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DoD: China seeking to project military power

A new Pentagon report to Congress released May 25 lays out some numbers and discussion about China’s growing military capabilities that, along with uncertainty over the rapidly growing regional, political and economic power’s plans for using its weapons and capabilities, give U.S. officials cause for concern.

“The United States welcomes the rise of a peaceful and prosperous China, and it encourages China to participate as a responsible international stakeholder by taking on a greater share of responsibility for the health and success of the global system,” states the annual report, required by law. “However, much uncertainty surrounds the future course China’s leaders will set for their country, including in the area of China’s expanding military power and how that power might be used.”

According to the report, China wants to advance its interests into the “greater periphery” of Central Asia and the Middle East. It wants to secure access to resources and markets in the developing world, and secure safe passage through critical sea lanes such as the Strait of Malacca. As it grows, it more urgently needs metals and fossil fuels.

How China might employ its military to protect those interests or pursue other national goals is somewhat unclear, but China’s military wants to build a force that can win “local wars under conditions of informatization,” the report states. In other words, it recognizes the role of modern information technology as a force multiplier, allowing the People’s Liberation Army to operate with precision at greater distances from the homeland.

The U.S. estimates that China’s military budget grew an inflation-adjusted average of 11.8 percent annually from 1996 to 2006. On March 4, China announced a 17.8 percent increase in its military budget, bringing its official total for 2007 to about $45 billion.

“This development continues a trend of annual budget increases that exceed significantly growth of the overall economy,” the report states.

China is developing and testing a formidable array of missiles, including the road-mobile, solid-propellant intercontinental-range DF-31, which achieved initial threat availability last year and “will likely” become operational if it isn’t already, the report states. China’s primary nuclear forces are contained on 20 silo-based, liquid-fueled ICBMs that could reach the U.S., along with more than 80 shorter-range ballistic missiles and 10 to 14 submarine-launched missiles.

As of late last year, China also had roughly 900 short-range ballistic missiles pointed at Taiwan, at least 100 more than in late 2005, the report states. And it is acquiring conventional medium-range ballistic missiles that possibly could be used to target distant naval ships.

China’s navy, according to the report, includes 58 attack submarines, about 50 medium and heavy amphibious lift vessels and roughly 41 coastal missile patrol craft. Late last year, China took delivery of its second Russian-made guided missile destroyer, a ship equipped with anti-ship cruise missiles and wide-area air defense systems.

It also is building and testing second-generation nuclear submarines, and took delivery of two Kilo-class Russian diesel subs. Some analysts, the report states, predict that China could have an operational aircraft carrier as early as 2015.

China has more than 700 combat aircraft “based within un-refueled operational range of Taiwan,” according to the report. While many of its aircraft are older models that have been upgraded, newer aircraft “make up a growing percentage” of the inventory. These include the multi-role F-10 fighter and the multi-role Su-27SMK Flanker, the latter under a licensed co-production agreement with Russia.

China is also producing its first indigenous attack helicopter, the Z-10, which will offer performance “equal” to the Eurocopter Tiger but “below” that of the U.S.’s AH-64 Apache, the report states.

Over the next few years, according to the report, China will take delivery of its first battalion of Russian-made S-300PMU-2 surface-to-air missile systems, which have an advertised range of 124 miles, according to the report. It is also developing an indigenous phased-array, radar-based SAM system with a range of 93 miles.

China has about 1.4 million ground forces, 400,000 of whom are deployed to the three military regions opposite Taiwan. But it is “pursuing comprehensive transformation from a mass army designed for protracted wars of attrition on its territory to one capable of fighting and winning short-duration, high-intensity conflicts against high-tech adversaries,” the report states.

Moreover, China is investing in a wide variety of information warfare systems including concepts such as computer network attack, defense and exploitation, according to the report. The PLA has established information warfare units to develop viruses to attack enemy computer systems and networks. In 2005, the PLA began to incorporate offensive computer network operations into its exercises, “primarily in first strikes against enemy networks,” the report states.

“The outside world has limited knowledge of the motivations, decision-making and key capabilities supporting China’s military modernization,” it states. “China’s leaders have yet to explain adequately the purposes or desired end-states of the PLA’s expanding military capabilities.

“China’s actions in certain areas increasingly appear inconsistent with its declared policies,” the report concludes. “Actual Chinese expenditures remain far above officially disclosed figures. This lack of transparency in China’s military affairs will naturally and understandably prompt international responses that hedge against the unknown.”