Frank Lavin wrote a piece for the National Review that was long on assumptions but short on critical details. The end result is a piece that doesn’t show how long and difficult the road is to supposed Chinese dominance and fails to account for U.S. countermeasures.
China’s military is growing and, as Lavin said, they won’t have a meaningful carrier presence for ten years. But the same reasons he gives for growth —no accountability, oversight, or checks by the people— suggest that China has economic problems in the future. After all, the economic dictates from politicians without accountability, oversight, or checks by the people have created a bubble that dwarfs the U.S. housing market. That crash led to the harsh military sequester, and it strongly suggests that China has a long road to the long march to dominance.
The launch of the second aircraft carrier begins Lavin’s study. Lavin correctly points out that China needs much more than this to become a dominant presence, but he only offers some vague notions that it will happen someday. Some might argue that China doesn’t need a continuous presence as many of its strategic objectives are like Taiwan and the disputed Senkaku Islands with Japan, and the South China Sea is relatively close to China’s shores. (In fact, this is often called the first island chain because of its proximity to the Chinese mainland.) But this runs against the entire point of Chinese White Papers that state they want a global presence. China has conducted anti-piracy operations in the Horn of Africa, built a naval base in Gwandar Pakistan, and has explicitly stated they want a white water navy that can project power abroad. But their main fighter has significant questions.
They have three geographic commands; its true. But the Chinese military and force structure is dominated by the army, and the Chinese navy has a history and continuing problem of being provincial. In 2014 the navy accounted for only 10 percent of the Chinese military, and the navy only had 3 full admirals to the army’s 24 generals (3 stars or higher). In the Sino French and Sino Japanese wars in the last 19th and early 20th centuries, the northern and southern navies refused to help each other (not that it would have helped much). Despite reforms to the organization and funding splurges for the navy, the multi-carrier fleet that Lavin suggests is an incredibly long way off and unlikely, to the point that it’s almost not worth talking about..unless it is used to further the perception of China as a bogeyman for the American people and secure more funding.
Frank Lavin contends that China (among other growing competitors) doesn’t need to match the U.S. ship for ship and weapon for weapon, as its anti-access area denial (A2AD) strategy can pack quite a punch. A2AD describes a strategy that seeks to use overwhelming amounts of newer and high-speed missiles and drones to overwhelm American defenses, or at least make it too costly for them to operate or access areas of Chinese operations. In simple terms, this strategy would make America too worried about Chinese missiles to stop a future invasion of Taiwan or seizure of disputed islands in the South China Sea.
But Lavin doesn’t describe America’s countermeasures or historical items that indicate America is well prepared for that strategy. Historically, new technologies have always been trumpeted as negating the king of the battlefield. Battleships were thought to be made obsolete by the torpedo boat destroyer, and the tank by new and advanced shoulder-mounted rockets. But the U.S. has over 70 years of experience dealing with missiles. New fighters like the F-35 network with older fighters to identify and engage targets “beyond the horizon.” Guided-missile destroyers have updated their radar systems to be 30 times more powerful. Close-in weapon systems are being updated to high-speed rail guns. The army is even testing repurposed artillery that can fire anti-missile shells. In short, the U.S. is updating systems to the point that China’s powerful punch will be a meaningless love tap.
China’s growing navy and their new, expansive, global mission does call for more analysis. But a careful consideration of their military structure, an assessment of U.S. countermeasures to Chinese strategy, and the danger of straightline projections suggest a more measured and nuanced approach than that provided by Lavin.
