Qionglin New Village sits deep in the Himalayas, just three miles from a region where a heavy military buildup and confrontations between Chinese and Indian troops have brought fears of a border war.

The land was once an empty valley, more than 10,000 feet above the sea, traversed only by local hunters. Then Chinese officials built Qionglin, a village of cookie-cutter homes and finely paved roads, and paid people to move there from other settlements.

China’s leader, Xi Jinping, calls such people “border guardians.” Qionglin’s villagers are essentially sentries on the front line of China’s claim to Arunachal Pradesh, India’s easternmost state, which Beijing insists is part of Chinese-ruled Tibet.

Many villages like Qionglin have sprung up. In China’s west, they give its sovereignty a new, undeniable permanence along boundaries contested by India, Bhutan and Nepal. In its north, the settlements bolster security and promote trade with Central Asia. In the south, they guard against the flow of drugs and crime from Southeast Asia.

The buildup is the clearest sign that Mr. Xi is using civilian settlements to quietly solidify China’s control in far-flung frontiers, just as he has with fishing militias and islands in the disputed South China Sea.

The New York Times mapped and analyzed settlements along China’s border to create the first detailed visual representation of how the country has reshaped its frontiers with strategic civilian outposts, in just eight years.

Working with the artificial intelligence company RAIC Labs, which scanned satellite images of China’s entire land border captured by Planet Labs, The Times identified the locations of new villages and checked them against historical images, state media, social media posts and public records.

The mapping reveals that China has put at least one village near every accessible Himalayan pass that borders India, as well as on most of the passes bordering Bhutan and Nepal, according to Matthew Akester, an independent researcher on Tibet, and Robert Barnett, a professor from SOAS University of London. Mr. Akester and Mr. Barnett, who have studied Tibet’s border villages for years, reviewed The Times’s findings.

The outposts are civilian in nature, but they also provide China’s military with roads, access to the internet and power, should it want to move troops quickly to the border. Villagers serve as eyes and ears in remote areas, discouraging intruders or runaways.

“China does not want outsiders to be able to walk across the border for any distance without being challenged by its security personnel or citizens,” Mr. Akester said.

The buildup of settlements fuels anxiety in the region about Beijing’s ambitions. The threat of conflict is ever present: Deadly clashes have broken out along the border between troops from India and China since 2020, and tens of thousands of soldiers from both sides remain on a war footing.

The first signs of Mr. Xi’s ambitions emerged in 2017, when state media told the story of a letter he wrote to two Tibetan sisters in the remote village of Yume, in a region near Arunachal Pradesh that is blanketed by deep snow for more than half the year.

He praised their family for having protected the area for China for decades, despite the inhospitable terrain: “I hope you continue your spirit as a patriot and border guardian.”

Over the next few years, workers built dozens of new homes in Yume, and officials moved over 200 people there.

Yume, also known as Yumai in Chinese, is among at least 90 new villages and expanded settlements that have sprung up in Tibet since 2016, when China began outlining its border village plan in the region, The Times found. In neighboring Xinjiang and Yunnan, The Times identified six new and 59 expanded border villages. (China says there are hundreds of villages like them, but few details are available and many appear to be mere upgrades of existing villages.)

Of the new villages The Times identified in Tibet, one is on land claimed by India, though within China’s de facto border; 11 other settlements are in areas contested by Bhutan. Some of those 11 villages are near the Doklam region, the site of a standoff between troops from India and China in 2017 over Chinese attempts to extend a road.

China makes clear that the villages are there for security. In 2020, a leader of a Tibetan border county told state media that he was relocating more than 3,000 people to frontier areas that were “weakly controlled, disputed or empty.”

Brahma Chellaney, a strategic affairs analyst based in New Delhi, said that in quietly building militarized villages in disputed borderlands, China is replicating on land an expansionist approach that it has used successfully in the South China Sea.

“What stands out is the speed and stealth with which China is redrawing facts on the ground, with little regard for the geopolitical fallout,” Mr. Chellaney said. “China has been planting settlers in whole new stretches of the Himalayan frontier with India and making them its first line of defense.”

In a written response to The Times, Liu Pengyu, a spokesman for the Chinese Embassy in Washington, said that in dealing with border issues with its neighbors, “China always strives to find fair and reasonable solutions through peaceful and friendly consultations.”

India and Bhutan did not respond to requests for comment about the buildup. Indian officials have previously noted “infrastructure construction activity” by China along the border. Local leaders in Arunachal Pradesh and Ladakh have complained to The Times that China was slowly cutting away small pieces of Indian territory.

India has responded with what it calls “Vibrant Villages,” a campaign that aims to revive hundreds of villages along the border.

But China is outbuilding India, says Brian Hart, an analyst for the China Power Project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, or C.S.I.S., who recently co-authored a report on border villages in Tibet.

Among other findings, the C.S.I.S. report identified what appeared to be a militarized facility in one such village, known as Migyitun, or Zhari in Chinese, an indication of the settlements’ dual-use nature. The Times studied satellite images of the same village and identified military trucks and tents, as well as what appeared to be a shooting range nearby.

