Green Water Dragon:
The
Practical and Ideological Limitations of the Modern PLAN
Simon E. Stone
The University
of Calgary
02/04/05
For the first time in history, China is not the largest power in
the area. There is another major player who calls the shots. For the first
time, China
is not a regional hegemon. Smaller states in Southeast Asia look to the United States, not China, for guidance and direction.
For the first time, China
is the second option in the region it dominated for 2500 years. Not
surprisingly, China
is actively attempting to change the current situation. The development of the
People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) is key to the
Chinese being able to once more dominate the region’s policies. No longer is military power simply contingent on land forces, and no
longer does China
hold a decisive advantage because of it. If China
is to compete as a world power in the region, it will have to continue to
update and develop the PLAN, and its ability to project Beijing’s power onto the ocean.
For
much of the past thousand years, China’s external security behavior
has been closely linked to the defense of the Chinese cultural, geographic and
socio-economic heartland. A unified state since 221 BC, Chinese expansion and
occupation of the territory now contained within its borders occurred over many
centuries, culminating in the powerful Ming Dynasty of 1368-1644. During this
period of expansion and consolidation, China’s most persistent security
threat came from the marauding tribes and kingdoms within the Asian landmass
along a long, continuous continental border. Historically, the defense of the
heartland required efforts by the Chinese state to either directly or
indirectly control, pacify, coerce or neutralize a very large periphery
surrounding it. The effective pacification of this area was largely considered
essential to prevent attacks on the heartland. Establishment of control over
the periphery, whether actual (as in the form of military dominance or economic
and political arrangements) or mostly symbolic (as in the more ritualistic
tributary system and diplomatic ties), was also considered important during the
Imperial era as a means of “affirming the hierarchical, Sino-centric, Confucian
international order.”
Even when the groups on the Chinese periphery posed no immediate threat, or during times in
relative power decline for the Chinese military, the maintenance of the
symbolic Sino-centric world order remained an important objective of the
Chinese state.
The
historical Sino-centric view of the world was forced into sharp perspective
during the European Imperial period. Starting in 1842 and continuing for more
than a century, the Chinese state was subordinated to a Euro-centric order, and
was dominated both politically and military by European power. This domination
was socially and politically very different from previous foreign dominance,
and it signalled a shift in the traditional security calculations made by the
state. For the first time in Chinese history, a security threat had come from
the ocean, not the continent, and the Chinese state had to quickly evolve to
compensate.
European
domination of China,
though temporary, was sufficient in scope to cause a fundamental realignment of
policies and procedures within the Chinese state. Arguably the success of the
Communist party in China
was directly related to the previous century of embarrassment. Under the
communists in the twentieth century, China began the long road back to
international power and regional dominance. This last point is key – regional
domination. Much of the current literature on China’s
aims and aspirations sees fit to ignore the historical context of Chinese power
and proclaims that China
represents a threat to the world order and is bent on global domination. China
has never in its history been a world superpower – though it has most certainly
been the dominant player in the area. This is precisely what the modern Chinese
state is attempting to restore – the Chinese position as regional hegemon. In
the current order, the focus of most smaller nations in
Southeast Asia is not on China,
as it was historically, but instead on the United States. While China represents no direct threat to the U.S.,
it does represent strategic competition for the allegiance of smaller nations
in the Asian theatre. In many respects the U.S. recognizes this condition in
the region and is willing to combine engagement and appeasement to foster the
growth of peaceful and mutually beneficial relations between the two powers.
To
accomplish the rebirth of Chinese regional hegemony, China has turned to some new
options. In the first instance, the Chinese state has proved willing to accept
the legitimacy of International Law and the framework through which resolutions
can be reached without resulting to force. China
has spent the past few years working within the Association of South East Asian
Nations (ASEAN) framework and engaged in plenary panels, discussion, dialogue,
and negotiation over such issues as natural gas and petroleum development, free
trade agreements, and even potential military flashpoints like the South China
Sea’s Spratly and Paracel
Islands. China
has shown considerable restraint in engaging in military actions to solve many
of these issues, although time will be the final arbiter. In many respects,
Chinese restraint in this arena is not because of a Confucian ideal of peace,
but rather a fear of engaging the larger and more powerful Americans into the
issue. So long as China goes
about its claims of territoriality and sovereignty within the framework of
international law and bilateral negotiations, the United States is happy not to
become active in dispute settlement. However, the Chinese government knows that
if it resorts to overt force to annex territory or solve otherwise complicated
issues, the U.S.
would feel obligated to respond. To this end, China has been adopting an
incremental and low-risk approach in expanding its claims in the theatre.
