EVENTS

Date:	Monday, May 8, 2006
Time:	3:00 PM -- 4:30 PM
Location:	Wohlstetter Conference Center, Twelfth Floor, AEI 1150 Seventeenth Street, N.W., Washington, D.C. 20036

May 2006

China's Undersea Warfare: Strategy and Capabilities

One of China’s major strategic goals is to develop “area-denial” capabilities in the waters along its periphery, precluding foreign interference in potential regional conflicts or in the Taiwan Strait. The centerpiece of this naval modernization program is the acquisition of undersea weapons systems, including sea mines and such submarines as the advanced Kilo class. Given the inherent difficulties of antisubmarine warfare and minesweeping operations, these capabilities will enhance China’s options for a wide range of naval scenarios. What acquisitions and organizational changes will shape the emerging Chinese navy? How will new technologies such as air-independent propulsion affect naval warfare in the East Asian littoral? What is China’s strategy for employing sea mines and submarines? Will China shift toward a power-projection strategy as it develops broader global interests? On May 8, AEI hosted Lyle Goldstein and Andrew Erickson of the Naval War College to address these and other questions relating to China’s undersea warfare.

Andrew Erickson
Naval War College

By studying U.S. minesweeping in Operation Desert Storm, People’s Liberation Army (PLA) analysts realized potential U.S. strengths and vulnerabilities. They saw how difficult it was for U.S. and allied forces to conduct minesweeping, and they saw shortcomings in the Iraqi mining campaign. They likewise observed during Operation Iraqi Freedom that it was difficult to sweep the few mines that Iraq laid. China has thus decided to develop sufficient mining capabilities to challenge to U.S. forces if they intervene in a Taiwan Strait scenario.

China has adopted a “vacuum cleaner approach” to mine warfare, seeking foreign sources of technology, transferring them, reverse engineering them, and producing very detailed and sophisticated capabilities. For example, China has purchased advanced Russian sea-mines, and Russian engineers helped with the development of advanced rocket rising mines. Apart from acquiring weapons from Russia, China is also trying to incorporate Russian technology into its own indigenous weapon systems.

The PLA has been developing a sea mine that would actually go above the water surface and could potentially attack low flying mine countermeasure aircraft. The Chinese have also developed underwater unmanned vehicles and practiced laying sea mines using them.

The advantage of laying sea mines is that although they cannot easily achieve sea-control against a large power like U.S. Navy, they can attain certain operational goals. A large stock of sea mines gives China a wide variety of options in terms of putting the most capable mines in certain areas and creating psychological effects.

Apart from this, the Chinese are also managing their mine arsenal more effectively. They are getting rid of obsolete weapons and heading towards an eccentric type warfare. PLA mining training is also becoming better very quickly. At the same time that we see these rapid improvements, Taiwan’s minesweeping capability is aging and vulnerable to preemptive attack.
 
Lyle Goldstein
Naval War College

There is an increased pace in the Chinese submarine development. Between 2002 and 2004, China launched thirteen submarines, excluding those imported from Russia, which is quite extraordinary.

New Chinese submarine weapons systems are also fearsome. They have some of the most advanced cruise missiles in the world, and they can now launch cruise missiles from under water even on some indigenous platforms.

This summary was prepared by AEI intern Shivani Kota.