TO TAKE TAIWAN, FIRST KILL A CARRIER

China's communist leadership has long anticipated that to militarily subdue democratic Taiwan it will first need to win a battle against the United States. The People's Liberation Army (PLA) is now preparing for one specific, and key, battle. It is developing methods to disable or sink American aircraft carriers and gathering the specific force packages to do so. With such a strike, Beijing hopes to quickly terminate American involvement in a Taiwan War.

SHIFTING PRIORITIES
The early 1990s saw much evidence of carrier-related research and nationalist-political advocacy, particularly from the PLA Navy (PLAN), to build a Chinese aircraft carrier. But, following the political crises of 1995 and 1996, which saw the Clinton administration deploy two battle groups around the carriers Independence and Nimitz near Taiwan in response to threatening PLA exercises in March 1996, sinking a U.S. carrier became much more pressing than building one.

In developing that capability, Beijing hopes to deter U.S. military assistance to Taiwan, and by actually sinking one, to terminate U.S. attempts to save the island. This strategy follows from the bias--a potentially dangerous one for China--that America's aversion to military casualties equates to its unwillingness to risk a real war over the fate of Taiwan. This is apparently a widely held view. It was expressed most boldly by Major General Huang Bin, a professor at the PLA National Defense University, in Hong Kong's Ta Kung Pao daily newspaper on May 13:

"Missiles, aircraft, and submarines all are means that can be used to attack an aircraft carrier. We have the ability to deal with an aircraft carrier that dares to get into our range of fire. Once we decide to use force against Taiwan, we definitely will consider an intervention by the United States. The United States likes vain glory; if one of its aircraft carrier should be attacked and destroyed, people in the United States would begin to complain and quarrel loudly, and the U.S. president would find the going harder and harder."

SUMMONING COURAGE
General Huang's statement is in fact not especially audacious, considering that since the mid-1990s the weakness of aircraft carriers and the methods to attack them has been a frequent topic in China's military press. It would appear that the PLA is mustering its courage, trying to convince itself that it can with some success attack U.S. carriers. In October and November 2000, for example, after Russian Pacific-based fighters and bombers made surprise runs against the carrier Kitty Hawk, the People's Liberation Army Daily could barely conceal its glee, devoting three articles to the incident.

GATHERING FORCES
The PLA's apparently growing confidence is likely bolstered by the fact that it is also gathering the forces needed to confront U.S. carriers at a useful distance from the Mainland.

--Sensor Package. Finding an aircraft carrier group is aLMOST as important as attacking it. Understanding this, the PLA is investing in multiple layers of reconnaissance and surveillance systems. In space, it is expected to soon deploy the first of new generations of high-resolution electro-optical satellites and radar satellites, which are especially useful in piercing cloud cover. The PLA has been developing over-the-horizon (OTH) radar with ranges up to thousands of kilometers for a long time. And its Air Force will soon take delivery of its Russian A-50E AWACS to find ships at sea. But because radar can be jammed, it is likely that the PLA will also use hundreds of small fishing boats, as well as agents in Japan, to track U.S. naval forces.

--Air Strike Package. The PLA Air Force (PLAAF) is now beginning to cooperate with the Navy in conducting naval strikes. Later in this decade, elderly PLA Naval Air Force H-6 (Tu-16) bombers will be supplanted by eighty to 100 PLAAF Russian Sukhoi Su-30MKK and about twenty indigenous Xian JH-7A fighter bombers. Both will carry long-range antiradar or antiship missiles, some of which will have supersonic speeds that can defeat U.S. close-in weapon systems (CIWS) for defense against such missiles. Both will also have new long-range self-guided air-to-air missiles (AAM) like the Russian R-77 or the indigenous Project 129 AAM, that will approach the usefulness of U.S. missiles like the AIM-120 AMRAAM. This means that PLAAF fighters will soon have half a chance fighting their way to their targets.

--Sub-Strike Package. According to Russian press reports, China signed a contract on May 2 to purchase eight Project 636 KILO class conventional submarines, to be delivered in five years. The PLAN already has four KILOs, including two Project 636s, with advanced quieting technology that makes them very difficult to detect. The PLAN's new KILOs, however, will be armed with the Russian Novator CLUB antiship missile system. The CLUB-N is a 300km range cruise missile that looks like the American TOMOHAWK and can be configured for land-attack missions. The CLUB-S has a subsonic first stage with a 220km range, but also uses a rocket-powered second stage to defeat CIWS. In addition, the PLAN may now be building its fifth Project 039 or SONG class conventional submarine. Early difficulties with this class appear to have been solved: Series production is centering on an upgraded Project 039A version. For most of this decade, the PLAN will also have some twenty older MING class conventional submarines and approximately five older Project 091 HAN class nuclear-powered attack submarines. While these may be less effective than the KILOs or the SONGs, they will nevertheless greatly complicate the task of the defenders.

