It’s best to be more specific about how big China is now, including its maritime area.

The U.S. Central Intelligence Agency posted on its website: "China's land area is 9,596,960 square kilometers, while the United States' land area is 9,631,418 square kilometers. We are 34,458 square kilometers less than the United States. Therefore, "China's land area is not only third after Russia and Canada, but fourth after the United States." In this regard, Professor Cui Haiting of the School of Environment of Peking University and Chen Jun, director of the National Basic Geographic Information Center, said: "China's land area is 960. Ten thousand square kilometers. In the Encyclopedia Britannica, China’s land area is 9,572,900 square kilometers, and the United States’ area is 9,518,287 square kilometers, which is smaller than China.” At the same time, the National Bureau of Surveying and Mapping revealed to reporters: “Accurate statistics have been completed. , will be announced at the appropriate time.” After reading this news, I don’t know how readers feel, but I have some thoughts on this. As early as the 1940s of the last century, when I was in primary school, my geography teacher told me that China's land is like a mulberry leaf with an area of ??more than 10 million square kilometers. I can't remember more or less. I don’t know when later, Outer Mongolia became independent. After my grandson went to school, his teacher told him that China’s land area is 9.6 million square kilometers. 9.6 million is an integer. Is it really an integer that is neither more nor less? Regrettably, when the Intelligence Bureau said that my country’s land area ranked not third but fourth, our professors still insisted on 9.6 million, and even cited that year’s edition of Encyclopedia Britannica to prove that we were third. The United States is fourth. What is even more strange and a bit ridiculous is that the dignified National Bureau of Surveying and Mapping actually said: "Accurate statistics have been completed and will be announced at the appropriate time." It should be said that today's surveying and mapping technology has advanced by leaps and bounds, and we can survey and map the world's highest peak It's very accurate. Isn't the land clearly mapped? Now, people have clearly mapped our country. It’s the 57th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China, but we still can’t tell people the size of our country. What kind of thing is this? Of course, China has gone through many wars, and our land is being divided up by others, while the land area of ??the United States is expanding, probably as a result of their land reclamation! China's officially announced land area is approximately 9.6 million square kilometers. According to the CIA of the United States, the world factbook, the land area is 9,326,410 square kilometers and the water area is 270,550 square kilometers. The land area of ??China published by several other authoritative encyclopedias is also between 9.55 and 9.6 million. But I don’t know if these data include the areas south of the Mai Line (about 80,000, controlled by India) and Aksai Chin (about 30,000, controlled by China). In addition, the "China Atlas of Provinces" published by China Map Publishing House in 2003 The data for each province in is aggregated to 9.338226 million, which is roughly equivalent to the land area announced by the CIA. Of course, the area data of each province is not very accurate, because the boundaries of each province have never been accurately delineated. Many are approximations. To sum up, it can be roughly judged that China's land area should be more than 9.3 million (including the area of ??water bodies distributed on land). If you want to know the exact data on China's territory, you can find very accurate data from foreign materials, but you will definitely not be able to get it from Chinese officials at this stage. It’s not that China can’t do it, but it’s because China’s borders with some countries have not been officially demarcated, and the disputed areas are quite large. If the official gives accurate data now, I am afraid that in future border negotiations, both externally and internally, we will be in a passive position. As long as China's borders are not finalized, there will never be an accurate statement on how large China's territory is. How big is China's land area? The answer seems to be clear. Everyone can blurt it out and be sure of it. On September 21, 1949, in the opening speech of the first plenary session of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, Mao Zedong, a giant of the generation, declared with a Hunan accent that shocked the five continents: The Chinese people have stood up since then! It is in this glorious chapter that has been recorded in history. In the document, the sentence "Our excellent conditions are a population of 475 million and a land area of ??9.6 million square kilometers" became the first public announcement of China's total land area. After that, everyone from the babbling toddler to the baby-faced birthday boy followed this saying. This is what the textbooks say, and this is what is said on radio, film and television. For decades, people have become accustomed to this “common sense”: 9.6 million square kilometers is China’s total land area; In fact, this is a wrong concept and number. Under the historical conditions at the time, this was an understandable mistake. In fact, 9.6 million square kilometers is only China’s land area. A country's territory includes not only land, rivers, lakes and inland seas, but also territorial waters and its continental shelf. For more than 20 years after 1949, in the absence of actual measured data, the length of the coastline of mainland my country has been using the data of "12,000 kilometers". So, how long is the coastline of mainland China? In 1972, the General Staff of the Chinese People's Liberation Army assigned the task of finding this answer to the Navy. After several years of actual measurements, the answer was found - 18,000 kilometers. This exciting new data was officially adopted on June 7, 1975.

