Transcripts For CSPAN2 U.S.-China Economic Security Review Commission 20240713

Contracted report for the commission on chinas expeditionary capabilities. Were really looking forward to that. At james, he specializes in emerging technologies, threat assessment, forecasting and data science. Much of his work analyzes chinas Armed Forces Modernization and u. S. Longrange strategic planning. Before joining james he was an extra Research Assistant for Yale University department of medical science where he did research on chinas naval modernization. Mr. Peltier has a master of arts in International Science from university of chicago. Good political real school. We will next year from kevin mccauley. Hes an independent analyst and was formally the scene Intelligence Officer for the soviet union, russia, china and taiwan during his 31 years in the u. S. Government. Hes senior china analyst for the armys National Ground Intelligence Center and he served on Advisory Board and working groups supporting the intelligence community, the National Intelligence council and the u. S. Indopacific command. His publications include pla system of systems operations, enabling joint operations. I dont know if you can call it Deputy Assistant secretary testimony, but hes a big systems guy. And he authored a chapter in a Forthcoming Army War College book on the pls efforts to cultivate joint operations. He will address how to pla is resolved is logistic system to advance its expeditionary capabilities as well as the systems limitations. Third panelist is doctor isaac kardon who is assistant professor in strategic and Operational Research at the u. S. Navy war college. Dr. Kardon is a member of the Navy War Colleges China Maritime Studies Institute where he studies and writes on chinas overseas port development, maritime disputes, and indopacific security and commerce. He was formally a Research Analyst at the National Defense University Center for study of Chinese Military affairs. Hes got a doctor and government from cornell. I appreciate very much your written testimony. We look forward to your oral testimony. Try and hold it to seven minutes. Minutes. Youll see the light change as we go along if anybody stays awake. Mr. Peltier, we will start with you. Thank you all for the opportunity to testify today. Ive been asked to focus my testimony on the nuts and bolts of chinas expeditionary capabilities. The Pla Air Force is going rapid modernization to address the shortfalls in the expeditionary capabilities which include both offense and power projection logistics platforms. I want to start my testimony by focusing on air naval cable bills, logistics and replenishment assets. That are too often neglected in discussions of chinas military modernization. The pla and has limited replenishment assets before 2013. Fact they had only five total auxiliary ships between the type 905, 908 and 903 classes. The type cmv 905 ships were fit commission in 1979 while the loan nine 08 is repurposed ukraine cargo tanker that was reportedly had much of its large cargo tanks converted into dry storage and staterooms in the time since. In fact, during the first four years of chinas gulf of aden Counter Piracy missions, it located only three ships during that timeframe for replenishment which the pla daily referred to as the era of the supply ship troika. Since then however, the United States is introduced seven ships that are part of the modified tighten class which has formed the backbone of these gulf of aden task force missions. These features have Quality Improvements including better helicopter facilities and increased cargo space but their primary and proven in terms of chinas expedition capability has really been in their number with seven introduced into Service Since 2013. Potentially more important moving forward is the introduction of the type 901 replenishment ship class which so far two have been introduced into service and they appear to be specifically designed for use with the p. L. A. N. Aircraft carrier groups. The class is much larger with roughly twice the displacement and the max speed of close to 25 knots which enables it to keep space with the Aircraft Carrier groups. It appears to be fairly similar to the u. S. Navy supply class ships. Over they peered to be more focused on replenishment of fuel and provision because only have one dry cargo delivery station compared to the supply classes 3 . This is important because the dry cargo delivery stations assist with the under waiver coordinates. In terms of offense of power capabilities, the introduction of the type 75 landing helicopter dock in combination with eight to ten type 71 amphibious transport could allow for an effective the u. S. Marine expeditionary units as has been previously argued before this committee. And in eu style contingent of a type 75, type 71 and the type 72 could contain up to 35 helicopters, 50 type five amphibious vehicles, as well as over 2000 marines and sailors. This would allow the United States marine corps to conduct land operations including human trait assistance and Disaster Relief operations as was limited counterinsurgency operations without the need for forward groundbased stationing of weapons and supplies. However, i should note that due to the limited Still Limited number of replenishment assets and forward basis that sustain