Asia Looks Seaward

Submarine Force

While digital training and simulations can be useful, the only way to become

proficient at handling submarines is to take them to sea and operate their weap-

ons. Chinese submarine exercises have increased in sophistication in recent years

and currently encompass such categories as command-and-control, navigation,

electronic countermeasures, and weapons testing.^157 ‘‘Based on the revised

[Outline of Military Training and Evaluation] issued in 2002,’’ reports the U.S.

ONI, ‘‘the PLAN is developing and implementing new and more realistic tactics

and combat methods to enable its submarines to be able to attack, survive after an

attack, and maintain the capability to attack again at a later time....’’^158 Crews

strive to conduct a wider variety of increasingly lengthy and challenging exercises

attuned to local environmental, hydrographic, and weather conditions.^159 PLAN

submarines have gradually increased the amount of red-on-blue adversary

training they conduct. In 2002, in the SCS, an ‘‘underwater vanguard boat’’ con-

fronted ASW ships, aircraft, and an underwater minefield barrier. It successfully

escaped after firing ‘‘a new type of Chinese-manufactured torpedo.’’^160 The

PLAN’s detailed arrangements for emergency contingencies, including the

training of its personnel to operate multiple weapons systems, are based on the

premise that suffering damage during future wars is inevitable.^161

Submarine-delivered mines appear to take priority in the PLAN training regi-

men,^162 in part as a critical aspect of future blockade operations.^163 By 2002,

mine-laying had become ‘‘one of the most common PLAN submarine combat

methods and the most basic requirement of submarine warfare.’’^164 Accordingly,

PLAN crews train to handle submarines loaded with large quantities of mines.^165

Drill variants include ‘‘hiding and laying mines in deep water’’^166 in combination

with such operations as torpedo launches.^167 Broad and deep mine-laying against

port targets is also emphasized.^168

PLAN officers recognize the challenges inherent in ‘‘penetrating the enemy’s

antisubmarine forces and laying mines behind enemy lines.’’ According to one

PLAN captain, ‘‘Secretly penetrating the combined mobile formation deployed

by the enemy’s antisubmarine forces is aprerequisite to fulfilling the mine-

laying task.’’^169 Submarine detachments have practiced ‘‘difficult new tactics like

‘mine laying in great depth.’’’^170 China’s official radio commended Chao Chunyi,

a torpedo and mine officer from the PLAN submarine detachment, for cutting

the loading time for mines in half.^171 Commander Ma Lixin, commanding officer

ofSongsubmarine 314 and a celebrity in China’s naval press, recently led the

efforts of an ESF submarine detachment to ‘‘develop tactical innovations.’’

In one year, Ma researched and developed over ten new operational methods,

‘‘including how to carry out a blockade and how to lay mines using conventional

submarines.’’ In early 2005, Ma ‘‘led his unit to participate in live exercises at

sea....’’^172 In one mine exercise, Ma was charged with evading ‘‘enemy’’ ASWair-

planes, a minefield, and—most difficult of all—an adversary submarine, in order

96 Asia Looks Seaward