04 March 2014

CMSI ‘Red Book’ #11: “China’s Near Seas Combat Capabilities”

Peter A. Dutton, Andrew S. Erickson, and Ryan D. Martinson, eds., China’s Near Seas Combat Capabilities, Naval War College China Maritime Study 11 (February 2014).

This edited volume explores China’s claims and capabilities within and around the ‘First Island Chain,’ the so-called ‘Near Seas.’ It assesses the rapidly evolving situations of concern in the Yellow Sea, the East China Sea, and South China Sea; and related capabilities, doctrinal development, and plausible scenarios. It concludes with discussion of possible U.S. Navy responses to China’s ‘Near Seas’ strategy.

Contents

CHAPTER ONE Chinese Houbei Fast Attack Craft: Beyond Sea Denial…………..1

by John Patch

CHAPTER TWO Underwater TELs and China’s Antisubmarine Warfare: Evolving Strength and a Calculated Weakness……………………17

by William S. Murray

CHAPTER THREE China’s Second Artillery Force: Capabilities and Missions for the Near Seas………………………………………………………..31

by Ron Christman

CHAPTER FOUR Aerospace Power and China’s Counterstrike Doctrine in the Near Seas…………………………………………………………………….. 49

by Daniel J. Kostecka

CHAPTER FIVE Chinese Air Superiority in the Near Seas………………………………. 61

by David Shlapak

CHAPTER SIX Land- and Sea-Based C4ISR Infrastructure in China’s Near Seas……………………………………………………….75

by Eric D. Pedersen

CHAPTER SEVEN Chinese Air- and Space-Based ISR: Integrating Aerospace Combat Capabilities over the Near Seas…………………………..87

by Andrew S. Erickson

CHAPTER EIGHT China’s Surface Fleet Trajectory: Implications for the U.S. Navy………………………………………………………….. 119

by Timothy A. Walton and Bryan McGrath

Abbreviations and Definitions…………………………………………………………………….. 132

About the Contributors …………………………………………………………………………….. 136

 

SAMPLE CHAPTER:

Andrew S. Erickson, “Chinese Air- and Space-Based ISR: Integrating Aerospace Combat Capabilities over the Near Seas,” in Peter A. Dutton, Andrew S. Erickson, and Ryan D. Martinson, eds., China’s Near Seas Combat Capabilities, Naval War College China Maritime Study 11 (February 2014), 87-117.

China’s progressively more potent naval platforms, aircraft, and missiles are increasingly capable of holding U.S. Navy platforms and their supporting assets at risk in the near seas and their approaches. Central to maximizing Chinese ability to employ these systems—and hence to consolidating China’s aerospace combat capabilities over the near seas—are its emerging command, control, communications, computers, intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (C4ISR) capabilities. These systems will enable the Chinese military to strengthen coordination, cueing, reconnaissance, communications, and data relay for maritime monitoring and targeting, as well as to coordinate Chinese platforms, systems, and personnel engaged in these roles. Particularly important will be effective utilization of ISR, the collection and processing of information concerning potential military targets. Many platforms and systems can support such operations; this chapter focuses on those dedicated to such purposes, with the exception of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) and helicopters, both of which are growing in importance but on which data are more difficult to verify at this time.

The successful achievement of high-quality real-time satellite imagery and target-locating data and fusion, as well as of reliable indigenous satellite positioning, navigation, and timing (PNT), would facilitate holding enemy vessels at risk via devastating multiaxis strikes involving precision-guided ballistic and cruise missiles launched from a variety of land-, sea-, undersea-, and air-based platforms in coordinated sequence. Emerging space-based C4ISR capabilities could thus greatly increase China’s capacity to assert its interests militarily in, over, and beneath the near seas. Beijing has a clear strategic rationale and corresponding set of programs to master the relevant components, particularly for “counterintervention” operations in and around its near seas. Doing so could finally enable the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) to translate its traditional approach of achieving military superiority in specific times and areas, even in a context of overall inferiority (以劣胜优), into the maritime dimension.

China has many ways to mitigate its limitations in C4ISR and target deconfliction for kinetic operations within the near seas and their immediate approaches, and potentially also for nonkinetic peacetime operations farther afield. Conducting high-intensity wartime operations in contested environments beyond the near seas, by contrast, would require major qualitative and quantitative improvements, particularly in aerospace, and impose corresponding vulnerabilities.