conduct of combat air operation be limited for the near in mediumterm. I also like to note that the p. L. A. N. Will likely start to experiment and introduce unmet assets into its expeditionary capabilities. I would like to suggest an equivalent to an experiment right now with the u. S. Marine corps were fighting laboratory with an autonomous Beach Landing capability should be expected. Rather than as external refueling pod. The tech 938 can support 2 to 3 ships for approximately two weeks before needing replenishment of their own and in general the pln has used five models of replenishment to send its overseas operations. The baseline is the inclusion of a replenishment ship on its overseas operations but they also use frequently civilian ports for replenishment or technical visits during its task force missions. In fact a kernel with the Naval Academy of military research noted that in the mediterranean region, the cost had a lot of supply points which can be used for naval warships. Third in november 2019, the ministry of National Defense reported the successful test of replenishment from a civilian container ship. And interestingly, the hoosiers last port call before the test was in dar salaam in tanzania inaddition to locations in singapore and china. It is likely the pla and will deploy replenishment of civilian ships, particularly over the next 10 years and with costco ships for low intensity operations in the future. For the pla and can use alreadydeployed military assets in what they call a replenishment relay model. Or a mobile supply point. They tested on route to the joint exercise in russia. As mentioned, the p. L. A. N. Is currently capable of supporting two meu style packets assuming they are limited to operations during the time period until 2025 james expects that these forces will continue to resemble goal of aden task force packages which have been stable in their duration and composition and an example is the 34th deployment which left in late december 2019 which included a type 52d destroyer and a replenishment ship, two helicopters, dozens of special operations personnel and 692 troops, more than is necessary for a goal of aden antipiracy mission. Id like to suggest that the p. L. A. Will introduce is new helicopter and its type lv destroyers into its overseas mission so they can gain operational experience in the use of those assets and this package would give china the kind of Rapid Reaction capability necessary to respond to contingencies at its overseas investments, particularly its bells Road Initiative sites and i would project that in the near future this is going to be a concern to respond to terrorist incidents or terrorist threats. I have just a few conclusions to wrap up with. The p. L. A. Is still in its Early Development and will struggle to sustain operations overseas until approximately the late 2022 2030. Chinas motivation and developing expeditionary capabilities is to protect their overseas economic investments at least in the short term particularly through the bells Road Initiative and the rapid expansion and the number of p. L. A. Replenishment ships andincreasing their ability to transport cargo and increase in helicopters available to either the p. L. A. Marine corps or the prepositioning of ordinance overseas , i view these as potential liminal moments in chineseexhibition and their capabilities. Thank you. Thank you. Miss malloy. We were having trouble with your mic in the last session. Is read right now that means its working. Id like to thank you for inviting me here. Ill provide some key points on Logistic Support x expeditionary operations. The p. L. A. Logistics capabilities are critical to explaining overseas nonwar and Wartime Missions. While the p. L. A. s current military logistics capabilities is inadequate to support increased operations globally, research by p. L. A. Theorists over the past decade has examined the methods to improve the logistics capabilities. China views strategic delivery as a critical logistics component to support expeditionary operations as well as an important means of deterrence and gaining influence regionally. The 2017 National Defense transportation law strengthens construction and development of National Defense integration as well as promoting Civil Military transportation integration and transportation law provides the basis for mobilizing civilian Transportation Resources to support both peacetime and wartime military missions. Although some p. L. A. Sources suggest that this all needs to be revised and improved. Several military integration is an important component supporting p. L. A. Modernization and improving military capabilities. This integration allows the p. L. A. To Leverage Research and capabilities to support the military. The joint Logistics Support force is an Important Role in Civil Military integration in the logistics area. And both the joint was support force and Service Logistics willplay a role in supporting overseas operations. Current Logistics Support for a nonwar overseas missions is mostly adequate, the establishment of logistics for a supply base eases logistics and maintenance or the antipiracy Escort Mission and other missions such as peacekeeping, although escort ships will continue to seek support from riley ports in the region. And the current p. L. A. Logistics has problems supporting