The villages also serve as propaganda: a display of Chinese strength and superiority in the region, said Jing Qian, co-founder of the Center for China Analysis at the Asia Society.

“They want the Indians, Central Asians and others to see and think that Chinese villages are so good, that the China model is working very well.”

The slice of the Himalayas where many Chinese villages have sprung up has been largely uninhabited for good reason. Its rocky, icy terrain is particularly forbidding in winter, with roads buried many months of the year by deep snow. The air is thin and cold. The land is barren, making farming difficult.

To persuade residents to move there, Chinese Communist Party officials promised them their new homes would be cheap. They would receive annual subsidies and get paid extra if they took part in border patrols. Chinese propaganda outlets said the government would provide jobs and help promote local businesses and tourism. The villages would come with paved roads, internet connections, schools and clinics.

A local government document reviewed by The Times indicated that some villagers may be receiving around 20,000 Chinese yuan a year for relocation, less than $3,000. One resident reached by phone said he earned an extra $250 a month by patrolling the border.

But it is unclear whether the villages make economic sense.

The residents become dependent on the subsidies because there are few other ways to make a living, according to Mr. Akester, the independent expert.

China’s relocation policy is also a form of social engineering, designed to assimilate minority groups like the Tibetans into the mainstream. Tibetans, who are largely Buddhist, have historically resisted the Communist Party’s intrusive controls on their religion and way of life.

Images from the villages suggest that religious life is largely absent. Buddhist monasteries and temples are seemingly nowhere to be found. Instead, national flags and portraits of Mr. Xi are everywhere, on light poles, living room walls and balcony railings.

“They want to transform the landscape and the population,” Mr. Akester said.

Over the years, the government has pushed many nomadic Tibetans to sell their yaks and sheep, leave the grasslands and move into houses, but often without clear ways for them to survive. Instead of herding, residents have to work for wages.

Interviews suggest that many nomads who have moved to the new villages are reluctant to adapt. Some herd yaks for half the year in the mountains; others return to their old homes to live for months at a time.

Residents are often not told about the challenges that moving can entail, Mr. Barnett said, including having to spend more to travel to towns and on electricity, water, food and other essentials.

“The major problem is they are moving them from one lifestyle to another,” he said. “They end up with no capital, no usable skills, no sellable skills and no cultural familiarity.”

When money isn’t enough, Chinese officials have applied pressure on residents to relocate, an approach that was evident even in state propaganda reports.

A documentary aired by the state broadcaster, CCTV, showed how a Chinese official went to Dokha, a village in Tibet, to persuade residents to move to a new village called Duolonggang, 10 miles from Arunachal Pradesh.

He encountered some resistance. Tenzin, a lay Buddhist practitioner, insisted that Dokha’s land was fertile, producing oranges and other fruit. “We can feed ourselves without government subsidies,” he said.

The official criticized Tenzin for “using his age and religious status to obstruct relocation,” according to a state media article cited by Human Rights Watch in a report.

In the end, all 143 residents of Dokha moved to the new settlement.

JERUSALEM – The White House is facing withering criticism that President Biden’s “Don’t” attack warnings to Iran are not being taken seriously after Tehran-backed terror militias injured American military personnel at the Ain al-Asad air base in western Iraq on Monday and is suspected of another attack in Syria on Friday.

On Saturday, Biden once again issued a “Don’t” when asked by reporters what his message to Tehran was. Critics argue his Iran policy is adrift and his warnings to the Islamic republic and its proxies in October and April have not deterred them.

Following the Monday attack in Iraq, Biden, joined by Vice President Kamala Harris, met with his national security team on the latest developments in the Middle East and said on X  that in addition to discussing the threats from Iran and its proxies, “We also discussed the steps we are taking to defend our forces and respond to any attack against our personnel in a manner and place of our choosing.”

Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo posted an interview with Fox News’ Bill Hemmer on X saying, “The Administration keeps saying “don’t” to Iran – but then does nothing to impose costs. This weakness means the risk from Iran continues to grow.” Biden said “Don’t” when asked if he had a message for Iran, days before Iran’s first attack against Israel in April.

US ASSETS DEPLOYED TO MIDEAST WILL HELP ISRAEL BUT WILL UNLIKELY ALTER IRAN’S MIND ON RETALIATION, EXPERTS SAY

On Friday, yet another attack against a U.S. installation in Syria occurred with U.S. officials telling Fox News that a drone struck the area, causing minor injuries to U.S. and coalition personnel. A damage assessment was still ongoing.

Iran’s increased jingoism in the Middle East is linked to the Biden administration’s failure to reestablish meaningful deterrence to blunt Tehran from launching new attacks, according to one expert.

“So long as the U.S. remains fundamentally in the business of absorbing strikes by Iran-backed militias against its basing infrastructure and regional force presence, these attacks can be expected to continue. Militia rocket and mortar and drone attacks are one way Tehran chooses to fight America on the cheap,” Behnam Ben Taleblu, a senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, where he focuses on the Iranian regime threat, told Fox News Digital.”