--Surface Strike Package. The PLAN is adding two new modernized Sovremenniy class destroyers to two already acquired. Armed with their hard-to-intercept supersonic 300km range YAKHONT and the 120km range MOSKIT missiles, these ships would likely wait behind the submarines and attacking aircraft. But the PLA may also be considering purchasing a SLAVA class cruiser from Ukraine. These are armed with sixteen 550km range GRANIT supersonic antiship missiles.

Surveillance/Targeting
--2-4 A-50E Awacs
--2-4 Optical and Radar Satellites
--Over The Horizon Radar

Air Strike
--80-100 Su-30MKK w 4x antiship missiles
--20 JH-7A w 2x antiship missiles
--?? J-10 w 2x antiship missiles

Missile Strike
--DF-21 intermediate range ballistic missile
--DF-15 short range ballistic missile
--Yakhont antiship missile
--Sunburn antiship missile
--Club Sub-launched antiship missiles
--Air-launched antiship missiles

--Other Strike Options. Another option mentioned in PLA literature is to attack carriers with long-range ballistic missiles. The former Soviet Union had considered this in the 1960s. With proper targeting, satellite navigation guidance and perhaps an enhanced radiation warhead, ballistic missile strikes could disable a carrier. The PLA can also be expected to make great use of deep-sea mines, such as its rocket-propelled EM-52, which could break the keel of a large ship. In addition, the PLA may use Special Forces to attempt to disable carriers in port and attack U.S. aircraft on foreign bases. This is especially critical, given that carriers now rely increasingly on land-based Navy and Air Force support aircraft.

CAN THEY DO IT?
It took the former Soviet Union more than twenty years to build a credible threat to U.S. carriers. China is trying to do so within this decade. To its credit, the PLA is rapidly gathering the right kinds of forces. Skeptics, however, will always question whether the PLA can use them in a sufficiently coordinated fashion to create maximum stress on carrier defenses. Once it has such forces in hand, the PLA will then have to marry layers of long-range sensors to force packages of air, submarine and surface ships armed with new long-range missiles. It may be that the Ukranian carrier Varyag, now being refurbished in a guarded Dalian shipyard, will best serve as a target ship to refine PLA carrier-attack doctrine and tactics. If properly used, the forces China is gathering could--at a minimum--stop one U.S. carrier battle group.

IMPLICATIONS FOR WASHINGTON
In a surprise attack scenario, given its strategic dependence on naval forces in East Asia, the United States might be able to muster only one carrier to support Taiwan. Strategic and economic pressures have reduced its fleet to thirteen carriers with smaller and less capable air wings. Former distinct fighter and attack aircraft are now melded in one platform, the F/A-18E/F. While this might be a convenient economical compromise for the Navy, it is not clearly superior to the Su-30MKK. Since 1999, the long-range antisubmarine function has been taken from the superb S-3 VIKING aircraft, and the number of E-2C HAWKEYE radar warning aircraft have been cut from five to four per air wing. It is time to reverse this trend. It is time to consider the systems needed to defeat China's gathering anticarrier forces if deterrence is to be sustained on the Taiwan Strait.

"I suspect the sinking of an American carrier would simultaneously terrify every suburban female in America who automatically votes Democrat and elicit en masse cries of outrage from them along the lines of 'What are we doing over there in the first place? Seven thousand dead!! And for what? Bring our boys home! Now!' And that's all it would take to terminally undermine our national resolve."

It won't matter. It'll all be over except for the aerial radiation surveys before they're able to paint their first "NO WAR!" posters.

BS. If the PLA forces were stupid enough to destroy Taiwan's resources, you can kiss North Korea and Beijing goodbye.

Shanghai would go too. Because we know there are docks in Shanghai that can front load tanks on the carrier ships for invasion to Taiwan.

In another thought, I question if this is actually an attempt to garner more funding for obsolete Naval technologies. The reality is that the United States can pound China from bases in South Korea, Japan, the Philippines, and Central Asian states.

As I recall, the Russians were doing SigInt work. They were trying to provoke a response from the Kitty Hawk's defense systems. (Just as we do when we skim the edge of their airspace with our reconnaissance planes) The captain played it correctly by not lighting up the Russians with his radar. He let them buzz around harmlessly and sent them home empty handed.

No, the American people would clamor for the extermination of Communist China. Don't think so? We're pretty much on our way to eradicating militant Islam for knocking down two buildings.

