Vietnam is set to have a credible naval deterrent to China in the South China Sea in the form of Kilo-class submarines from Russa, which experts say could make Beijing think twice before pushing its neighbor around in disputed waters.
Vietnam has taken possession of two of the state-of-the-art submarines and is to get a third in November in a US$2.6 billion deal agreed with Moscow in 2009. A final three are scheduled to be delivered within two years.
Annual trade between Vietnam and China has risen to US$50 billion, but Hanoi has long been wary of China, especially over Beijing’s claims to most of the South China Sea. Beijing’s placement of an oil rig in waters claimed by Vietnam earlier this year infuriated Hanoi, but the coast guard vessels it dispatched to the platform were always chased off by larger Chinese boats.
Once the submarines are fully operational, the Vietnamese are likely to run so-called area denial operations off its coast and around its military bases in the Spratly Islands (Nansha Islands, 南沙群島), which are also claimed by Taiwan.
That would complicate Chinese calculations over any military move against Vietnamese bases in the islands or in the event of an armed clash over disputed oil fields, analysts said.
“Sea denial means creating a psychological deterrent by making sure a stronger naval rival never really knows where your subs might be,” said Collin Koh of Singapore’s S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies. “It is classic asymmetric warfare utilized by the weak against the strong and something I think the Vietnamese understand very well. The question is whether they can perfect it in the underwater dimension.”
From the harbor of Cam Ranh Bay the first two submarines have recently been sighted on training runs along the Vietnamese coast according to diplomats in the region.
A Vietnamese crew is training aboard its third submarine in waters off St Petersburg ahead of its delivery to Cam Ranh Bay in November, Russia’s Interfax news agency reported last month.
Military analysts are trying to gauge how quickly Vietnamese crews are mastering the advanced submarines and some believe Hanoi plans to start sending them further offshore into the South China Sea soon.
“The Vietnamese have changed the whole scenario — they already have two submarines, they have the crews and they appear to have the weapons and their capabilities and experience will be growing from this point,” said Siemon Wezeman, an arms expert at the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute. “From the point of view of Chinese assumptions, the Vietnamese deterrent is already at a point where it must be very real.”
As well as possessing shorter-range torpedoes, Kilo-class submarines while submerged can launch sea-skimming anti-ship missiles that can travel 300km.
Zhang Baohui (張寶輝), a security expert at Hong Kong’s Lingnan University said he believed Beijing’s military planners were concerned about the submarines.
“On a theoretical level, the Vietnamese are at the point where they could put them to combat use,” he said.
Senior Vietnamese military officials told reporters they were satisfied with progress, saying training at sea and integration of the submarines into its developing naval force was going smoothly.
They stopped short of confirming whether the first two were fully operational but stressed they would be used “defensively.”
That echoes public comments from Vietnamese Deputy Minister of Defense Nguyen Chi Vinh who has repeatedly said, without mentioning China directly, that Vietnam would not start a conflict in the South China Sea but if one began “we would not just stand back and watch.”
Vietnam has significantly expanded its navy in recent years, acquiring modern frigates and corvettes, mostly from Russia, that are equipped with anti-ship and anti-submarine weapons.
Hanoi has also embarked on a shipbuilding program based on Russian designs.
Former Western submariners watching developments said they were impressed with the apparent progress despite the enormity of the challenge for Vietnam in developing a submarine capability from scratch.
Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr yesterday vowed that those behind bogus flood control projects would be arrested before Christmas, days after deadly back-to-back typhoons left swathes of the country underwater. Scores of construction firm owners, government officials and lawmakers — including Marcos’ cousin congressman — have been accused of pocketing funds for substandard or so-called “ghost” infrastructure projects. The Philippine Department of Finance has estimated the nation’s economy lost up to 118.5 billion pesos (US$2 billion) since 2023 due to corruption in flood control projects. Criminal cases against most of the people implicated are nearly complete, Marcos told reporters. “We don’t file cases for
Ecuadorans are today to vote on whether to allow the return of foreign military bases and the drafting of a new constitution that could give the country’s president more power. Voters are to decide on the presence of foreign military bases, which have been banned on Ecuadoran soil since 2008. A “yes” vote would likely bring the return of the US military to the Manta air base on the Pacific coast — once a hub for US anti-drug operations. Other questions concern ending public funding for political parties, reducing the number of lawmakers and creating an elected body that would
‘ATTACK ON CIVILIZATION’: The culture ministry released drawings of six missing statues representing the Roman goddess of Venus, the tallest of which was 40cm Investigators believe that the theft of several ancient statues dating back to the Roman era from Syria’s national museum was likely the work of an individual, not an organized gang, officials said on Wednesday. The National Museum of Damascus was closed after the heist was discovered early on Monday. The museum had reopened in January as the country recovers from a 14-year civil war and the fall of the 54-year al-Assad dynasty last year. On Wednesday, a security vehicle was parked outside the main gate of the museum in central Damascus while security guards stood nearby. People were not allowed in because
Tanzanian politicians are in shock over the massacre of hundreds of young protesters during its recent election, insiders told Agence France-Presse, but are too afraid to speak out as a tiny cabal around the president takes control. Gruesome images of dead Tanzanians have flooded the Internet in the wake of the Oct. 29 elections that triggered widespread protests over government repression. Tanzanian President Samia Suluhu Hassan officially won with 98 percent of the vote, but key opposition leaders were jailed or disqualified. The opposition said that more than 1,000 people were killed as security forces crushed the protests under cover of a five-day
RSS