So I've done some thinking about this whole story, and this is my assessment.
Now, everyone knows actual nuclear submarine production for the PLAN is done at Bohai shipyard, while diesel electric submarine production is done at Wuchang and Jiangnan shipyards. Full size nuclear submarines are indeed a bit large to safely navigate to and from Wuchang shipyard down the entirety of the Yangtze river.
This purported "Zhou class" (which prior to now is a designation which has not been used before in any mainstream capacity) is being claimed to have been built at Wuchang. It's possible they are attributing that name to the mysterious X tail submarine that we've seen at Wuchang.
The idea that nuclear submarine production is being expanded from Bohai to Wuchang is inconsistent with every other report, rumour and imagery that we have when projecting PLAN nuclear submarine trends into the near future, which is that the expansion of nuclear submarine production capacity is occurring at Bohai.
Now, one co-occurring rumour we do have in recent years is that the PLAN may be pursuing a miniature nuclear submarine, or rather a diesel/nuclear submarine hybrid (where a low pressure nuclear reactor is installed with a diesel electric submarine), and that was expected to be built at Jiangnan shipyard and possibly Wuchang as well, however the first hull was not expected to be already in the water so early, most expected it to emerge from 2025 onwards, if that.
Based on all of the above, there are basically two major questions that need to be answered:
1. Was there actually a submarine that sunk in the first place?
2. If 1. is true, then what was the actual type of submarine that sunk?
For question 1, despite the lack of convincing visual evidence and the lack of a clear affirmatory quote from the DoD official in the WSJ article, I'm willing to give them the benefit of doubt and say it is possible that there was a submarine that sank, simply on the basis that it seems highly highly odd for a relatively reputable and mainstream outlet like WSJ to push a piece of news like this without there being some level of corroborating proof outside of a satellite image showing a few floating cranes. But they really haven't helped themselves out by not outright quoting the DoD official affirming such an event if it occurred.
For question 2, this requires one to have a bit of knowledge about PLAN nuclear submarine production distribution/predictions and local geography. I find it immensely unlikely that any proper nuclear submarine that we know is in production or likely to be in production soon (meaning SSN like 09IIIB, or upcoming 09V etc, let alone SSBN like 09IV/A/B or upcoming 09VI) would be anywhere near Wuchang shipyard let alone be actually built there. That leaves a few other options -- it could have been the first of the "mini-nuke" submarine that they're developing, or it may be a one-off testbed submarine which may or may not be related to the "mini-nuke" itself, or it may be just a new conventional submarine.
In order of most likely to least likely identification if an actual submarine did sink, IMO:
Conventional submarine > "Mini-nuke" testbed submarine > Lead boat of new "mini-nuke" submarine >>>> Proper SSN (or SSBN)
Ultimately big claims have a big burden of evidence, and the pictures demonstrated show nothing convincing, and the unnamed DoD official doesn't have actual affirmative quotes of the event being stated. While there is no reason to think the author of the original article is making everything up, the evidence shown is unconvincing and circumstantial at best, and if they had access to more clearcut quotes there should hopefully be a good reason for actually omitting it.
And all of this is without getting into the underlying credibility of how your usual media reporting/literacy of PLA matters are like, and their ability to accurately interpret (let alone ask the right questions) to people who may have access to privileged information on the PLA.
Incidentally, I think this specific situation can be one where comments from the likes of shilao and yankee on their podcast can actually be useful.
Now, everyone knows actual nuclear submarine production for the PLAN is done at Bohai shipyard, while diesel electric submarine production is done at Wuchang and Jiangnan shipyards. Full size nuclear submarines are indeed a bit large to safely navigate to and from Wuchang shipyard down the entirety of the Yangtze river.
This purported "Zhou class" (which prior to now is a designation which has not been used before in any mainstream capacity) is being claimed to have been built at Wuchang. It's possible they are attributing that name to the mysterious X tail submarine that we've seen at Wuchang.
The idea that nuclear submarine production is being expanded from Bohai to Wuchang is inconsistent with every other report, rumour and imagery that we have when projecting PLAN nuclear submarine trends into the near future, which is that the expansion of nuclear submarine production capacity is occurring at Bohai.
Now, one co-occurring rumour we do have in recent years is that the PLAN may be pursuing a miniature nuclear submarine, or rather a diesel/nuclear submarine hybrid (where a low pressure nuclear reactor is installed with a diesel electric submarine), and that was expected to be built at Jiangnan shipyard and possibly Wuchang as well, however the first hull was not expected to be already in the water so early, most expected it to emerge from 2025 onwards, if that.
Based on all of the above, there are basically two major questions that need to be answered:
1. Was there actually a submarine that sunk in the first place?
2. If 1. is true, then what was the actual type of submarine that sunk?
For question 1, despite the lack of convincing visual evidence and the lack of a clear affirmatory quote from the DoD official in the WSJ article, I'm willing to give them the benefit of doubt and say it is possible that there was a submarine that sank, simply on the basis that it seems highly highly odd for a relatively reputable and mainstream outlet like WSJ to push a piece of news like this without there being some level of corroborating proof outside of a satellite image showing a few floating cranes. But they really haven't helped themselves out by not outright quoting the DoD official affirming such an event if it occurred.
For question 2, this requires one to have a bit of knowledge about PLAN nuclear submarine production distribution/predictions and local geography. I find it immensely unlikely that any proper nuclear submarine that we know is in production or likely to be in production soon (meaning SSN like 09IIIB, or upcoming 09V etc, let alone SSBN like 09IV/A/B or upcoming 09VI) would be anywhere near Wuchang shipyard let alone be actually built there. That leaves a few other options -- it could have been the first of the "mini-nuke" submarine that they're developing, or it may be a one-off testbed submarine which may or may not be related to the "mini-nuke" itself, or it may be just a new conventional submarine.
In order of most likely to least likely identification if an actual submarine did sink, IMO:
Conventional submarine > "Mini-nuke" testbed submarine > Lead boat of new "mini-nuke" submarine >>>> Proper SSN (or SSBN)
Ultimately big claims have a big burden of evidence, and the pictures demonstrated show nothing convincing, and the unnamed DoD official doesn't have actual affirmative quotes of the event being stated. While there is no reason to think the author of the original article is making everything up, the evidence shown is unconvincing and circumstantial at best, and if they had access to more clearcut quotes there should hopefully be a good reason for actually omitting it.
And all of this is without getting into the underlying credibility of how your usual media reporting/literacy of PLA matters are like, and their ability to accurately interpret (let alone ask the right questions) to people who may have access to privileged information on the PLA.
Incidentally, I think this specific situation can be one where comments from the likes of shilao and yankee on their podcast can actually be useful.
