A think tank has released a new platform focusing on how Micronesia, a little-mentioned but strategically placed archipelago in the western Pacific, is becoming a central arena in the U.S.-China great-power competition.

The region—which includes sovereign states such as Palau and the Federated States of Micronesia, as well as U.S. territories Guam and the Northern Mariana Islands—is part of what the Pentago n calls the “Second Island Chain.”

This string of islands would, as the name suggests, serve as a second line of defense to contain Chinese forces in the event of a major conflict, lying beyond the First Island Chain that stretches from South Korea down to the Philippines.

Mapping Militarization

The newly minted Micronesia Security Monitor (MSM), created by the Guam-based Paci

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