09V/09VI (095/096) Nuclear Submarine Thread

[AndrewS]

This thread is about 09V and 09VI so I'll be brief with this digression. US Navy does control all the oceans through its Carrier groups and that situation will not change for the next 30 years. Might makes right. The beauty and elegance of the One Belt and One Road Initiative is to render this naval dominance completely irrelevant by shifting the geopolitical center of the world back to the Eurasian continent with overland connectivity (the maritime part was added later to make it sound more economic-oriented and all encompassing). Instead of spending a trillion dollars on instruments of destruction, using that same amount on infrastructures pays much better dividend by create brand new markets and more prosperous consumers while neatly removing the US from the entire picture. If you work remotely from home instead of commuting to office, do you care how dangerous or congested the traffic is? Why use oil tankers when you can have a pipeline from Iran to Xinjiang? Why use USD/SWIFT when you have DCEP (digital currency)? Why play with rules defined for your enemy's benefit (the so called 'International System')? Why bother with Saudi Arabia/UAE when you can build an alliance with Iraq/Iran/Syria/Afghanistan/Pakistan? Why sail the Indian ocean when you have the Northern Passage? Why sweat about selling 5G to an aging population of 500 million in NA and Europe now when your potential market 10 years from now can be five billion people in Africa, Latin America, and Asia?

Great generals win by maneuvering/out flanking the enemy, not by frontal assaults or play into your enemy's strengths. China's strategy has been to bypass areas where US is dominant and leave the US with all the legacy weapons and doctrines. The US Navy is probably the service China worry about the least. USN hasn't come up with a single successful hull design since the Spruance 50 years ago. Zumwalt and LCS are complete disasters. Ford class is being capped at 4 and the Marines no longer have any purpose at all. China's A2/AD strategy is working really well. What good is your CVN if your plane's range + weapon range won't even reach your enemy's coastline? Waiting until China is more resilient in finance and high tech, then it is time to sell Iran MARV technology to keep the Hormuz clear.

Back to the 09V quantity question. 36 is more than plenty (I was actually thinking 24 09V's and 12 09VI's). (1) Although it is hard to imagine a cheaper form of transportation, China can reduce its dependence and criticality to its national interests. (2) Don't forget the diesels which are inherently quieter and an order of magnitude cheaper life cycle cost. We are at the very beginning of the endurance/AIP revolution. When a diesel can go a month or two underwater, why bother with nuclear? (3) Why use a manned sub for land targets when a submersible arsenal ship (or a swarming mothership from above) can do more for much less. (4) A poor country (like Vietnam) must buy these small Jack-of-all-trades frigates overloaded with all sorts of weapons. When you are rich, you can afford to build 05VI corvettes knowing you have 05IV's, 05II's, and 05V's for the tougher jobs.

Let the 09V's be dedicated SSN hunter killers. With longer range SLBM's, the SSBN's can stay in Bohai which is already a safe-enough bastion. I think the 05VI corvette design shows China recognizes the usefulness of dedicated platforms. US wishes it can do this too but its cost structure is way too high and it has failed too many times that it must adapt the FREMM design for the Constellation class of frigates. If you follow US submarine discussions, USN thinks the Virginia is too small and the follow-on class will be substantially bigger but can the US afford such a Seawolf-like boat.

There are a key analytical error at the beginning of your analysis.

Overland road and rail connectivity is many more times expensive than sea freight.

For China-India and China-Europe trade for example, seaborne transport is a lot cheaper than rail
This is why over 90% of China's trade is seaborne, and this won't change much because transport costs are based on physical limits

So your assertion that Belt and Road Initiative will put the focus back to the Eurasian continent is not going to happen.

And you mention many other countries in the rest of the world.
It's not practical to use overland connections, so this freight has to be seaborne.

---

And remember that China is already the world's largest trading nation and the largest economy in terms of actual physical output.
China is also aiming to double the size of the economy from 2020-2035, and we can also see R&D spending continuing on an explosive growth path.

So by 2035, it's possible for China to have an economy twice the size of the USA, and also be spending twice as much on technology R&D.

So I think it highly unlikely that the China would be satisfied with only 36 SSNs (as you suggest) and accepting that its overseas trade is subject to the control of a larger US Navy.

More likely is a Chinese Navy that aspires to global sea control to protect global trade from the US Navy.
That requires the Chinese Navy to be larger than the US equivalent.

