. "The message that they are sending is China is always preparing for war," Wen told CNN.
...just like the United States, which may see its already-enormous military budget grow 50% from about $1 trillion to $1.5 trillion in FY 2027 -- if Congress makes Trump's fever-dreams a reality.