Chinese evaluations of the U.S. Navy submarine force

Naval War College Review, Wntr, 2008 by Gabriel Collins, Andrew Erickson, Lyle Goldstein, William Murray

The U.S. Navy submarine force has set the standard in undersea warfare for at least half a century. America's submarines made a vital contribution to victory in the Second World War, and they formed an elite force of truly innovative capabilities during the "Cold War at sea" with the Soviet Navy. Since the end of the Cold War, the submarine force has been a leader among U.S. military warfighting communities in transforming itself to remain relevant against militant Islamist extremism and other emerging threats.

In such missions, the submarine force conducts strategic deterrence, intelligence and surveillance, extended-range land attack, and insertion of special forces, in addition to forming the essential backbone of the Navy's mission of sea control--the all-important, enabling task of maintaining command of the seas for the U.S. armed forces. With the launch of the first of the Virginia class in 2003, the Navy's position at the forefront of global submarine forces was set for the foreseeable future.

Perhaps partly inspired by the great successes of the U.S. submarine force, navies around the world have invested heavily in undersea warfare, especially in submarine capabilities. China stands out among these as an emerging submarine power. Over the last decade, Beijing has been building four different classes of boats while importing the Kilo-class diesel submarine from Russia in large numbers. Indeed, China's intense focus on undersea warfare has led some to speculate that a transpacific rivalry is already under way, at least with respect to submarine capabilities. As policy makers in Washington grapple with the challenge of China's rise, therefore, it may be wise to consider how Beijing is approaching its evolving naval strategy dilemmas. This article examines Chinese views of the American submarine force. As that submarine force constitutes one of the most vital elements of Washington's overall strategy for establishing and maintaining sea control in times of conflict, Beijing's assessment of those capabilities may be critical to uncovering the future evolution of this nascent rivalry.

More specifically, then, this research was undertaken for three reasons:

* The U.S. Navy submarine force is thought to represent a key capability for conflict scenarios involving China.

* This part of the U.S. Navy has undertaken major efforts at transformation within a new geostrategic and technological environment.

* The American submarine force represents a rather well-defined warfare area and thus lends itself to a bounded research effort.

Over the last decade, there has been an explosion of publishing in China on all subjects, including strategic and military-technical research. Thus, there are at least five serious journals devoted to naval warfare and dozens of more technically oriented journals. (1) In this project, well over a thousand Chinese articles were surveyed, of which approximately 150 were judged worthy of closer scrutiny and analysis by the research team. The danger of circularity--attributing to Chinese analysts ideas that have simply been translated from original English-language sources into Chinese--is real, but one that the research team carefully considered throughout. Most Chinese journals now openly attribute English-language articles to their original sources. By and large, this kind of material (direct translation from English) was not evaluated in this study, in favor of articles that appeared to represent the actual opinions of Chinese naval and defense analysts.

This article is divided into five parts. The first section surveys Chinese reactions to a variety of current issues in the U.S. submarine force, including recent deployments and incidents of special interest. A second section examines Chinese evaluations of specific submarine force capabilities, focusing especially on new factors (e.g., the development of SSGNs) that have been central to transformation efforts. Section three considers some critical historical issues, particularly Chinese perceptions of U.S. submarine operations during the Cold War. A fourth section considers how Chinese analysts believe their antisubmarine forces would match up against the U.S. submarine force. Section five reviews Chinese perceptions regarding the overall future trajectory of the U.S. submarine force. A conclusion summarizes the article and offers policy recommendations.

Overall, this article finds that Chinese naval analysts study the U.S. submarine force in excruciating detail, as concretely manifested in thousands of both strategic and technical articles that focus on it. (2) As one Chinese naval analyst puts it, "Nuclear attack subs are the most worthwhile weapons investments because they are the most survivable weapons platforms.... During a regional conflict, [U.S.] nuclear attack submarines are the first in and last out." (3) Nevertheless, there is also a keen appreciation that the U.S. Navy is focusing primarily on ongoing military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. Writing in the official PLA journal [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] (Modern Navy), one analysis declares, "The U.S. Navy's capabilities to wage war at sea are gradually declining, and open ocean warfare is already not a focal point." (4) Recognizing the potentially major role of the U.S. submarine force in China contingencies, another analyst suggests: "On the basis of a great quantity of research, the PLA [People's Liberation Army] believes that U.S. nuclear submarines are very quiet, and difficult to discover and counterattack; at the same time, [their] attack power is great, [and] must [be] restrain[ed]." (5) Such assessments underline the importance of a closer examination of Chinese perspectives concerning the American submarine force.