the relatively small peacekeeping force and in particular the Infantry Battalion south sudan which indicates supporting a larger force under, conditions would stress the logistics system, especially currently. P. L. A. Legislations are examining requirement for a network of overseas logistics faces ports and airbases. Importantly. Pla strategists advocate the establishment of airbases to support the delivery of courses equipment and material. An air traffic transport is considered the most rapid method how moving supplies and forces. In addition to establishing or a support network of overseas and airbases, pla sources identified other means for supporting operations and these methods include instructing artificial islands and over floating basis area chinese concepts of floating basis resemblesthe us military mobile offshore based concept. The pla assesses the advantages of these methods would include and avoiding posts nation response. Pla recognizes repositioning of material and equipment as an important means to rapidly introduce forces into the region and p. L. A. Theorists have examined us military preposition for lessons learned. Up repositioning use military or civilian ships in addition to floating basis or artificial islands or baseson land. And the p. L. A. Recognizes repositioning as an important component in future naval logistics. The pla navy currently has six and strategic delivery capabilities are a plate of comprehensive ships and takers as we heard over a relatively few while the newer more capable Amphibious Assault ships for transportation argue albeit growing. Therefore strategic delivery capabilities are currently limited as well. As we heard july 20 transport is being fielded. But a large numbers of these civic transports or other heavy transports me strategic deliveryrequirements. The pla will mobilize large and medium civilian ship enterprises to support overseas missions. Some pla sources most suggest mobilizing 100 civilian ships to support an emergency operation. In 2012, civilian ship and companies are forming a strategic delivery support we to include support at the la offshore and opens the opposite and the defense of operations. The p. L. A. Assesses the training of the civilian reserve fleet as inadequate, skills required for wartime support missions are particularly lacking. Civilian ships to train with the pla active force normally in relatively small numbers. And despite the transportation law, many civilian ships require modification or augmenting the navy. As with the pla Navy Air Force can mobilize civilian aircraft and establishing a strategic delivery support force or civilian aviation 2013. Currently there are 15 civilians support cleats based on Major Airlines to lead increasing requirement for overseas nonwar and Wartime Missions area and while the civil air has many cargo aircraft, only approximately 143 large and medium cargo planes are assessed as meeting p. L. A. Standards and many ofthese are rolling transports. The other overseas Logistics Support and strategic delivery capabilities are currently limited and air and Maritime Transport will need considerable expansion in the futureexpeditionary operational requirements. Although the pla acknowledges his current logistics and strategic delivery Capabilities Even if civil augmentation are inadequate , modernization and Planning Efforts appear likely to improve the p. L. A. Capabilities to support future nonwar and wartime expeditionary missions. And while noncore missions provide the us an opportunity to work cooperatively with china and the p. L. A. , however as they expanded capabilities to support Wartime Missions globally, the us and allied forces operating overseaswill only increase. The mobilization and and employment of civilian assets could make an indication and targeting of transportation assets conducting military missions difficult and overseas pla basis, civilian ships, aircraft and enterprises are expected to provide intelligence and other data to the p. L. A. The us a will need to carefully consider cooperation and Critical Technology transfer that can contribute to the p. L. A. Religion logistics capabilities and this consideration that include sales, cooperation and Technology Transfer to chinese shipping and airline Enterprises Area that concludes my testimony. Thank you very much,doctor cardin. Thank you again to the commissioner for having me back. Ive been asked to speak on a number of topics. First where and how china is securing bases anotherAccess Points. The notable exception of chinas sole military base including the limited c and airlift platforms discussed now by michael pinellas, is the plas only method of predicting military power. Lacking a network of overseas bases in the short to mediumterm, they would much rather rely on Access Points in order to operate on the island chain as the navy is the service rent its mission fall, the testimony focuseson those port facilities. The navy like other navy on commercial ports to support its operations. The distinctive aspect of their efforts to support the growing overseas presence is accessed through large and growing number of ports, partially owned and operated by prc. Since every 2020 prc term operate terminal at 94 points across the globe. The far larger number of ports, transport the works installed equipment or dredged