The coastline suddenly grew to more than 6,000 kilometers, which means that the original data used had an error of more than 1/3. So, will the total land area roughly calculated in the absence of precise measurement also have shocking errors? We say "9.6 million square kilometers". This number is at best our country's land area. The vast maritime territory is not included. According to the provisions of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, coastal states enjoy "sovereign rights" not only over the 12-nautical-mile territorial sea, but also over the 24-nautical-mile contiguous zone, the 200-nautical-mile exclusive economic zone and the continental shelf. According to this convention, the sea area under China's jurisdiction should be 3 million square kilometers. These 3 million people, equivalent to 1/3 of the total land area, are, like the land, the sacred land of the Chinese nation. Therefore, the correct data of the total land area under China’s sovereign jurisdiction should be more than 12.6 million square kilometers. In the future ocean of mankind, the modern blue "enclosure" movement has become increasingly sharp and complex and has become difficult to control. Islands can enjoy the same rights as land territories. They can have their own territorial waters and contiguous zones, as well as their own exclusive economic zones and continental shelves. This is an express provision in the archipelago system. If the sea area is demarcated according to this system, then a small island or even a reef can obtain 1,500 square kilometers of sea area. As a result, smart people who take advantage of the loopholes in the archipelago system continue to appear. Xiang Zhuang dances with his sword, aiming at Pei Gong. Their eyes were of course fixed on the alluring blue ocean. In 1988, many news media in my country reported that the Japanese government allocated 30 billion yen and spared no effort to save its southernmost territory, Okitori Island. Although Okinori Island has the title of an island, it is actually 1,700 kilometers away from the mainland of Japan, and only two rocks are exposed in the Pacific Ocean. Due to the long-term erosion of the waves, the stone pillars supporting these two reefs have become thinner and thinner, and may be broken off at any time. The disappearance of two small reefs does not seem to cause a country to make a fuss, but according to the provisions of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, if there are no islands and reefs, then there will be no national management centered on the original islands and reefs. economic waters. It goes without saying that what Japan will lose by then will not be two rocks, but an economic sea area under national jurisdiction of up to 430,000 square kilometers. The tens of billions of yen spent just to exchange for the existence of two reefs seem to be more than worth the gain; but when compared with the exclusive economic zone of hundreds of thousands of square kilometers, it obviously becomes a far-sighted and great move that will last forever. . The Japanese are shrewd and the British are wise. The Malvinas Islands, composed of more than 200 large and small islands, are by no means a beautiful tourist destination. There are more than 250 days of rain and snow every year. The harsh climate and harsh environment mean that only more than 2,000 people can survive on the island. When the news came out on April 2, 1982 that the Argentine army had occupied the Falklands, the British, who had a strong maritime awareness, quickly followed the final word of the "Iron Lady" Mrs. Thatcher and dispatched 1/2 of their naval strength. It carried 117 ships and nearly 300 aircraft, with a total force of more than 27,000, and conducted a long-distance attack of more than 13,000 kilometers, resulting in the loss of 17 ships, including guided missile destroyers and frigates, 19 aircraft, 450 casualties, and a cost of 21.6 At a huge cost of US$100 million, the island was taken back by force. While some compatriots in our country expressed doubts about the correctness of Britain's move, the British people enthusiastically celebrated the great victory of which they were proud. The great ancestors of the Chinese nation not only left us 9.6 million square kilometers of land land, but also left us 3 million square kilometers of maritime land. As for the land land, as the date of the resumption of Hong Kong and Macao approaches, as a contemporary The descendants of the Yan and Huang Dynasties have a clear conscience, but for quite a few maritime territories, they are ashamed of themselves: ——In the fertile South China Sea, currently the Nansha Islands except Yongshu, Huayang, Dongmen, Nanxun, and Chigua With the exception of Subi Reef, which is garrisoned by our People's Navy, and Taiping Island, which is garrisoned by Taiwan's military, other larger islands and reefs have been seized by other countries. In these sea areas and on our maritime territory, there are more than 600 foreign drilling wells operating, plundering 19.25 million tons of oil and 21.5 billion cubic meters of natural gas every year. ——The Diaoyu Islands have belonged to China since ancient times, but now others are erecting monuments, towers and websites on them. ... Maritime rights and interests will determine the future of a nation and a country. Although these words did not come from the mouth of any mentor giant, they were a thought-provoking judgment. Countries around the world are fiercely competing for the ocean, but many of our compatriots are still ignorant of the basic national conditions of how much ocean land they own. Please remember the formula 9.6 million square kilometers + 3 million square kilometers = 12.6 million square kilometers.