Asia Looks Seaward

week. Each training sortie for fighter and attack aircraft also averages around 45

minutes.’’^196 Integrating operations between highly regimented, rigidly

structured PLAAF units and immature, sea-based PLAN units would require

technical and service-culture innovations, as well as exercises that are less

carefully scripted than has been the case in recent years, to develop the requisite

interoperability and interservice coordination. Significant additional research is

required to gauge how much coordination exists among PLAN land-based naval

air and surface/subsurface assets. Thisisallthemorecritical,asthetypeand

degree of coordination will necessarily vary depending on the maritime mission

assigned. China’s development and procurement of increasingly advanced

aircraft will not automatically solve the lack of practical experience with these

platforms. Indeed, as China’s experience has demonstrated, mastering them will

involve the loss of expensive aircraft and hard-to-replace pilots.

PLAN Doctrine

China’s military lexicon contains no term for ‘‘doctrine.’’ Depending on the

operational level of conflict referenced, it is more appropriate to refer to strategy,

campaigns, and tactics.^197 At the strategic level, the PLAN receives guidance

analogous to that of the other PLA service branches. The ‘‘National Military

Strategic Guidelines for the New Period’’offers the ‘‘highest level of strategic

guidance for all PLA military operations during war and preparation for war

during peacetime.’’ The most likely scenario Beijing expects to face is ‘‘local wars

under modern high-tech conditions.’’ As articulated in the Guidelines, the

concept of ‘‘active defense’’ instructs the PLA to prepare to undertake a variety

of sophisticated offensive measures simultaneously, targeting enemy weaknesses

within this larger strategic context. Doctrine has evolved rapidly to address new

challenges: the PLAN ‘‘has published an entirely new set of revised guidance

documents since the end of the 9th Five-Year Plan (1996–2000).’’ Since the

beginning of this decade, the PLA has sought to implement this guidance through

its ‘‘Two Transformations’’ program, using informatization and mechanization to

transform itself from a personnel-intensive into a technology-intensive force.^198

It is only at the tactical level, and to some extent at the campaign level, that

the PLAN possesses a ‘‘doctrine’’ distinguishable from larger PLA thinking.

The PLAN’s strategic guidance is currently conveyed by eight Chinese characters

that together mean ‘‘active defense, offshore operations.’’ The former ‘‘four charac-

ters’’ apply more generally to all PLA service branches, informing military strategy

and military-strategic guidelines. The latter ‘‘four characters’’ refer to the PLAN’s

area of responsibility.^199

The major generals who edited the PLA’s first English-language volume

on strategy offer a naval context for China’s preparations to fight and win local

wars under modern high-tech conditions. They foresee possible threats to

100 Asia Looks Seaward