harbor. It contracted project do not leave the firm in control of the operations of the port and are thus excluded from analysis of how chinese commercial facilities they support military operations. The organizational and geographic patterns of this ownership are presented in appendix a along with my written testimony. Geographically beware of perspective Access Points can basically be read off the map which is submitted as appendix b. A large number of port around the atlantic with 32 wide dispersal geographically on either side of that ocean in the north means the greatest concentration is in fact in the indian ocean and into the eastern mediterranean. Those are feeling that the from hormuz, six from suez among others approximate two maritime chokepoints. How securing control over the operations of utilizing it is more complex. And the sessions and investments the chinese for all that these points are commercial. Potential or close coordination between the firms the pla is considerable demonstrable but the conditions under which it can occur not unlimited. Chinas lack of alliances needs to understanding legal commitments for military use. In peacetime this may not be so problematic in the event of a conflict of permissions will not be granted they drastically limit the p. L. A. Ability to secure supplies beyond its borders area estate owned enterprise versus private distinction doesnt tell us about the degree to which the firm will coordinate with the military of the state. Corporate ownership is the degree to which the firm itself control the operations of the court. Capacity to supply naval best vessels, concessions from the local Port Authority and the nature and scope of chinas broader diplomatic relationships of the host country. Sole ownership of the port operators is a condition at best of her and guarantees logistical support. In general terminal operator will have significant discretion in granting access for naval vessels, storage, bunkering as you well as use of drydock and other facilities. These arrangements are more feasible in friendly countries in which low transparency is the norm in contracting and in their governments more generally. On the question of military civil fusion and it importance to p. L. A. Protection force capabilities, note that central policy and law on military civil fusion aims to provide a more substantial role to the military and defining the conditions under which assets are deployed. This is a component of a far more intensive push to insert Party Control over aspects of society and administration that current leadership as deemed responsive to central authority. Regulation and reforms in my written testimony pray a mechanism for the requisition of civilian assets. With promises of reimbursement and reward for compliance as well as punishment for noncompliance. In a distinct call for more integrated systems in which civilian transport infrastructure are built and maintained so that they can you be utilized for the armed forces while theres no clear evidence of this practice, to have been developed under commercial contracts, there are plausible ways that some facilities can be operated or maintained so as to facilitate their access. To summarize here by noting that the discussion among pla logistics analyst is largely along the lines of what should be done to domestic facilities and is yet to be done adequately. Challenges of refueling, receiving power of munitions or meeting other needs at four imports are substantially greater abroad and they are in the mainland. Pla prefers to operate its own facilities. But becausea Robust Network of such facilities is not in the offing in the short immediate term, leveraging overseas capacity is the best option facing chinas logistics letter. On the question of what china regarded as the most important criteria for selecting future bases and Access Points for the p. L. A. The most significant criteria raised by military and civilian analysts are geographic proximity to proceed security threats. Places in friendly stable countries, places with suitable natural conditions to port and places capable of adequate force protection and an additional more recent factor distinctive to p. L. A. Is this advantage offered by the presence of Chinese Enterprises on or near port sites. The geostrategic considerations are typically the paramount ones for analysts, they focus on chinas vulnerable lifeline to the South China Sea across the indian ocean through hormuz. To the goal or through the suez and on to the mediterranean and i propose what they call strategic strong point trekking across the region that supply intervals are short, not to make one or more points redundant in a crisis. Some analysts argue that military access should adhere more closely to economic departments focused on Foreign Policy. Keynotes should straddle those places where the flow of goods and resources are concentrated. As put straight before the flag and suggesting locations suitable for military support should be determined by force order considerations pursuing chinas commercial interests. What we might call you economic and strategic motivations different demands on priorities and resources but they are not mutually exclusive area that they dictate many of the same considerations for locating Access Points. The key to establishing criteria concerns