China increasingly feels the need for a strong navy to protect its worldwide commerial interests, and to increase its options on Taiwan: As China Grows, So Does Its Long-Neglected Navy (Gordon Fairclough, Wall Street Journal, July 16).
It wants to protect its access to the sea lanes:
"The oceans are our lifelines. If commerce were cut off, the economy would plummet," says Ni Lexiong, a fellow at the Shanghai National Defense Institute and an outspoken proponent of Chinese sea power. "We need a strong navy."
For Chinese strategists, the country's rapid economic growth -- which underpins the Communist Party's continued hold on political power -- and its military advancement are now inextricably linked. "Security issues related to energy, resources, finance, information and international shipping routes are mounting," says a government white paper published last December that lays out China's defense policy....
Much of China's concern stems from its dependence on foreign oil. China imports nearly 50% of its oil and is more dependent on imported Middle Eastern crude than the U.S. Roughly 72% of China's imported oil now comes from the Persian Gulf and Africa on tankers that pass through the narrow Strait of Malacca -- a strategic choke point -- between the Indonesian island of Sumatra and peninsular Malaysia.
President Hu Jintao has referred to the potential vulnerability of his country's energy supplies as China's "Malacca dilemma." The country has no ships stationed permanently near the straits.
China also depends on the outside world for a host of other raw materials -- from copper to coal and iron ore -- required to keep what is now the world's fourth-largest economy humming. Nearly all of China's trade moves by sea from the country's east coast. Many exports are carried by China's own burgeoning fleet of merchant ships.
"Economic globalization entails globalization of the military means for self-defense," Zhang Wenmu, a professor of strategic studies at the Beijing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, wrote last year in China Security, a military-affairs journal. "With these complex and expanding interests, risks to China's well-being have not lessened, but have actually increased."...
While the immediate driver of China's naval development has been the potential for conflict over Taiwan, its longer-term goals are much broader. Navy officers speak of developing three oceangoing fleets, one that would patrol the areas around Korea and Japan, another that would push out into the western Pacific and a third that would protect the Strait of Malacca and the Indian Ocean.
"The navy needs to be able to go wherever China has economic interests," says one senior Chinese naval officer who spoke on condition of anonymity. "China should have naval forces stationed at strategic points," the officer says, even though "this would certainly push China into more direct confrontation with developed countries."
China has helped finance and engineer the construction of a deep-water port in Pakistan that U.S. defense planners say could be used by Chinese naval forces in the future, giving them easier access to the Arabian Sea and Persian Gulf region. U.S. military officers also believe China is operating listening posts in southern Myanmar to monitor shipping traffic through the Strait of Malacca.
China has also begun building a network of satellites that can be used to guide navigation by its own ships at sea, as well as to keep track of other countries' vessels. Chinese military leaders are even talking about building aircraft carriers -- which for decades have been the mainstay of U.S. maritime power.
China would also like more options for dealing with Taiwan:
In 1996, during a standoff between leaders in Beijing and Taipei over Taiwanese moves to assert independence, China test-fired missiles near the island. The U.S. responded by ordering carrier battle groups to the area.
China's inability to prevent this U.S. show of military strength and support for Taiwan rankled political and military leaders in Beijing. They started to develop what is viewed by the Pentagon as an "anti-access strategy." The Pentagon says it is designed to limit the U.S. military's freedom of movement in Asia and, specifically, its ability to intervene in any conflict between China and Taiwan.
The cornerstone of China's effort is its elite submarine force. In recent years, eight new Russian-built, diesel-powered Kilo-class submarines have been added to the fleet, joining a growing number of new Chinese-built attack submarines, including some powered by nuclear reactors. The Kilo subs are especially stealthy and hard to detect when submerged.
China's navy now has nearly 60 submarines, according to U.S. estimates. Some of the newest are equipped with Russian-made cruise missiles that fly at supersonic speeds when they approach their targets and were specifically designed to attack and sink aircraft carriers, according to U.S. naval officers. Some subs also have advanced torpedoes, which home in on ships' wakes at high speed.
"They've decided that submarines are the best way to delay a U.S. entry" into any conflict over Taiwan by threatening U.S. aircraft carriers, says Bernard D. Cole, a retired U.S. Navy captain who now teaches at the National War College in Washington and studies the Chinese navy. "There's nothing harder than finding submarines. It's a very tough business."
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