[Thrownatbirth]

If China expands its submarine fleet to 78 by 2020 as planned, it would be on par with the U.S. Navy's undersea fleet in quantity, if not in quality

During the Cold War, I can remember the Soviets having over 50 subs AT SEA at a given time. We found out quality matters far more than numerical superiority in submarine operations. Even in ten years, I doubt China will be able to match the technical/operational quality of US SSNs/GNs/BNs. It's a very slow learning curve.

[Eric in the Ozarks]

It’s something the clintons couldn’t sell to the Red Chinese.

[stuartcr]

On top of that, we’re tracking them as soon as they leave port.

[Delacon]

My Dad who was a sub driver pointed out that the US Navy has control of all the choak points. We have listening stations off of Iceland, south Africa, pretty much ever where. If a fork gets dropped on a chinese sub, we know it. I can remember back during the cold war, my dad's bosses were worried that the Russians couldn't be that stupid because we were tracking every one of their noisey subs. They thought they must have been putting a steel bar between the engine and the hull then pull the bar out and go silent when the balloon went up. Turns out they were just stupid and couldn't make a good submarine. Same thing is happening with china. China may fight India, may fight Russia, but it will be on land. Taiwan has nothing to worry about.