 

[AndrewS]

The beauty and elegance of the One Belt and One Road Initiative is that it is in a large extent a waste of money. Eurasian land routes will never be able to compete in volume and efficiency with the maritimes routes.

BRI rail routes aren't really about competing with ocean freight.
They're competing with air freight which is twice as expensive as rail from China to Europe.

It looks like there is a viable niche for China-Europe trains to account for 8-10% of total freight trade.
And they're targeting to remove subsidies by 2022.

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[Blitzo]

Trade routes are relevant to geopolitics, grand strategy, as well as nuclear submarine procurement projections to an extent, but I think we're veering a bit too far off course.
Let's get back on topic please.

 

[kentchang]

There are a key analytical error at the beginning of your analysis.

Overland road and rail connectivity is many more times expensive than sea freight.

For China-India and China-Europe trade for example, seaborne transport is a lot cheaper than rail
This is why over 90% of China's trade is seaborne, and this won't change much because transport costs are based on physical limits

So your assertion that Belt and Road Initiative will put the focus back to the Eurasian continent is not going to happen.

And you mention many other countries in the rest of the world.
It's not practical to use overland connections, so this freight has to be seaborne.

---

And remember that China is already the world's largest trading nation and the largest economy in terms of actual physical output.
China is also aiming to double the size of the economy from 2020-2035, and we can also see R&D spending continuing on an explosive growth path.

So by 2035, it's possible for China to have an economy twice the size of the USA, and also be spending twice as much on technology R&D.

So I think it highly unlikely that the China would be satisfied with only 36 SSNs (as you suggest) and accepting that its overseas trade is subject to the control of a larger US Navy.

More likely is a Chinese Navy that aspires to global sea control to protect global trade from the US Navy.
That requires the Chinese Navy to be larger than the US equivalent.

You are absolutely correct about the cost. No comparison between rail freight and container ships but OBOR is not meant to compete on transportation cost basis. That would be very silly and futile. OBOR can be viewed as the Shanghai-Beijing HSR scaled up 1,000x. Remember all the doubter comments about that railroad back in 2008? It costs too much, waste of money, it is too expensive for average people, planes are faster, just a vanity/showpiece project, etc. The HSR was completed only 8 years ago and where are the critics today? People already take the entire HSR network for granted. These critics didn't see that railroad for what it really is. A magnet to attract all sorts of developments along every inch of that railroad like a Macy's as an anchor store in a strip mall. The HSR was never meant to fill travelers going between BJ and SH (only two(?) non-stop trains every day), it is primarily for people traveling shorter hops between these two cties just like I don't know anyone who travels from Woodlawn in the Bronx to Crown Heights in Brooklyn on the #4 train in New York.

I'll take one OBOR route as example, freight train from Yiwu to Amsterdam. Both are coastal cities. Going overland has only one real advantage: Speed (15 vs 30 days. 10 possible with gauge-changing bogies and e-custom clearance). Good for high-valued/more time-sensitive products. However, the real value in such a route is not for goods starting from Yiwu, it is for goods picked up along the way like Urumqi and unloaded in Moscow. OBOR connects the two ends of the Eurasian continent. Its main benefactors are the people and towns in the interior of this land mass, not its coastal regions which are already very developed and rich (and aging and dying). It is to facilitate travel, short haul freight, and commerce all along that route both domestic and international and by doing so, raise the local living standards so they become higher-quality producers and consumers. This is a decades-long process. It is a very long term investment that only China has the will and resources to do. It is a huge bet. No risk, no return. Maritime freight is perfect for global trades between port cities. OBOR is meant to open up all the interior regions in all the connected countries, somwhat levels the playing field with coastal regions. The two complements, not competes. The problem for the US is that IF OBOR succeeds after 20 to 30 years, what does that leave the US on the world stage? Not a whole lot. No more high-tech (who can trust the US), no more industries (overpaid workers), and no more Wall Street (nothing worthwhile to invest in the US). Just a whole lot of corn, wheat, and barley to sell. That is why no matter which party is in charge, the US is very scared and rightfully so but way too late, too divided, and too impotent to stop China's momentum peacefully.