which ports have ownership and physical characteristics necessary for meaningful use and personally which countries have relationshipswith china can support such militarization. In response to questions on chinas use of military diplomacy and a variety of other engagements, comment on a narrow subset of this broad range of pla activities. P. L. A. Vessels have visited27 of the 94 ports under operation or ownership. Perhaps more notable at 56 of the 94 ports overseas, the pla again at a different port in that same country. And in 17 of those, there was a prc term with a majority share in a terminal operation read this implies a diplomatic rather than operational factors are determinative rid of china either the first of the host countrys preferences, seek to downplay the military implications of his commercial enterprise or both. Its also clear many of these facilities are unsuitedfor military use or otherwise unable to host multiple vessels. These are firm level factors that are directed by the pla. As such the data did not establish a land between pla visits and the establishment ofbases and Access Points. Note that in other forms of military cooperation which include training exercises, leadership visits, arms sales, silicate greater institutional connection between the pla and Foreign Military. A showcase print capabilities, professionalism which is of course a valuable impression to lead with Foreign Military who may consider affording greater access to more powerful pla that may benefit the National Security. Ill close with a couple implications and recommendations. First an implication that over the long term p. L. A. Planners will require a network of overseas bases short to medium term, based on what model isascendant. The model provides logistics capability and intelligence value with limited capability. Second, probably a quick reports make it provide functions not only for the logistics but Intelligence Communications that do not require the establishment of formal pla facilities. As you recommendations that note there is no viable method yet identified for preventing chinese firms commercial entry, i think the us failure to roll back the concession by Shanghai International courtroom at the israeli port to be a cautionary tale. Security partner like israel is not persuaded that the Security Risks are unavailable it is unlikely other states will forgo chinas involvement area is more useful than insisting that other states reviews chinese largess would empower them to exploit it. Firms and agencies could provide consultation with governments and businesses, engaging with prc projects providing legal, managerial advice on how best to retain control over important operational elements of their infrastructure. And finally, given the number and geographic distribution of ports under prc for operational ownership, the original Combatant Commander should be cast to specify which ports are essential to the United States joint forces carrying out their assigned missions. I appreciate that very much. I was interested in the comments on operations enabling capabilities and also on the whole idea of reach and on Time Logistics and specifically i am interested in whether you have seen ground based facilities or discussions of how space enables command and control, how space would enable on Time Logistics and how dependent they would be on space as they get out and away from their near space. In other words, i dontthink theyre going to do this on hf, if theyre on a ship or aircraft, theyre probably not. If they are on a ports or a strong point, they might be able to use cyber which is important in itself as an enabling capability. And then finally, have you seen anything in discussions in pla literature or training that involves preplanned timebased forced deployment. Those are very necessary because they are Amphibious Operations or force projections. Any of you in any order that we might as well start in the order that you are. Ill start off by saying that i think that pla investments in all sorts of what we would turn emerging technologies including space and cyber capabilities, particularly for commandandcontrol, their investment is pretty massive and i think its only goingto continue to grow. I think that a lot of pla and associated academics believe that these kind of capabilities and their investments will allow the pla to kind of leapfrog or to evolve more quickly interms of their overall military and expeditionary capabilities. So i think thats what i would start off with but i would say that besides the cure capabilities themselves, i think we have to knowledge that in terms of both doctrine and actual experience, with commandandcontrol, with base assets, pla is limited at this point. So thatsgoing to be a determining factor. Even after thecapabilities themselves are developed. I havent seen specifically information on using spacebased assets in support of logistics. Although i often with logistics does rely on the Communication System for their logistics on communications and communicating with units and also they use the motto to when theyre trying to provide just in Time Logistics unit to understand where that unit is so that the transporting unit can provide logistics to the supported units. They do use spacebased systems and in particular either to support Logistics Support and i