For
China
to be an actor of any significance in the modern world, the development of the
People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) must continue to proceed apace. In the
past, a nation’s military strength and security were closely tied to its land
forces. Today, the security of a nation like China depends almost entirely on the
development of the Navy and Air Force. The success of the Royal Navy in 1842
suggested to China
that the new world order would come from the ocean, not the continent, and that
lesson still holds to this day. The international system has stabilized some
since the end of the Cold War, and China no longer faces continental
threats across its land borders. Rather, China’s interests lie off her
coast. To that end, PLAN has been rapidly developing since the mid 1980’s. In
general, a navy can be said to be of three types – Brown water navies (limited
to coastal defense), Green water navies (tied to the coast but able to affect
island groupings and patrol Exclusive Economic Zones), and Blue water, or open
water, navies (able to project force across oceans). Originally founded as a
coastal defense force or brown water navy, the PLAN has undergone significant
reformations in the recent decade in an attempt to be able to project China’s
interests over a larger area.
This is primarily due to two reasons. Firstly, China has far reaching interests.
Territorial claims in the South China Sea
cover a distance of more than 1000
nm away from the Chinese coast, and similar claims over island groups like the
Spratly and Paracel chains are likewise distant from the coast. Secondly,
as already briefly mentioned, China
and the U.S.
view themselves as strategic competitors. Potential flashpoint issues like North Korea or Taiwan could bring the two powers
into direct military confrontation with each other. Certainly it is unfair to
suggest that China
is actively seeking such a turn of events, but it recognizes that the possibility
exists, and that it is currently no match for the Americans. To that end, PLAN
is developing into a modern fighting force based on the principles of
asymmetric warfare and battle space denial capabilities.
Since
the 1985 reforms initiated by Deng Xiaoping, the PLAN has undergone significant
changes in policy and procedure which could be framed as a
‘reconceptualization.’ The most important development is the recasting of the
primary function of the PLAN. Rather than the pre-1985 emphasis on protecting
continental territory though resisting aggression by a singular adversary
against China’s
coastline, the new emphasis has been placed on defending maritime territory and interests
against multiple potential adversaries away from its shores. China’s
military planners themselves now believe that the PLAN’s modernization should
be concept-driven rather than situation-driven since i) there is no immediate
threat from a major power; ii) better conceptualization leads to a more optimal
allocation of scarce resources for defense modernization; and iii) conceptual
innovation enhances inherent capacity to win asymmetric wars by compensating
for the relative inferiority in capabilities.
Generally speaking, the PLAN is moving from a highly defensive and supportive
force into an offence-orientated and highly independent force.
Another
new PLAN function is ‘naval diplomacy,’ which is done in two primary ways. The
static approach refers to “altering the deployment of the maritime military
force, or developing such force and facilities to express political and
diplomatic intentions,” while the more dynamic (read: aggressive) approach
consists of “the acts of military force to directly or indirectly express
diplomatic and policy intentions.” In
concert with such diplomacy is a greater recognition by the international
community that the PLAN is a professional, capable force. Recent developments
in policy have tilted towards battle space denial capacity. Such policy
recognizes that PLAN is not capable of combating a larger (read: American)
force in direct confrontation, but that PLAN is prepared to deny as many
opportunities as possible, making such a confrontation costly for the larger
force. The construction of naval bases in numerous island chains, building of
missile launching and artillery positions, and forward sea and air observation
posts are all examples of PLAN’s battle space denial policy. As
part of this area denial capability, PLAN has invested significantly in a fleet
of submarines. While the current fleet is a mix of older Russian/Soviet designs
and smaller Chinese designs, PLAN is building a fledgling fleet of Chinese
designed and built modern submarines. The Song class vessel, a diesel-electric
patrol craft, is the backbone of the new fleet and China recently launched a sixth
boat into service.
Successful
area denial capability will dramatically alter the cost-benefit calculations
made when considering military action. Imagine if you will, the following
situation:
Twenty
years from now, a particularly contentious issue around either the South China
Sea, or Taiwan,
has precipitated the possibility of armed conflict. Over this time, the PLAN
has developed dramatically improved area denial capability, which will do much
more significant damage to any superpower intervention than currently possible.
