Tuesday, December 13, 2005

China's Bogus Sub Threat

All this sounds familiar. From Strategypage:

Despite howls in some circles (right up to the four star level), the “threat” from China’s 60 or so submarines seems very limited. Rarely are there more than 4-6 boats at sea at any time, often there are none at all, and a number of units (the Han nuke boats, for example), seem never to go to sea at all. China’s Type 092 SSBN Changzheng, laid down in 1978 and commissioned in 1987 (NATO designation: Xia class) seems to be a maritime basket case.

Remember when we lived in dread of the vaunted Soviet navy, yet they rarely went to sea and rarely trained like Western navies? Just more myths to justify big ticket battleships while our troops don't have enough heloes and armor.