would think as they moved overseas, they would have to rely to a much greater extent on spacebased communications systems. And like i said, they seem to have quite a bit of experience working internally and trying to use those systems. Thank you and i return to you mister cardin, you specifically use some very good personal imagery. In addition to anything you might want to answer, have you seen ground based equipment . Looking at opensource images, i havent identified anything at any of the commercial port sites read i guess its worth noting that the single pla space station down in argentina, and i suspect being for a proliferation offacilities like those rather than nesting in into commercial facilities is more likely. I think the commercial operators rely on normal commercial communications and whateversatellites are available. There are forces that claim this is a very significant peacetime capability and has liabilities in a wartime context. Thank you. Commissionercleveland. Thank you all for appearing. And adding to our understanding. I have 3 very separate questions for each of you. Mister peltier, you mentioned in your Opening Statement and im not sure i got it quite right like you to elaborate role of unmanned assets and exhibition area forces and likened it to marine land which, thats not important but im interested in your understanding of the role of unmanned assets and autonomous capability when it comes to Expeditionary Forces. How do you see that the evolving . Mister mcauley, on page 31 of your statement you identified multiple areas for improvement, that the p. L. A. Has identified including referencing why go. Im curious what role you see the civilian sector, the private sector playing in addressing the specific areas of military capability i am interested in that double military solution in terms of specific examples of the role that the civilian side would play and mister cardin, i share commissioner russells view of your extraordinarily good imagery. Blair said this morning that he talked to you and burma and pakistan were sort of the two focal points for chinese control of the region and he saw the region if i understood him correctly as really the focus of chinese interest and if we can maintain our position in that region, we will have to worry less in terms of global competition. Nobody so far has mentioned chinese activities in cambodia. You mentioned that doctor cardin in your testimony. Im very interested in the chinese i think colonization is a fair statement of cambodia and in particular the port and airfield that they have underway and im interested in your assessment of where are they in that process and how it fits into admiral blairs assessment that burma and pakistan are the valued military assets as opposed to the role that cambodia might play and we can talk in the nexthour about those three questions but please, mister peltier. Sure. On the issue ofunmanned assets and expeditionary operations i would say that in part , that is to some degree speculation on my part but it is informed by some of the writings that ive seen on the, that come from p. L. A. Academic journals on military transportation and some of these academics have discussed the importance of unmanned and autonomous assets at point of delivery overseas though they wish to automate at the very end of our supply chain and in terms of fielding overseas forces, to automate that final step so thats one rainy critical parts that i think they are looking into. I think that more broadly we should view their pursuit of Unmanned Systems as a natural extension of their overall interest in Autonomous Systems more generally. So theres interest and development of Artificial Intelligence and autonomous and Unmanned Systems. I think its pretty allencompassing so we should expect that there expeditionary capabilities as well. This is much more my colleagues area of expertise but we can see doctrine for then we see the introduction of whatever the capability is when you say expected, have we seen the deployment of drones and unmanned assets in the context of power projection . As far as ive seen at least i have not noticed any actual deployments of these unmanned assets in terms of the autonomous logistics systems. However, they have experimented with open called the marine lizard which is an unmanned assault vehicle which is fairly similar to the type v. Amphibious vehicle i think that the fact that that has been tested should be somewhat revelatory. On the issue of ub, the Pla Air Force has been experimenting with using the uavs to supply units in remote areas and so i think thats very applicable to forces overseas, especially if there want to be supplied from a ship to shore or units in a remote or difficultareas. On the issue of Civil Military integration and the civilian sector, a lot of the emerging technologies and even some of the older technologies that are new technologies that the pla are being integrated to provide not only Precision Logistics with their working for but now the pla is talking about Intelligent Logistics there trying to incorporate Intelligence Technology into the logistics system you and their units and some of the joint Logistic Support centers apparently are already developing intelligent Monitoring Systems within their theater. So that they cannot only monitor what they have on