Cost is also a very relative term. I mentioned OBOR because strategically, it also removes all the maritime straits and ports as 'choke' points. Driving trucks over Lake Ladoga to Leningrad wasn't fun but it saved Leningrad. You always want to have a Plan B or Plan C so you don't get held hostage by someone else (like ZTE or Huawei). How much is national survival worth? Since WW II, the US Navy has structured and bet all its marbles on its carrier groups. Its total investment probably exceeds that of OBOR. If you read USNI Proceedings these days, in every issue, freightened boys (aka retired Captains and Admirals) write about what the US must do or why China is doomed to fail. They know more than anyone else how little leverage the USN really has. One Captain actually suggested the US can elicit help from Thailand ("a loyal and traditional US ally") to contain China! In time of peace, Asian countries all welcome US ships and the money they spend on local economy. In time of war with China, how many will actually allow an US ship to enter its territorial waters, let along dock and replenish?

In an earlier post, I said I think it will be the US that will give up chasing China within the next two decades. With 2x or more the GDP and more room to increase R&D budget, it is the US that cannot compete in future-tech arms race. China graduates 10x the number of STEM graduates, can channel 10-100x the money (e.g. $2B US gov't support vs $200B in BJ/muni investments to semiconductor industry), has much lower cost basis (10x people means paying them less), and a much smarter work force (China's average IQ is 105 vs 98 for the US). DJI's dominance is a great example today. There is more cut-throat competition in China than in the US today especially in the military field where contract awards are more like Federal hand-outs.

I was specific in saying 24 09V's is adequate for SSBN screening and not 24 as total undersea non-SSBN fleet size. My points were (1) no reason to overbuild the 09V for the next 10 years. 10 years from now, more new and fun toys to choose from. (2) the next ten years is good for maturing the supply chain and people (both shipyard workers and design engineers). (3) dedicated/specialized platforms are better than general purpose boats IF you can afford it like SSGN's and submersible munition/mine laying bots. (4) I see a steady decline in the USN order of battle and the projected uptick of USN fleet size after 2030 is just wishful thinking. (5) Russia has every incentive to keep US rattles in order to keep itself relevant in the world. (6) conventional subs can do 90% of the job at a small fraction of the total cost. I am cheap. If you are the CNO, you would do the same cost/benefit analysis too (think Zumwalt's fancy guns).

 

[Blitzo]

You are absolutely correct about the cost. No comparison between rail freight and container ships but OBOR is not meant to compete on transportation cost basis. That would be very silly and futile. OBOR can be viewed as the Shanghai-Beijing HSR scaled up 1,000x. Remember all the doubter comments about that railroad back in 2008? It costs too much, waste of money, it is too expensive for average people, planes are faster, just a vanity/showpiece project, etc. The HSR was completed only 8 years ago and where are the critics today? People already take the entire HSR network for granted. These critics didn't see that railroad for what it really is. A magnet to attract all sorts of developments along every inch of that railroad like a Macy's as an anchor store in a strip mall. The HSR was never meant to fill travelers going between BJ and SH (only two(?) non-stop trains every day), it is primarily for people traveling shorter hops between these two cties just like I don't know anyone who travels from Woodlawn in the Bronx to Crown Heights in Brooklyn on the #4 train in New York.

I'll take one OBOR route as example, freight train from Yiwu to Amsterdam. Both are coastal cities. Going overland has only one real advantage: Speed (15 vs 30 days. 10 possible with gauge-changing bogies and e-custom clearance). Good for high-valued/more time-sensitive products. However, the real value in such a route is not for goods starting from Yiwu, it is for goods picked up along the way like Urumqi and unloaded in Moscow. OBOR connects the two ends of the Eurasian continent. Its main benefactors are the people and towns in the interior of this land mass, not its coastal regions which are already very developed and rich (and aging and dying). It is to facilitate travel, short haul freight, and commerce all along that route both domestic and international and by doing so, raise the local living standards so they become higher-quality producers and consumers. This is a decades-long process. It is a very long term investment that only China has the will and resources to do. It is a huge bet. No risk, no return. Maritime freight is perfect for global trades between port cities. OBOR is meant to open up all the interior regions in all the connected countries, somwhat levels the playing field with coastal regions. The two complements, not competes. The problem for the US is that IF OBOR succeeds after 20 to 30 years, what does that leave the US on the world stage? Not a whole lot. No more high-tech (who can trust the US), no more industries (overpaid workers), and no more Wall Street (nothing worthwhile to invest in the US). Just a whole lot of corn, wheat, and barley to sell. That is why no matter which party is in charge, the US is very scared and rightfully so but way too late, too divided, and too impotent to stop China's momentum peacefully.

