July 29, 1999
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| July 29, 1999 | atimes.com | |
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| China CHINA FOR REAL: How to cross the Taiwan Strait By Bradley Martin Asia Times Online China's communists still smart from their humiliating naval loss in the battle to "liberate" Quemoy from nationalist control in 1947. The first and second waves of communist troops got to the island in the Taiwan Strait aboard a fleet of wooden vessels, including junks. But the primitive transport ships then failed to make it back to the mainland in time to bring succeeding waves of needed reinforcements. A few of the 9,086 invaders were captured; the rest perished. Always known as primarily a land power, Beijing has been pondering ways to build up its naval capabilities - for which the most likely wartime use would be in an effort to liberate Taiwan. In an article entitled "How to cross the Taiwan Strait?" the July issue of Jianchuan Zhishi, a magazine published by the Chinese Society of Naval Architecture and Marine Engineering, argues that one key is the ability to quickly convert the country's civilian ships to wartime use. Author Su Hongyu gets to his point only after suggesting that tactical nuclear weapons should be used early in a conflict with Taiwan to establish air and naval superiority - a thought that fits nicely into the general wish on both sides of the strait lately to look and sound fearsome. After the PLA has nuked or otherwise taken out "the enemy's aircraft on the ground and his warships in their harbors," next comes that nagging old question of how to get PLA ground troops ashore on enemy territory in sufficient force to prevail. Su puts forth "a new concept of people's war" - but one that is not so new that it doesn't borrow ideas from other navies of the world. From merely serving as sensing units in an information-transmission chain to being refitted as out-and-out fighting ships, the country's merchant vessels are the key, Su says. Installing new electronic and magnetic devices for military use on merchant ships is fairly simple because typically they are not already bristling with huge quantities of radar and other electronic equipment. And container ships can be converted quickly to missile launch ships - the missiles housed in containers, so that the ships become floating arsenals. For actually carrying reinforcement troops, after the first wave hits in regular landing vessels, there are the high-speed coastal passenger ships China has "vigorously developed." For carrying armored vehicles, ro-ro (roll-on, roll-off) vehicle carriers are an obvious option. But in addition, Su says, "outstanding progress has been made in developing floating-bridge and float-pier technologies in our country. We can use a combination of such technologies to carry 10 tanks on a floating pier and send it to the other side of the strait. We can unload materials from general cargo ships onto floating piers. Using floating bridges as trestles, we can carry out a landing operation anywhere along the west coast of Taiwan." With memories of its fight for the Malvinas, Su notes, Britain built a floating military port. Not that China is doing all this right now. But Su says it should be a relatively straightforward matter to do so in the future - especially if designers of new civilian ships keep a few simple rules in mind. | |||||||||
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