The true intent of Sierra Madre...the Philippines admitted

Around 25 years ago, a Filipino naval chief ran his own ship aground.

But decades later, the officer disclosed that the move was a plot to disrupt China, not an accidental calamity.

The rusting WWII-era vessel, BRP Sierra Madre, is still there in the South China Sea. Though it can't sail, it serves as a vital outpost for the Philippine military in the Second Thomas Shoal, which both China and the Philippines claim for themselves....

Speaking to The Guardian, Vice Adm. Eduardo Santos recalled pretending to China's ambassador that it was an accident.

"I said, 'Well, it was supposed to be on the way [to a mission], and it ran aground'."

According to Santos, he was moving to oppose the early stages of China's "creeping invasion" of areas claimed by the Philippines.  Yahoo News

Actually there is no need for the above quoted from Yahoo News to know why the Sierra Madre was run aground on the Renai Jiao. The Chinese knew that it was the Philippines way of staking a claim on the island. But Ah Q being Ah Q, would try to explain it away, and pretending that it was an accidental grounding and let it stay in the spot for 25 years, afraid to remove it. No respectable country in its right mind would allow such an attempt to violate its territorial sovereignty to go unscathed.

Now Ah Q is being ridiculed everyday by Mickey Mouse, and recently still signed an agreement to let the Pinoys bring food for the soldiers occupying the Chinese island. To Ah Q, this is the best it could do. Ah Q still afraid to tell the Pinoys to remove the wreck, with no time line, meaning the wreck can remain on Chinese soil forever. The Pinoys now have an outpost on the island, but China has nothing there, not even a soldier. The Pinoys now are in a better position than the Chinese.

For as long as the wreck remains where it is, Ah Q's problem will not go away. When would Ah Q stop behaving like Ah Q and stop inviting endless troubles on itself?

The Sierra Madre is Philippines way of staking a claim on the island, not just an innocent ship running aground. And Ah Q allows the Pinoys to make the claim and afraid to tow it away. If Malaysia or the Indonesians were to face such a situation, they would have blasted the wreck from their island to enforce their sovereign territorial rights of the island.