China Shows Its Naval Power

Potentially troubling news for the US Navy:

American military chiefs have been left dumbstruck by an undetected Chinese submarine popping up at the heart of a recent Pacific exercise and close to the vast U.S.S. Kitty Hawk - a 1,000ft supercarrier with 4,500 personnel on board.

By the time it surfaced the 160ft Song Class diesel-electric attack submarine is understood to have sailed within viable range for launching torpedoes or missiles at the carrier.

According to senior Nato officials the incident caused consternation in the U.S. Navy.
The Americans had no idea China's fast-growing submarine fleet had reached such a level of sophistication, or that it posed such a threat.

One Nato figure said the effect was "as big a shock as the Russians launching Sputnik" - a reference to the Soviet Union's first orbiting satellite in 1957 which marked the start of the space age.

The incident, which took place in the ocean between southern Japan and Taiwan, is a major embarrassment for the Pentagon.

Yes, it a major embarrassment if it happened as reported.

I don't know the full make-up of the battle group but I would imagine that it contained at least one frigate that should always be conducting ASW ops. They also should have had cruisers and destroyers doing the same. The fact that the subs accompanying the fleet may not have picked it up has me the most concerned however.

Still, we don't know if the sub was detected and if it was, there's not a lot the ships could have done to warn it off except pound it with sonar to let it know they had a track on it.

I don't believe this to be as big an issue as the Daily Mail makes it out to be because there's a lot here we don't know. The sub could have been picked up we and may have let it go so we could get a better read on the sonar picture of its screws. The fact that the sub popped up amidst the battle group doesn't strike me as exactly right, the job of our subs is to tail a contact without that contact knowing it and get info on the class and plant noise, etc, I imagine the the Chinese doctrine is akin to ours and the old Soviets.

So that begs the question: why would the sub surface and make its presence known if it had successfully infiltrated the pickets we had established? If it was done purely for propaganda purposes, it may have had a counter effect because it sure was stupid in a military sense.

The Chinese Navy (especially their submarine crews) has been improving and will continue to do so as they procure more and better equipment. However, I don't believe that they are so well-trained at this point that they succeeded in getting past our sonar and into the heart of the battle group without us knowing.

The Navy started changing ASW tactics beginning in 2005 and one should hope that we've got a plan for dealing with the diesel boats that are being procured by potentially hostile nations.

Bryan at Hot Air has more. Update: My previous thoughts on a war with China can be found here.