supply, they can monitor the delivery and also monitor unit requirements, what what supplies do they need, what supplies are they using, what casualties do they have so that they can provide medical support and that sort of thing. So are really getting into a lot of different types of systems and different areas that will enable increase precision Logistics Support and increasingly what theyre talking about as intelligent Logistics Support. Theyre looking into, i need robotics and automation for not only production but warehousing and transportation, rapid loading and self loathing. Unloading equipment with technologies , containerization. All many of these are things that are developed with civilian businesses and enterprises that theyre being incorporated into the pla to make their logistics capabilities much improved so i think there is a lot of, that the pla is gaining Civil Military integration and incorporating civilian technologies and practices into the military for increased capabilities. You. On the question of burma and pakistan and reports that admiral blair noted appear, actually the focus of and full of case studies we been doing up in newport and have fought quite a lot about the port facilities as well as the broader commercial projects that theyre connected to, i think admiral blair also pointed out just alien feature of them which is that these are countries that are contiguous to china and the idea is that you would have some type of uninterrupted rail pipeline, maybe fiberoptic connections to china so there are reasons why thats tremendously attractive and i think its feeds into an interest among Chinese Defense planners and a model that i think differs quite remarkably on the way the United States cannot oversee spacing in the way that these are interior lines read this is our external lines talk up in the middle of the ocean but theres a sort of robustorganic connection. That said, i dont think either of those two particular ports are necessarily unique or irreplaceable and i do think that the strength of this wrong point idea as evidence in the many different suggestions that come out from chinese authors on where might be suitable, which countries, which places in that they are designed to function in a networked way and to be redundant in some ways so i think if for example sensitivity is about india make china hesitant to overtly militarys, whether indias potential reaction or pakistans reluctance to do any number of other factors, there are other alternatives and each individual point, strong point doesnt need to have the full family of military capabilities. I think the idea from a logistic planning standpoint is you can do refueling somewhere, you got a good drydock somewhere else. You can figure out how to reposition the munition somewhere else and if youre able to integrate that, that they it and would require quite a lot of sophisticated landing, that you can do it. So placing cambodia into that equation, i think its a little bit of apples and oranges iq cambodia is off this main slot and the maritime lifeline moving through South China Sea to other cities, sign thailand is not so different distance but at the same time the establishment of pretty significant facilities make that area probably not as i have priority and i would tend to think about the development of i guess theres a evidently a lease of about 20 percent of the cambodian coastline along military life runways and active discussions about building two separate deepwater port projects which i note in that case as well as in burma, there is no operational port there. There had been announcements about it for years and years, is there some of the complexities of operating countries that are unstable and prone to bad governance and and there are reasons why china is the only better on these projects but i would tend to think that area and the gulf of thailand as being much more focused on that region and chinas ability to project power into Southeast Asia and to shape its relationships with those state as opposed part of the broader Logistical Network i think they are sort of within striking distance of those problem reports and of high nine basis such as thats seems like its not part of this model frankly. Thank you. Im going to send regrets but he left a related question to chairman clevelands. He was also very interested in the mention of unmanned assets. And specifically he wanted to know whether these were sort of longrange Unmanned Aerial Vehicles like we operate on a base like langley or the shorter range things operate off chips, whether it be uavs. So he wanted that in the record. Ill know from the beginning that much of my research so far as focus on unmanned surface vessels that china is developing. They tested several of them. Some of them are more focused on kind of autonomous river patrol and Coastal Patrol and the sorts of things theymaybe armed assets but they are not necessarily what i would call eight for expeditionary capabilities. I would imagine that something of an easy win in terms of chinese unmanned Capability Development is to take existing man assets and to replace the internals to convert them into unmanned capabilities as with the marine so my sense is that in the short to mediumterm over the next five years,thats the kind of thing we might expect. I will note that janes more broadly