Cost is also a very relative term. I mentioned OBOR because strategically, it also removes all the maritime straits and ports as 'choke' points. Driving trucks over Lake Ladoga to Leningrad wasn't fun but it saved Leningrad. You always want to have a Plan B or Plan C so you don't get held hostage by someone else (like ZTE or Huawei). How much is national survival worth? Since WW II, the US Navy has structured and bet all its marbles on its carrier groups. Its total investment probably exceeds that of OBOR. If you read USNI Proceedings these days, in every issue, freightened boys (aka retired Captains and Admirals) write about what the US must do or why China is doomed to fail. They know more than anyone else how little leverage the USN really has. One Captain actually suggested the US can elicit help from Thailand ("a loyal and traditional US ally") to contain China! In time of peace, Asian countries all welcome US ships and the money they spend on local economy. In time of war with China, how many will actually allow an US ship to enter its territorial waters, let along dock and replenish?

In an earlier post, I said I think it will be the US that will give up chasing China within the next two decades. With 2x or more the GDP and more room to increase R&D budget, it is the US that cannot compete in future-tech arms race. China graduates 10x the number of STEM graduates, can channel 10-100x the money (e.g. $2B US gov't support vs $200B in BJ/muni investments to semiconductor industry), has much lower cost basis (10x people means paying them less), and a much smarter work force (China's average IQ is 105 vs 98 for the US). DJI's dominance is a great example today. There is more cut-throat competition in China than in the US today especially in the military field where contract awards are more like Federal hand-outs.

I was specific in saying 24 09V's is adequate for SSBN screening and not 24 as total undersea non-SSBN fleet size. My points were (1) no reason to overbuild the 09V for the next 10 years. 10 years from now, more new and fun toys to choose from. (2) the next ten years is good for maturing the supply chain and people (both shipyard workers and design engineers). (3) dedicated/specialized platforms are better than general purpose boats IF you can afford it like SSGN's and submersible munition/mine laying bots. (4) I see a steady decline in the USN order of battle and the projected uptick of USN fleet size after 2030 is just wishful thinking. (5) Russia has every incentive to keep US rattles in order to keep itself relevant in the world. (6) conventional subs can do 90% of the job at a small fraction of the total cost. I am cheap. If you are the CNO, you would do the same cost/benefit analysis too (think Zumwalt's fancy guns).

Just FYI, note the mild warning in the bottom of the last page.

The discussion here has all been informative and largely relevant, but let's avoid talking too much about trade routes and geopolitics. We all appreciate how those factor into procurement drivers for things like nuclear submarines, but let's wind it back a bit so it's more focused on nuclear submarines..

 

[kentchang]

I wouldn't be surprised if the initial 095 is the undersea equivalent of the 052C/054 since the 093 series seems to follow the same 051B/052/052B pattern. When did they ever mass produce the initial hull form? Especially if the 095 has a new single-shell hull. If so, I reduce my estimate of the 095 to just 2 to 4.

I hope they can also avoid the need for mid-life refueling but China seems to prefer more major mid-life upgrades than the US since factory availability is higher and labor cost much lower.

 

[Blitzo]

I wouldn't be surprised if the initial 095 is the undersea equivalent of the 052C/054 since the 093 series seems to follow the same 051B/052/052B pattern. When did they ever mass produce the initial hull form? Especially if the 095 has a new single-shell hull. If so, I reduce my estimate of the 095 to just 2 to 4.

I hope they can also avoid the need for mid-life refueling but China seems to prefer more major mid-life upgrades than the US since factory availability is higher and labor cost much lower.

Well, the comparisons between the 09III family and the 051B/052/052B/052C etc have been made before.

We know there are multiple 09III subtypes, a combination of unique hull builds and new hulls with external iterative improvements and almost definitely internal upgrades as well.




We of course also saw successive variants of 051B/051C and more importantly 052, 052B and 052C as they evaluated new technology and subsystems.
They did this because they recognized many core technologies and subsystems were not sufficiently mature and the actual ships they were producing weren't competitive or capable enough for their requirements. The same logic likely (I would say almost definitely) applies to their 09III family SSNs.

