Beijing’s plans to build an “Underwater Great Wall” could pose a chilling threat to Taiwan, according to a US expert on the Chinese military.
“Not only would it be a direct threat to Taiwan’s current and future submarines, it could also help erode deterrence by giving Beijing more confidence that it could succeed in attacking the island,” International Assessment and Strategy Center senior fellow Rick Fisher said.
Reports have appeared in this week’s Jane’s Defense Weekly and in The National Interest magazine that China has ambitions to construct a massive underwater monitoring system to detect foreign submarines in all ocean areas concerning Chinese national interests.
“Since the Cold War the US has held a decisive advantage in undersea warfare which has continued to the current era, providing a constant capability that has deterred Chinese aggression,” Fisher told the Taipei Times.
“A potential Chinese ‘Underwater Great Wall’ of multiple moored sonar, ship sonar and anti-submarine warfare aircraft, all sending signals to be processed by shore-based supercomputers, could enable China to attack distant US submarines with missiles armed with torpedoes or nuclear depth charges,” he said.
However, Fisher said that such a network would invite attacks or deception operations “so it might not provide an undersea advantage for a long period.”
“Once the underwater network is neutralized, submarines can assert their previous advantages, so it remains in Taiwan’s and America’s interest to continue to develop new submarines,” he said.
Fisher said that the bottom line was that China intends to make the oceans far more visible, requiring Taiwan, the US and its allies to rapidly develop countermeasures, better submarine technologies and better ways to communicate with submarines to warn them of approaching Chinese threats.
Jane’s Defense Weekly said that China State Shipbuilding Corp (CSSC) has proposed the construction of a network of ship and subsurface sensors that could significantly erode the undersea warfare advantage held by the US and Russian submarines and contribute greatly to China’s ability to control the South China Sea.
“While some elements of this network have been known for some time, CSSC is now in effect proposing an improved Chinese version of the Sound Surveillance System that for a time gave the US a significant advantage in countering Soviet submarines during the Cold War,” Jane’s said.
The National Interest cited a recent study by the RAND Corporation that speculated on what might happen if US submarines were operating against a Chinese amphibious force invading Taiwan.
It predicted that Chinese anti-submarine warfare forces might destroy 1.82 US submarines per week of the campaign.
Therefore, if the campaign lasted two weeks the US Navy could expect to lose three to four submarines, it said.
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