Where have you been since 9-11? We have a president who embraces the political correctness of the left and says that Islam is a religion of peace. We change the name of our military operation to avoid offending anyone, and we make sure we don't damage any mosques even though the terrorists may be hiding in them. We refuse to check Islamic men when they board our civilian aircraft, but strip search our 90 year old cripples. He is pussy-footing around the saudi's eggshells when he should be stomping on them. It increasingly looks like Afganistan will be the first and last military operation of this so-called war on terror. I think the aftermath of 9-11 has PROVED that we are unwilling to do what it takes to defend ourselves.

"The chin were laughing their heads off at us during that time, especially AFTER we paid them over 1 million US Dollars to get the plane back."

What are you smoking? They demanded that kind of money, and Bush threw a tiny fraction of it at 'em, which, with their "face" oriented culture was a direct slap to the face.

China lost face by getting that payment, bigtime. They lost a hell of a lot more face than they would have if Bush flat-out refused to pay them at all.

They stood there and demanded Fort Knox, and we tossed a pair of nickels at 'em and said "shove it up your a$$" as we turned away and left.

I don’t fully understand why China didn’t take Taiwan while Clinton was in office – he would have weighed all options and done nothing. With that in mind, the only real deterrent China had for those 8 years was the Taiwanese Defense Force!

It is my opinion that the Chinese were counting on another four years of RAT in the White House.

"no one has yet come up with an effective defense"

Poppycock.

There's a very effective defense. It's called "massive retaliation". Also known as "deterrence". If China decides to go for broke, we break them.

You forgot the missile subs. We have 50 or 60 of em and one boat could pretty much wipe North Korea off the map.

Indeed. The subs are always a factor. A few on this thread have mentioned a possible 3 front war (Iraq, Korea, Taiwan). Although the US would probably not respond this way, I'd like to see a massive nuking of N Korea and China. Then the President could go on TV and explain "We found ourselves in the midst of a 3-front war. We didn't want to be. Now we aren't. Don't f*** with the US."

>>AFTER we paid them over 1 million US Dollars to get the plane back.

No. China was asking $1 million, but the US sent in a &30,000 check which China rejected, so actually the US got the plane back for free, yes, free use of their facilities, fuel and all other things.

What wasn't mentioned in the article was the new torpedo developed by the Russians, which will likely end up in the Chinese arsonal

Go to the link about my series of novels above. The premise I posit for the fictional novel is that the Chinese indeed develop a superior, long range, supercavitating device and employ it with devastating effectiveness against us.

If they are fast enough, and the supercavitating weapons are ... they don't need to. The entire premise is that they get there bfore the vessel has the chance to turn out of the way.

The larger the ship, the more slowly it makes a turn to avoid something coming at it. A supercavitating device moving at severeal hundred miles per hour ... theoretically close to the speed of sound ... can get to the ship from a fairly long distance before the ship can move out of the way.

Agreed. Firearms are considered very effective, even though bullets can't track their targets. Those torpedos were not designed to take out fast attack subs or PT boats. They were made to take out relatively slow ships, like Aegis cruisers and lumbering giants, such as carriers. A supercarrier IS the most effective way to project power, but they were never built for any kind of evasive action.

Actually, the "Squall" was developed as a close-range "knife fight" weapon for combat between submarines. Those boats are fast and maneuverable enough to warrant use of a supercavitating hyper-speed weapon. By the time the sonarman hears it, it's too late to evade it.

Another issue is that the torpedo's design limits its potential for maneuvering. Turn a bit too much "sideways" and the bubble collapses, destroying the torpedo. The thing would have the turning radius of a Bonneville Salt Flats racer at 200+ mph.

The design also creates an enormous amount of noise, so any submarine using such a weapon would get one shot before Hell rained down on it. Now, if we were to build a similar toy with "swim-out" capability, that would really turn subsurface warfare on its ear.

If the Chinese attacked Taiwan and sunk a US carrier, how do you think Japan would react? Or all of the Pacific rim countries? China would be isolated. And they could just kiss the Panama Canal privleges good bye. We won't stand for that. America will protect its interests. Don't expect Europe to help though. They may sink the carrier with a lot of expenditure and a few lies, but we will hurt them where it counts. We'll send them back to the stone age from whence they recently came. Wal-Mart might have a problem though. Actually I think this article is floating about because there is also a big defense bill floating about in Congress right now.

How many people on an aircraft carrier? 7,000+

If they did a surprise attack and took it out you don't think we would go all the way? It would be Pearl Harbor all over again. The enemy would be fully known unlike the Taliban. It would be a well identified country to fully go after.

A conventional attack will be met by a conventional attack. I think it's ridiculous to assume we would go nuclear if we are not attacked with nukes.

We lost 3000 in September we didn't go nuclear.....

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