In such a context, it is presumable both that: i) the superpower will be less
willing or able to militarily engage; and ii) China is more willing or able to do
so.
As of the
moment, such a scenario is only an interesting mental exercise. What is
important to take from this hypothetical situation is that the continued
development of battle space area denial capability and of a modern navy will
have important strategic consequences in the near future. Successful
achievement of even marginally increased denial capability will dramatically
alter the calculus of military actions for both China and the surrounding states.
A
watershed moment in the evolution of Chinese Maritime power and the continued
development of the PLAN occurred in May 2004 when the head of the PLAN was
assigned a permanent seat in the Central Military Commission (CMC), China’s
highest national security decision making body. This
long awaited recognition of the place of the Navy came as welcome news to
Chinese Naval planners and officers, who are now working towards the forefront
of the Chinese military institution. Inherent in this reform is the recognition
that, even in the absence of conflict, the PLAN serves China’s growing range of national
security interests.
Arguably the most important reform within the PLAN however, has nothing to do
with types or classes of vessels, with area denial or rapid reaction, with
strategic alliances or naval diplomacy. It is that, lacking its own indigenous
naval history and quietly shelving the confines of Maoist strategic
formulations, the PLAN appears to be engaged in the creation of a community of
sophisticated maritime strategic thinkers. The
move away from rote, scripted thinking to more free play confrontational
stylization will have immediate impacts on the effectiveness and capability of
the PLAN.
Finally,
it is worth noting that the entire enterprise of modernization rests squarely
on the shoulders of sustained economic growth. Despite the growing recognition
of the importance of the PLAN, the People’s Liberation Army is still the
principal agent of military might in China and, as such, is the first to
receive funding and the last to lose it. While the PLAN may still perform
admirably with less funding, it is clear to see that the continued growth and
development of the PLAN into a professional and modern force requires a
sustained economic boom to facilitate financing. Importantly,
this too changes the calculus of the Chinese military plan. China and the United States are closely linked in
economic terms, and trade between the two countries is in the billions of
dollars. This presents an interesting catch-22 for the Chinese authorities. In
order to sustain the economic boom that finances military development and
modernization, China must
continue to work closely with the United States, continuing to build
fruitful business and political linkages – and likely developing a deeper level
of integration and dependence. When the military development reaches its
zenith, Chinese leaders may find themselves unable or unwilling to disturb such
a well developed and mutually beneficial trade relationship. The ties that are
currently necessary to fund the military modernization may, in time, remove the
impetus for the same modernization – supplanting strategic competition with
economic cooperation and gains from trade.
The
newly modernized and developed PLAN will face two challenges in the near future
– the issues of Taiwan and
the South China Sea. Both issues are of
importance to the Chinese government, and both garner international attention.
The resolutions to these two potential flashpoints may well come peacefully and
diplomatically – China
has shown its willingness to work through the framework of international law –
or they may be resolved militarily and at great cost.
The
South China Sea (SCS) issue is currently one of the more complicated issues in
international law. The region encompasses hundreds of small islands and reefs,
the majority located in the Paracel and Spratly island groups. The actual
number of islands, like the question of rights associated with those islands,
is contested. The region is bordered by China
and Taiwan to the north, Vietnam to the west, Malaysia,
Brunei, Indonesia, and Singapore
to the south and southwest; and the Philippines to the east. Historically,
these uninhabited islands have, for the most part, constituted only hazards for
the region’s traffic, but they are also claimed to have considerable strategic
and economic value. The SCS continues to possess rich fishery resources, and it
is widely said to hold enormous potential as a source of oil and natural gas.
Most importantly, however, it is a vital sea-lane and is the world’s second
busiest international shipping lane. Well over half of the world’s
petroleum-bearing traffic passes through its waters. Over half of the tonnage
shipped through the sea is crude oil from the Gulf, destined for East Asia.
In this respect, the South China Sea is a
flashpoint for a number of reasons.
Firstly,
the sheer number of claimant states on the regions resources almost guarantees
a crisis in the near future. For the time being, all parties are willing to
operate within the framework of ASEAN, but it will not take much to create a
crisis in the region. One such potential issue is the future of energy
consumption in the area. Urbanization and population growth have caused the
region’s energy needs to increase significantly, putting pressure on imports
and encouraging petroleum exploration. Over the next twenty years, oil
consumption is expected to rise by 3.9% annually, with nearly half of that
increase coming from China.
