Exactly. In wartime, if any vessel was even suspected of damaging SOSUS lines on purpose, they would be destroyed without further ado. No investigation, no arrests, missile inbound.
Chinese cruise and anti-ship missiles
- Thread starter crobato
- Start date
Exactly. In wartime, if any vessel was even suspected of damaging SOSUS lines on purpose, they would be destroyed without further ado. No investigation, no arrests, missile inbound.
Engineer
Major
No, you are missing the point. Iraq doesn't matter, since comparison of China to Iraq is invalid.
Considering the fact that modern tanks have equipments to detect enemy's laser signal, when a similar equipment is used in the role of air defense, a B-2 going active with laser designator will be in a very dangerous situation. Even ignoring such equipment, the constrains from laser guided munitions such as visibility will severe limit when and where the aircraft can go.
To use laser guided munitions would require the B-2 to come to visual range of the target. Outside the range of anti-aircraft defenses means GPS guided munitions will be unusable due to jamming.
Nope. It is a fleet, thus require coordination no matter how simple the coordination is. It also requires secure communication with friendlies. This isn't a strategy game where you click a button to build a unit, then click again to send it on its way.
You are not reading. Military crew are not trained to operate fishing trawlers that have specialized equipments built for the purpose of trawling. Nor do such a crew have experience on ship handling when trawling gears are deployed.
First, in a war, China will not only sink these fishing trawlers but respond by striking other military targets of these nations. Second, any civilian assets that follow military's order and participating in military actions are military assets and not innocent. Third, Japan, South Korea, and other nearby nations will already have accepted the risk of angering China and receiving a face full of missiles when they volunteer to aid the US during a war. Your scenario where they can freely and openly attack China's assets without receiving retaliation will not happen.
False. Actions such as cutting another nation's undersea cable will be a violation of International Law.
Waving your hands in the air and say "shallow" means nothing, nor saying "seabed conditions", nor claiming "limitations of technology".
Modern cables can be buried at depth of 1500m, under 1.5m of earth, and can be pursued as long as the sea floor is flat enough for the undersea plow. Technologies for cable burial is always ahead of technologies of bottom trawling, because owners of cables have to ensure their investment will be protected even when fishermen run out of fish in shallower regions ten years later and move to deeper regions.
You are underestimating what damage trawling activities can cause to cables. Spinning what I have said to "to the sea bed" does not automatically means undersea cable is fragile and that a hydrophone network is a house of cards.
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Engineer
Major
No. Has the US actually rectified anything?
cloyce
Junior Member
Maggern
Junior Member
No. But UNCLOS has been ratified by so many countries (almost all, AFAIK) that it is considered as codification of international custom and thus legal to all countries irregardless if they have ratified it or not. The US would thus be bound by most of the provisions of the treaty if it was sued before the International Court of Justice.
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not ratifying it is a tactic of not be legally bound to it but using the spirit against others when it suits their interests... if any case goes against the US it will just say "i'm not subject to it" .. even if the world is defacto adhere to the UNCLOS the US has the power of influence to force its own interests by might makes right and no one will make too much of an issue based on moral ... pretty much use and write the rules of the "game" where it suits your interests but leave legal loopholes to have it not apply to your disadvantage and if that still doesn't work it devolves into "law of the jungle"
Maggern
Junior Member
I think you underestimate and misunderstand the concepts of international law. The US has no influence in ICJ matters, unless one of the 14 judges are from the US at that time. The Court judges solely on judicial grounds, outside power relationships etc. The fact of the matter is that UNCLOS was an attempt to codify what was already considered international custom, and after its drafting enough countries has signed and ratified it to bolster this position. International custom binds all nations of the world, and simply refusing to ratify a treaty doesn't mean you are elevated above custom. Custom is custom, it's the way the world has agreed all countries should behave. The ICJ can thus judge against the US in such a case.
Now, where you are right is that if the ICJ judges against the US, the trail stops there. There is no implementary power (aside from the Security Council, but....yeah)
PS: If a country presents reservations to a treaty or any part of international law, it also abandons its right to protest breaches of these by other countries. This is also codified by treaties the US has signed and ratified.
Engineer
Major
Actually, to be fair, if we were discussing Iran's equivalent of SOSUS, then your example is perfectly valid. However, we are discussing China here, so I will give my last attempt to explain why your example is invalid.
The issue here is not whether there are or lack of similarities. Are there nodes in SOSUS just like Iraq's fiber optics network? Quite possibly yes. But you can also say that about all communication networks. The issue is how you are using these similarities in an attempt to generalize things. You are making the generalization that China's system will be easy to destroy because Iraq's system was easy to destroy, but you totally ignore the differences between China and Iraq; whereas US enjoyed air-superiority over Iraq, US will be denied air-superiority over China. Thus, whether two networks have similar structure doesn't matter, because you cannot wipe out a network when you cannot get pass the defenses. This, is the reason why I say your Iraq example is irrelevant.
Hopefully that will clear things up for you, although I won't hold my breath over it.
Pointblank
Senior Member
It is valid on a technical level due to the nature of networks.
1. Not all areas can be heavily defended, as no nation has the ability to heavily protect all of their assets across a large area. There will be gaps, and those gaps will be exploited.
2. GPS guided munitions are not rendered useless due to jamming of the GPS signal. GPS guided munitions are primarily INS guided, with GPS used to fine tune the targeting. In such cases, the CEP usually increases, but such increases are still within acceptable limits.
All that is required is to give trawler crews areas they are to trawl, and let the individual captains of the trawlers to make their decision as to how they wish to proceed.
Under international law, you cannot deliberately target civilians with lethal force. In war, you must do your utmost best to preserve civilian life, and if any civilian is caught in acts of sabotage, they must be charged criminally, or let go.
No it isn't; its a civil court issue. In short, you can only sue the person who might have cut the cable, and only to recover the cost of repairs.
Trawling activity is capable of moving 25 tonne boulders with ease and slice into the ground 20cm on each pass, with most trawlers making multiple passes in the same area.
In the East Asia Sea, on average, there are 20-30 instances of submarine cables being cut by civilian activities each year, usually through trawling. A higher concentration of cables means the more likelihood of cables being damaged.
I will also add that trawling activity has also damaged underwater oil pipes, which are more durable than underwater cables.