U.S. soldiers train at al-Asad air base in Western Iraq. (U.S. Army )

He added, “With such lopsided response ratio, at least 172 strikes since Oct. 7 and only a handful, around 10 or so, responses, it’s no surprise that the deterrence brought about by the last time Washington meaningfully used force against these groups in early 2024 has worn off.”

The Iran expert continued, “Deterrence is iterative. That fact cannot be minimized in the Middle East today. The rise in strikes by these militias may be tied to part of Iran’s larger revenge strategy after the killing of [Ismail] Haniyeh [a Hamas terror leader], the trickle of attacks starting up since this summer have more localized considerations by the militias in Iraq and Syria, and are part of a larger plan to generate a cycle of violence that forces America from the region.”

HEZBOLLAH IS THE ‘X-FACTOR’ IN LOOMING ISRAEL, IRAN WAR WITH ‘NATION STATE CAPABILITIES’

A military truck carries a missile past a portrait of Iran’s leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, during an annual military parade.   (Atta Kenare/AFP/GettyImages)

Fox News Digital approached the State Department about the lack of an American military response to the Katyusha rockets that were fired at the base.

Before the latest attack in Syria, a State Department spokesperson told Fox News Digital, “The Iran-aligned militia attack on U.S. forces stationed at Al-Asad Airbase in western Iraq marks a dangerous escalation and demonstrates Iran’s destabilizing role in the region. As President Biden has made clear, we will not hesitate to defend our people and hold responsible all who harm our U.S. personnel.”

Sabrina Singh, a deputy spokesperson at the Pentagon, said on Thursday about the attack, “It was two rockets launched by what we believe to be an Iranian-backed Shia militia group that impacted Al-Asad Airbase in Iraq. There was a third rocket that was intercepted before it impacted the base. In terms of how these rockets got through, look, that’s something that CENTCOM is going to review and is reviewing right now. We want to make sure that this doesn’t happen again.”

Four service members and one contractor were injured during Monday’s attack, according to the Pentagon spokesperson. 

EXPECT IRAN’S RESPONSE TO EXTEND BEYOND THE MIDDLE EAST: ROBERT GREENWAY

 U.S. soldiers prepare to go out on patrol from a remote combat outpost on May 25, 2021, in northeastern Syria. (John Moore/Getty Images)

Joel Rubin, a former State Department official during the Obama administration, defended Biden’s policies and told Fox News Digital, “The president has made it very clear to Iran that there would be significant consequences if it were to take military action against Israel. In addition to sending additional military craft to the region, he’s working the diplomatic channels to make sure Iran understands this, creating deterrence. While the crisis has not yet fully passed, it’s clear that Iran is thinking twice about its next moves.”

Iran’s main proxies in the Middle East are the Lebanese-based Hezbollah movement, Hamas, and the Houthi movement in Yemen. The Islamic republic has used its vast oil and gas profits over the decades to export its revolutionary Islamist ideology to countries in the Mideast and in the West, including the U.S., where U.S. intelligence revealed Tehran incited anti-Israel protests on college campuses, threatened to assassinate President Trump and is meddling in the presidential election.

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A mural of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader, on March 8, 2020, in Tehran. (Kaveh Kazemi/Getty Images)

Iran has, since 1984, been continuously classified by the U.S. government as the world’s worst state-sponsor of terrorism. Radical Islamists seized power in Tehran in 1979 and declared America as the “great Satan.” Iranian Islamists are also fond of chanting “Death to America” at mass events and in the country’s parliament.

Fox News Digital reported in February that an Iranian manufactured drone fired by a Tehran-backed militia in Iraq killed three U.S. soldiers in Jordan.

Fox News’ Andrea Vacchiano contributed to this report.

Disney and “Fortnite” developer Epic Games unveiled details of a broad plan to integrate Disney brands and characters into Epic’s cutting-edge game franchise during the company’s presentation Saturday at the D23 fan gathering in Anaheim, Calif.

During the Disney Experiences Showcase presentation, Josh D’Amaro, Disney’s parks and products chief, and leaders of Marvel (Kevin Feige), Pixar (Peter Docter), Lucasfilm (Dave Filoni) and Walt Disney Animation Studios (Jennifer Lee) revealed some of the early plans for the Disney-Epic Games collaboration to build new games and entertainment universes tied to its enormously popular “Fornite” gaming franchise.

“At Disney Experiences, Imagineers dream, create, design and build these stories into real places. And we have Imagineers in place right now all around the world because everything we’re going to share with you is in active development,” D’Amaro told the crowd. “Plans are drawn. Dirt is moving. I just want to be clear about this: We are doing everything you’re going to hear tonight.”

For one, on Aug. 16 fan favorite Marvel characters Doctor Doom and the Fantastic Four will be featured in the storyline for Fornite’s Battle Royale’s Chapter 5, Season 4: Absolute Doom. The significance is that fans will be able to pick up clues and hints as to the storylines for upcoming Marvel films featuring those characters. That connects the game to Marvel storytelling in an deeper way than before — a move with significance to Marvel’s most dedicated fans.