April 23, 2009
Courtesy Of Asia Times Online
HONG KONG - China will show off its nuclear-powered submarines for the first time in history on Thursday during a fleet parade to mark the 60th anniversary of the founding of the naval arm of the People's Liberation Army (PLAN).
The display of the country's most advanced submarines, as well as the parade itself which will feature 21 ships from 14 foreign countries including the United States and Russia, shows China's growing confidence in the rapid modernization of its navy.
The largest naval parade in the PLA's history is also a sign that Beijing is attaching increasing importance to the role of the navy, once considered the weakest of the three branches of the PLA. China's deployment of ships to the coast of Somalia to fight pirates at the end of last year is regarded as a strategic change of the PLAN from a near-shore defensive force to a blue-water combat armada.
In an interview with the state-run Xinhua news agency, Vice Admiral Ding Yiping, PLAN's deputy commander, said the nuclear-powered submarines would appear at Thursday's fleet review in the northern port city of Qingdao.
"It is not a secret that China has nuclear submarines, which are key to safeguarding our country's national security," Ding said, adding that the number of China's nuclear submarines was far less than those of the US and Russia.
The 225,000-member PLAN operates up to 10 nuclear-powered submarines and as many as 60 diesel-electric vessels, more than any other Asian country. China's second-generation, nuclear-powered Jin- and Shang-class submarines are considered just a notch below cutting-edge US and Russian crafts.
Speculation has been rife as to whether President Hu Jintao, who will review the fleet parade in his capacity as chairman of the Central Military Commission, will take the opportunity to announce China's plan to build one or more aircraft carriers. A senior PLA official in Beijing said it was unlikely Hu would make the announcement. "It is no longer a secret that China wants to build aircraft carriers. There is no need to make a formal announcement on such things," said the official who declined to be named.
United States chief of naval operations Admiral Gary Roughead downplayed concerns over China's plans for an aircraft carrier but said the US would like to have a better idea about the intentions behind China's naval modernization.
"The advancement and the growth of the PLA Navy is consistent with China's economic advancement and its role in a globalized world. I think it is important, however, that as we create a naval capability, indeed any military capability, that there should be clear communications with regard to what the intentions of that capability are. That's why visits like mine are important," said Roughead during a news conference on Sunday in Beijing.
The high-profile naval display is also a sign of China's confidence in the overall modernization of its military. China has for a long time kept a low profile in regard to its naval buildup, the PLA source said.
Not so long ago, the navy was the weakest branch of the PLA. Ships and weapons were so outdated the Chinese military was reluctant to show them in public, preferring to keep any development top secret. Moreover, China has been concerned that flexing its naval clout could arouse suspicion from neighboring countries, some of which have territorial disputes with China.
But as China's interests spread globally, Beijing needed a strong naval force to protect its "blue water" interests, as exemplified by the need to protect Chinese commercial ships off Somalia, the source said. "So now it's better for China to increase the transparency of its naval development than to continue keeping it a top secret. Anyway, it is hard to keep it secret given modern reconnaissance means," the source said.
Ding Yiping said in his interview with Xinhua that suspicion arises because of misunderstanding, adding that the fleet parade on Thursday was aimed at promoting understanding about China's military rise.
"Suspicions about China being a 'threat' to world security are mostly because of misunderstandings and lack of understandings about China," said Ding. "The suspicions would disappear if foreign counterparts could visit the Chinese navy and know about the true situation."
Ding also said the review would be a platform for foreign navies to enhance mutual understanding. High-level delegations from 29 countries and 21 vessels from 14 countries will attend the review.
Exchanges between naval forces of different countries would enhance trust and cooperation, PLAN Commander Admiral Wu Shengli said on Tuesday in Qingdao at a seminar to mark the four-day celebrations.
Wu said maritime disputes should be resolved in accordance with the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, and that all countries should avoid military competition or conflict. Governments should respect each other's sovereignty and territorial integrity on an equal and mutually beneficial basis, and should not use, or threaten to use, military force in international relations, Wu said.
Wu also urged the world's navies to work together to combat threats such as terrorism and piracy. "It is the obligation of all countries' naval forces to work together to ensure safety on the oceans, and crack down on such unconventional threats," Wu said.
It is interesting that Qingdao has been chosen as the place for the fleet parade. Qingdao is the headquarters of the Beihai Fleet, one of China's three naval fleets. It was in Qingdao that the PLAN set up its first naval aviation school in early 1950s. China's first submarine fleet was also formed in this northern city in 1954.
But just 150 kilometers northeast of Qingdao is Liugong Island at the mouth of Weihai Bay, a well-known historical site often considered as the home of China's "national humiliation".
During the reign of the Guangxu Emperor from 1875 to 1908, the Qing Dynasty founded the Beiyang Fleet as China's first modern navy, considered the best in Asia at that time. A telegraph center, a naval academy and the headquarters of the Beiyang Naval Units were set up on Liugong Island.
But during the First Sino-Japanese War, the Beiyang Fleet suffered a crushing defeat. In the spring of 1895, Liugong Island was occupied by Japanese forces. Ding Ruchang, commander of the Beiyang Fleet, committed suicide. The Japanese occupation lasted for roughly three years before the British bought the territory from the Japanese.
The principal result of the first Sino-Japanese War was a shift in regional dominance from China to Japan. It came as a fatal blow to the Qing Dynasty and Chinese classical tradition.