This chapter reviews dedicated Chinese air- and space-based ISR systems, examines one relevant operational scenario (tracking hostile surface ships in and around the near seas), considers China’s remaining limitations, and concludes by assessing strategic implications for China’s military and the U.S. Navy. …

 

About the Contributors

Ron Christman is the Senior Intelligence Officer for the new Standards and Evaluation Cell of the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA). From December 2012 to June 2013, he served as the deputy director of the Regional Command West Fusion Center, Camp Arena, Herat, Afghanistan. Prior to this assignment, from 1987, he served in a number of positions within DIA related to Asian security issues, missile force affairs, and defense resourcing and planning support.

Peter Dutton is a professor of strategic studies and director of the China Maritime Studies Institute at the Naval War College. His current research focuses on American and Chinese views of sovereignty and international law of the sea and the strategic implications to the United States and the U.S. Navy of Chinese international law and policy choices. He is a retired Navy Judge Advocate and holds a juris doctor from the College of William and Mary, a master of arts (with distinction) from the Naval War College, and a bachelor of science (cum laude) from Boston University.

Dr. Andrew S. Erickson is an associate professor in the Strategic Research Department at the Naval War College, and a core founding member of the department’s China Maritime Studies Institute. Erickson received his doctorate and master of arts in international relations and comparative politics from Princeton University and graduated magna cum laude from Amherst College with a bachelor of arts in history and political science.

Daniel J. Kostecka is a senior analyst for the U.S. Navy. He has a bachelor of science degree in mathematics from Ohio State University, a master of liberal arts in military and diplomatic history from Harvard University, a master of arts in national security policy from the Patterson School of Diplomacy and International Commerce at the University of Kentucky, and a master of science in strategic intelligence from the National Intelligence University. Kostecka has been published in the Naval War College Review, the Jamestown Foundation’s China Brief, and the U.S. Naval Institute Proceedings; his articles have been translated into Chinese, Japanese, and French. Kostecka served as an active-duty Air Force officer for ten years and still serves in the Air Force Reserve, with the rank of lieutenant colonel.

Ryan Martinson is research administrator at the China Maritime Studies Institute. He holds a master’s degree from the Tufts University Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy and a bachelor of science from Union College. Martinson has also studied at Fudan University, Beijing Language and Culture University, and the Hopkins-Nanjing Center. He previously served as Deputy Director of the China Exchange Initiative.

Bryan McGrath is the founder and managing director of the FerryBridge Group LLC, a defense consultancy. He is a retired naval officer who commanded USS Bulkeley (DDG 84) and served as the team leader for and primary author of the 2007 “A Cooperative Strategy for 21st Century Seapower.”

William S. Murray is an associate research professor and the director of the Halsey Bravo research effort in the Warfare Analysis and Research Division of the Naval War College’s Center for Naval Warfare Studies. He joined the U.S. Navy in 1983 immediately after graduating cum laude from the State University of New York at Buffalo with a bachelor of science in electrical engineering. Professor Murray served on, and qualified to command, nuclear-powered submarines. In 1994 he received a master of arts degree from the Naval War College. Professor Murray has served on the operations staff at U.S. Strategic Command and as a member of the faculty of the Naval War College’s Strategic Research Department. He retired from the Navy with the rank of lieutenant commander in 2003. He is the coeditor of China’s New Nuclear Submarine Force and China’s Energy Strategy: The Impact on Beijing’s Maritime Policies, both published by the Naval Institute Press. He has published articles in International Security, the U.S. Army War College Parameters, Comparative Strategy, the U.S. Naval Institute Proceedings, Jane’s Intelligence Review, Undersea Warfare, and the Naval War College Review.

John Patch is a career intelligence analyst and qualified surface warfare and joint specialty officer. He is a former Army War College associate professor and chairman of the U.S. Naval Institute Editorial Board. He currently teaches intelligence studies for the American Military University and serves in the Intelligence Community.

Eric Pedersen is a senior analyst for the U.S. Navy. He served as an active-duty U.S. Navy officer for thirteen years and still serves in the Navy Reserve, with the rank of lieutenant commander. Pedersen has a bachelor of science degree in systems engineering from the U.S. Naval Academy and a master’s in strategic intelligence from American Military University.

David A. Shlapak is a senior policy analyst with the RAND Corporation in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. In his nearly thirty years in the national-security field he has led studies on topics ranging from nuclear strategy to counterterrorism and homeland defense. He has for the last fifteen years worked extensively on issues relating to Asian security and U.S. defense posture in the Pacific region.

Timothy A. Walton is an associate of Delex Consulting, Studies, and Analysis. Specializing in Sino-American reciprocal force dynamics, he provides the U.S. government, industry, think tanks, and international partners with assistance in strategic planning, concept-of-operations development and analysis, requirements and capabilities analysis, and capture shaping.