- BEIJING - China is negotiating
to buy eight submarines from Russia in a $1.6 billion deal that would significantly
increase China's ability to blockade Taiwan and challenge U.S. naval supremacy
in the seas near China, Western and Russian sources said.Four Russian producers
are currently bidding to build the Project 636 Kilo class vessels equipped
with the Klub long-range anti-ship missile system, defense experts say.
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- The deal is part of a massive $4 billion package of weapons
that Russia has committed itself to provide to China over the next four
to five years. Those weapons include two more Sovremenny-class destroyers
(China has already received two), a new batch of S300 PMU2 anti-aircraft
missiles and 40 Su-30MKK fighter-bombers among other items. China has already
purchased four Kilo class subs from Russia.The deal cements Russia's place
as China's biggest military trading partner, far ahead of Israel and former
Soviet states, such as Ukraine. It also cements China's place as the world's
biggest importer of weapons and underscores the increasingly hot race between
Taiwan and China for military supremacy across the Taiwan Strait.
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- China became the world's biggest importer of weapons
in 2000, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute,
and continued in the No. 1 position last year, mostly through purchases
of ships and combat aircraft worth close to $3 billion - more than twice
any other buyer's acquisitions.The United States is Taiwan's main defense
supplier. In April, the Bush administration approved a multibillion-dollar
package including eight diesel submarines, 30 AH-64D Apache Longbow attack
helicopters, 12 P-3C submarine-hunting aircraft, four Kidd Class destroyers,
long-range radar systems and Patriot-3 missiles.
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- The American submarine deal is a question mark, however,
because the United States no longer makes or designs diesel-powered subs
and two nations that do, Germany and the Netherlands, have refused to allow
the United States to use their designs or manufacturers.
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- Defense experts said the Chinese submarine deal could
have the greatest effect on the military balance in the region. Such a
deal would "very significantly enhance" the Chinese Navy's "ability
to influence events in the East China Sea," said Bernard Cole, an
expert on the Chinese Navy at the National War College in Washington, "first,
by enforcing a blockade against Taiwan, if Beijing adopts that course of
action, and also by posing a serious problem for opposing naval forces
attempting to operate in the area. No part of naval warfare is more difficult
than detecting, localizing or neutralizing submarines."
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- The deal reflects the double-barreled nature of China's
military modernization strategy - focused on reunification with Taiwan,
which broke with Communist China in 1949. On the one hand, the strategy
seeks to enable the People's Liberation Army to recover Taiwan by force,
if necessary. On the other, it wants to deter any intervention by the United
States, which has committed itself to Taiwan's defense under the vaguely
worded Taiwan Relations Act.In 1996, two U.S. aircraft carrier battle groups
faced down Chinese threats to the island, days after China had fired missiles
across the strait during training exercises.
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- Assuming that China could find the American carriers
in the future, such a response would be riskier once the new submarines
were operational, defense experts said.The deal, first reported on June
7 by the Canadian-based Kanwa Intelligence Review, a publication focused
on the Chinese military, has prompted competition among Russian manufacturers
to win the contract, although China's desire to have swift delivery means
that work will occur at several plants at once to fill the order.
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- Russian press reports have identified the contenders
as the Admiralteyskie Verfi Shipbuilding Plant based in St. Petersburg;
the Komsomolsk-on-Amur Shipbuilding Plant; the Krasnoye Sormovo Shipbuilding
Plant in Nizhni Novgorod, and the Sevmash Shipbuilding Plant based in Severodvinsk.
The Admiralteyskie Verfi Shipbuilding Plant built the first two Kilo 636
submarines for the Chinese Navy.
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- In talks with the Russian defense minister, Sergei Ivanov,
in Beijing early this month, Chinese military officers requested that several
of the vessels be built in the plant on the Amur River near China so that
their delivery could possibly escape the notice of the United States, according
to Ivan Safronov, a Russian military expert.The deal underscores serious
troubles within China's domestic submarine manufacturing program, especially
the multibillion-dollar program to develop the Song class guided-missile
submarine. China tried to develop the Song to replace its Romeo-class,
called Ming class in Chinese, attack submarines, introduced in 1962.
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- According to Jane's Defense Weekly, the first Song, built
with assistance from Israel and others, started sea trials in 1995, but
proved a failure. A second substantially modified Song began sea trials
in early 2000, but analysts say these are far behind schedule and have
yet to be completed."If Beijing is going to buy eight additional Kilos,"
Cole said, "it means that their domestic program to build Songs is,
in fact, in trouble, which would certainly not surprise me."
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- A second problem associated with China's purchase of
the Kilos concerns its ability to use the submarines properly and not just
brandish them like fancy toys. China bought four Kilo class submarines
during the 1990s, two of the export version and two of the more capable
Project 636 version produced by Russia for its own navy. The Chinese Navy
has experienced operating problems, initially because of inadequate crew
training, and more consistently because of certain material problems -
such as troublesome batteries. Reportedly, China still has to send its
Kilos back to Russia for all but routine maintenance.The new Kilo will
be equipped with Klub class anti-ship missiles with a range of 225 kilometers
(140 miles). But China would need to develop the ability to see "over
the horizon" in order to use the weapons properly, defense experts
said. Most submarines can only "see" a few kilometers without
the aid of satellites, other submarines, airplanes or ships. But so far,
China does not have "over the horizon" capability.
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- As such, a senior U.S. defense official said, developments
such as the Kilo deal illustrate the patchy nature of China's military
modernization."China still cannot find ships at sea," he said.
"Over the horizon targeting escapes them. The United States built
an open ocean surveillance capability in the 1960s. China has all the tools
to build its own, but it has not."
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