This growth provides the second and third potential crises in the region. China and Japan are both especially dependent
on the flow of oil from the Gulf, so both states have a vested interest in the
sea-lanes remaining open. If some short-sighted state in the region were to
make a play to control the area, China would not hesitate to
militarily intervene, considering the flow of oil a vital interest. In this
action, China would likely
find itself operating in concert with the U.S.,
which would be one of the few times the U.S.
and China
may collaborate in military initiatives. In the longer term, energy consumption
growth will necessitate a resolution to determine which states own which
particular piece of the SCS. There have already been military clashes over the
Paracel and Spratly
Islands, and the
continuing pressure over oil exploration will precipitate a number more clashes
before the issue is resolved, even if it is done so diplomatically.
Taiwan
also represents a potential flashpoint in the region. History certainly lends
credence to the idea that the Taiwan
issue will not be one solved quickly. It is important to note in this context
that China considers Taiwan an exceedingly vital interest, and it is
an interest over which China
is prepared to go to war. Taiwanese independence, the most spoken of catalyst
to military operations in the theatre, is contrary to the official Chinese
government position of One China, and runs opposite to the Chinese goal of
unifying the Han people under one government. Any form of deliberate attempt by
Taiwan to cede from China
will be met with a military response. In this context, it becomes clear why the
new PLAN will be so based on battle space denial capability. Taiwan is not a lightly armed
island, nor would be any parties intervening in the conflict. The overwhelming
Chinese consideration regarding Taiwan
is the involvement of the United States,
whose position regarding Taiwan
is under constant revision. If Taiwan
were to force China’s hand,
and if the United States
were to militarily assist the Taiwanese claim, China wishes to be prepared to make
American intervention as costly as possible. Moreover, excluding American
intervention in the conflict, China
wishes to be able to limit the Taiwanese response to China’s reaction. The newly
modernized PLAN, with its emphasis on asymmetric warfare, flexibility and
mobility, will become increasingly able to adequately deliver on the Chinese
governments wishes in the Taiwanese theatre of operations.
Both
the South China Sea and Taiwan
represent issues for which the newly redesigned PLAN has been specifically conceived.
In both cases, the PLAN’s thrust is a new genesis in Chinese military thinking.
Gone are the days when revolutionary vigor and force of will carried
wave after wave of men into combat. In the modern navy, limited actions in
localized theaters of operation are undertaken using asymmetric warfare and
area denial capability. The PLAN appears not to be pursuing a blue water naval
capacity, but rather developing competency in its key task of preparing for cross-straits
military action involving Taiwan,
and particularly at dissuading the U.S. from intervening in such a
conflict. The
PLAN is envisaged as a shield, not a sword, and there seems to be no indication
that all of the new thinking regarding policy has changed that. Certainly the
modern navy is far different from that of even twenty years ago. PLAN is now
better able to project China’s
power exactly as far as they are keen to have it go – to Taiwan and the South China
Sea. While the development of a blue water navy may be the source
of some debate, PLAN’s “overall yet less glorious task remains to better
control China’s
territorial waters and its Exclusive Economic Zone.”
The
Chinese government is as rational as any in the international system. It has
recognized that in the current state, China does not have the power to
effectively combat the large superpower that wields influence around the world.
Moreover, it is not interested in taking its place. Seeking only to regain its
position as regional hegemon, China
is quickly developing the PLAN into a capable and professional force, which is
able to project Chinese power across the Taiwan Strait and into the South China Sea. Currently, the development of a blue
water force is outside the scope of what China wishes to accomplish. Because
of the specific nature of some of the issues and interests in China’s view, the PLAN has been
developed as a more flexible and professional version of the old navy. Certainly
the development of a larger and further reaching naval capacity is not outside
the reach of the Chinese government, however such a
development remains far in the future. The issues that take precedence in China’s
calculations are those with which a more flexible, yet shorter reaching, navy
is most capable of dealing. In short order, China
will have a capable green water navy, able to defend the coast from aggression
and extend the power of Beijing
onto the sea. For the first time in history, China will be the power in the
region both off the water and on it.
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