PUERTO PRINCESSA: Nine hungry marines guarding the Philippines’ loneliest outpost aboard a rusted World War II vessel had just one option after Chinese vessels blocked fresh supplies from reaching them -- go fishing.
The troops were 200 kilometres from the nearest major Philippine island, holding on to a tiny reef in the South China Sea as part of a decades-long territorial row that in recent months had grown increasingly hostile.
“We knew about the dangers signing on to the job, but my worry was we were running out of supplies,” Mike Pelotera, the leader of the Marine unit, said that after his five-month mission ended this week and he returned to shore. “But we are marines and we adapt, we went fishing.”
In a remarkable act of military doggedness, the Philippines has since 1999 stationed a tiny number of marines on a former US Navy boat that was deliberately grounded on a group of islets and reefs called Second Thomas Shoal.
The 100-metre BRP Sierra Madre, built during World War II then acquired by the Philippines in the 1970s, is now little more than a rusted hull and incapable of sailing. But it has thwarted Chinese efforts to occupy all of the area, which is believed to contain huge deposits of oil and gas.
AFP