But then, once they were happy enough with technologies and design to be sufficiently competitive, they proceeded to mass produce quite a number of new warship classes without doing the "build a pair, evaluate, rapidly iterate, repeat" pattern -- 052D, 056, and more importantly 055.
For the 055 in particular, building a brand new hull that is almost double the size of the previous largest surface combatant they have built, with a new propulsion configuration, and ordering 8 before the first hull was even launched (with four simultaneously in visible work before the first was even launched as well) should really be the marker that changes our perspective for the PLAN's willingness to do serial production of a new hull with key decisive new technologies without building a small number of hulls first, if they are sufficiently confident.
I.e. this is primarily industry dependent.


With the 09III family, we know there is one last 09III variant to identify that we haven't seen yet, the elusive 09IIIB, which will, among other improvements, supposedly field a VLS.

The 09IIIB will then lead into the 09V, which despite how little we know, we can all agree on it is being constructed and will succeed 09IIIB.

We can also see that Bohai has the massive new facilities that are built and still being expanded and that part of the yard is only going to be for constructing nuclear submarines, and it is not a stretch at all to believe that they would've only built this new facility to coincide with a desire to actually use its production capacity.


Putting all that together, the tantalizing questions will be:
- Would the PLAN only seek to mass produce nuclear submarines (aka actually use the massive new facility they've built/are building) once they have a class of submarine they deem to be sufficiently capable/competitive, keeping in mind the only SSNs in production right now should be 09IIIB and 09V and therefore those two are the only candidates for viable mass production in the immediate future? And following from that, we naturally lead to...
- Is 09IIIB going to be the nuclear submarine equivalent of 052C or 052D? -- and/or...
- Is 09V going to be the nuclear submarine equivalent of 052D or 055?

(The class comparisons aren't perfect of course but you catch my drift)

 

[ougoah]

An unfortunate phenomenon I've noticed during my time on this site is that I seem to elicit responses from people I least want to hear from. Oh, well.

Has an economy larger than a city-state grown at double digit rates for three decades without interruption, post or pre WW2? There's always a first, and China is that first.


Your doubts and opinions are quite meaningless because there just isn't much thought behind them. You simply fail to comprehend China's scale and momentum - if you did, you wouldn't do anything as ridiculous as compare it to America and the Soviet Union. I hope (but not expect) the following example can go some way to correcting your ignorance: Let's take France's economy and compare it to China's. When I last did a calculation in 2019, China added France's entire GDP as an increment to its own every couple of years. Contemplate that for a second - think about all of your country's economic activity and understand that every two years, another French economy pops into existence in China. Note that this was back when France had an economy, before COVID-19 demolished it.

The point of this example is not to belittle and diminish France, the point is that China is without peer or equal. It cannot be compared to anything else, it is in a galaxy of its own.

China is just better.

Not only do you fail to comprehend China's scale, you completely misunderstand the most basic principles of its military development. The cautious experimentation you brought up happens only if China's technology is both behind the world standard and rapidly advancing. Once China is confident that its technology is competitive, it's full speed ahead - ref. Type 052C -> Type 052D/Type055 transition. With the construction and expansion of the new yard, it's crystal clear that China is confident that the Type 09-IIIB/09-V is competitive and will begin rapid construction.

But we can all pretend for various reasons, some because they're legalistically cautious, others because they're spiteful anti-China ill-wishers, that what applied in the USSR and US applies to China. Then a few years later when the obvious comes to pass, we can all pretend to be surprised that the capacity China built actually gets utilized.

It may be achievable no doubt about that but unless they're confident in having caught up to leading standards with the 095, there's less room for error with commitments to put 10 into service per year! Or at least build 10. They usually build two hulls for tech trial but this pattern seems to have changed with the 055. If the two hulls are deemed worthy of full mass production with improvements made in following batches, even then 10 per year is unlikely because it forces the PLAN to take unnecessary risks. If they're too slow, then the subs will become obsolete quicker. There's definitely some perfect balance to all these concerns and that rate I'm confident well below 10 per year. Maybe 10 hulls for the type over several blocks.

 

[Broccoli]

Have they actually increased training of the crews to justify claims about 10-20 submarines build each year? Not including those diesel boats being build what also needs crew or are people assuming PLAN dumbs diesel boats?

 

[AndrewS]

Have they actually increased training of the crews to justify claims about 10-20 submarines build each year? Not including those diesel boats being build what also needs crew or are people assuming PLAN dumbs diesel boats?

Their aren't and won't be 10-20 new submarines per year. But that could be the potential capacity of the build halls