Military exchange between China and Japan remains a sensitive issue. Hong Kong media reported that China turned down Japan's offer to send ships to participate in the Qingdao fleet review, though the report is not officially confirmed.
One hundred and fourteen years after the defeat of 1895, China's ships will sail with those from other naval powers in the Qingdao fleet review. "This delivers a message that China will never allow its navy to be defeated so easily again," the PLA source said, adding that the Chinese navy will now sail into the world's oceans with a new posture.
The PLAN was formed on April 23, 1949, in Taizhou city in Jiangsu province. It originally consisted of nine warships and 17 boats obtained when a unit of the Kuomintang's second coastal defense fleet defected to the PLA. Coincidentally, Taizhou is the birthplace of Hu Jintao.
Qingdao will be China's fourth naval review since 1949. The first was held in Dalian in 1957. The second was held in 1995 in the Yellow Sea and attended by Jiang Zemin, Hu's predecessor. The third was held in 2005, after a Sino-Russian joint military exercise in the sea off Shandong province.
Wu Zhong is the China Editor of Asia Times Online.
(Copyright 2009 Asia Times Online (Holdings) Ltd. All rights reserved.)
Also Of Interest:
China's New Super Missile Targets U.S. Carriers In Deep Ocean
By MARTIN SIEFF,
UPI Senior News Analyst
Published: April 1, 2009 at 6:45 P
Courtesy of United Press International
WASHINGTON, April 1 (UPI) -- China is developing a new, nasty surprise for the U.S Navy's aircraft carrier battle groups -- a super-long-range anti-ship ballistic missile with a range of 1,200 miles.
The U.S. Naval Institute reported on its Web site Tuesday that the new weapon has already been under secret development for years. It is a modified version of the Dong Feng 21 missile that, in addition to its range, can carry a warhead capable of doing serious, and possibly lethal, damage to an 80,000-ton nuclear-powered U.S. supercarrier.
The Naval Institute report said details of the new anti-ship ballistic missile were first revealed on a Chinese blog that U.S. military analysts regard as a credible source for information about the People's Liberation Army and Navy. The report was translated into English and can be viewed at the naval affairs blog Information Dissemination: informationdissemination.blogspot.com/2009/03/plan-asbm-development.html.
"The range of the modified Dong Feng 21 missile is significant in that it covers the areas that are likely hot zones for future confrontations between U.S. and Chinese surface forces," the Naval Institute noted.
The report also describes the new missile as being difficult to locate and track on radar because of its combination of "a complex guidance system, low radar signature and a maneuverability that makes its flight path unpredictable."
The report said the new missile can fly at speeds of up to Mach 10 -- 10 times the speed of sound. That is about 7,500 miles per hour at sea level. It can fly more than 1,200 miles in less than 12 minutes.
The weapon was not developed in isolation. The Naval Institute report said it can be guided on to its giant aircraft carrier targets by a combination of low-Earth-orbit satellites, radar and unmanned aerial vehicles.
U.S. naval analysts believe that the Chinese allowed details of the new ASBM to be published unofficially because the weapon is already operational, the report said. "The Chinese rarely mention weapons projects unless they are well beyond the test stages," it said.
The new Chinese weapon, if it is operational or likely to be so soon, marks a huge advance in naval warfare and heralds a shift in the balance of power at sea that could prove strategic in its scale. It would be, as the Naval Institute report pointed out, "the first time a ballistic missile has been successfully developed to attack vessels at sea. Ships currently have no defense against a ballistic missile attack."
China has slowly but relentlessly and steadily built up already an overwhelming concentration of short-range anti-ship and anti-aircraft missiles to dominate the Taiwan Strait. Already, they have made the strait a death trap for U.S. carrier battle groups in any time of war. However, the U.S. carrier force has retained its great capability to project power hundreds of miles against land-based targets while remaining out of range of land-based and light warship-based ASBMs.
The new anti-ship Chinese ballistic missile, however, if it proves successful and reliable, could have the capability to threaten U.S. warships operating more than a thousand miles away from Chinese land bases, effectively driving U.S. naval power in the event of any conflict with China back into the Central Pacific. It will also spur urgent U.S. efforts to adapt and advance existing ballistic missile defense technology to provide defenses against the new threat.
Along with the Chinese naval buildup, U.S. Navy officials appear to view the development of the anti-ship ballistic missile as a tangible threat.
Respected analyst Raymond Pritchett writes on the U.S. Naval Institute blog at blog.usni.org/?p=1964 that senior U.S. Navy officers appear to be taking the new threat very seriously indeed.
"The Navy's reaction is telling because it essentially equals a radical change in direction based on information that has created a panic inside the bubble," he wrote. "For a major military service to panic due to a new weapon system, clearly a mission kill weapon system, either suggests the threat is legitimate or the leadership of the Navy is legitimately unqualified. There really aren't many gray spaces in evaluating the reaction by the Navy ... the data tends to support the legitimacy of the threat."
China's naval commanders are certainly riding high and feeling confident these days. On March 8 they harassed a U.S. survey ship, the USNS Impeccable, which appears to have been on an intelligence-gathering voyage in international waters near the major Chinese strategic submarine and bomber bases on the island of Hainan.
The new weapon also confirms reports from United Press International's Andrei Chang that the Chinese navy is no longer satisfied with simply being able to prevent the U.S. Navy and its carrier battle groups from operating in China's home waters. Beijing appears determined to create the weapons systems that will allow it to assert command of the seas at least 1,000 miles out into the ocean beyond its shores.
No comments:
Post a Comment