as heard reports of operators of chinese created uavs, particularly their male uavs and have heard what i would describe as kind of poor reports of their capabilities. In fact, some of the countries i operate them in the middle east and africa are reportedly trying to find other users or their capabilities. So i think there are some degree about some kind of concern about the quality i guess of the existing chinese produced capabilities. These were created specifically for export no so we would expect that p. L. A. Capabilities are of ahigher quality. I need a little bit of education here. I want to assume for the moment we are talking about 2000 chinese marines. So to reach and they can supply them for 2 weeks but then they have a problem. How many containers of replenished supplies are necessary for 2000 marines to continue to operate . Physically, on the container side. Anybody got a yes . This gets you, where im going with this is repositioning replenishment supplies in anticipation of operations in a commercial port that has sufficient warehousing and or cold storage capacity, in africa and or say southamerica. But that could deal with the unpredictability of the operation lasting more than two weeks. And we testified that for chinese intended to have 100 commercial ships, prepared to support them, right . I need to know physically if, are those discernible when they are at sea . In other words, can i tell from the satellite that commercial ship is one that can replenish Chinese Military . Anybody know that . So in other words, facing three ships to eastern africa, that were capable of that, then maybe i think something is going to happen . Thats the problem with using these civilian ships. Youre not really sure what condition his of these civilian ships, especially since they seem to want to go towards using containerization because they believe its the way of more rapidly road loading and unloading equipment and inputting their talking about using containers for transport Armored Vehicles and heavy equipment. But im not sure how you could tell a civilian ship as being used to support or to transport military supplies as opposed to shoes and umbrellas. Thats why i was asking a question on the number of containers because the containers are sitting around and in piles in every port in the world. Largely from china. And so whats in them becomes important. Getting them there, he commercial ship, my understanding of the commercial ship is that if its going to replenish a pla navy ship, and therefore requires some unloading capacity that is different from a commercial ship. Thatswhy i was asking the question about recognition from a satellite. So can i tell, i mean, we better start tracking these hundred ships if in fact theyre trackable. I suspect that the sort of thing its difficult to tell from satellite imagery i would call you to at least one point in my testimony and also my china maritime report that my colleague wrote about civil transport for the military power projection and its up on our website. Where you can actually see the sort of enthusiastic reporting about the various things that cosco and china merchants in particular have done in exercises in the mainland. And in building or retrofitting vessels, for example a china merchants sports railroad chip that meets military specifications so with cargo like that, its probably either easier to identify tanks or other heavy equipment if its a containerized, i think thats sort of part of the beauty of the containerization system. They are all identical boxes and theres nothingpreventing repositioning of containerized materials. I guess im going to add to that is that not everything the military is going to need to sustain an operation over the longterm and unless and until you really have a full ace with all the things they need. I think that was admiral blair area is point specifically was hes not concerned about ports for real long term highintensityconflict. What my question was built around is sort of not necessarily reacting to a crisis of 18 Chinese Oil Workers or captured by somebody, but a Foreign Policy objective that involves military force in a friendly state or client state and having the ability to before they had the longterm ability for highintensity conflict to. And youre describing to me with ports and civilian ships, the desire to create a capacity. And so im a little more curious about what that capacity in fact has to be. In order to keep people 2000 marines. And they didnt create 30 or 40,000 marines today. Because they have no intention of using them. Right . I mean, they are only using them in the site china sea area for their near sea. So they have to come up with it seems to me and why im interested in all the civilian stuff is they have to come up with an interim solution to real expeditionarycapability. In part i think to address your question, the pla does have norms for what they expect expenditures for different units to be and in combat, unfortunately i dont know what those norms are what they are used for planning so based on those norms and what they might expect asfar as operations , i mean, they know and could reposition those amounts of supplies and the you yes, they could probably supply them to enterprises to maintain and warehouses for that sort of thing. To use as repositioning for operations. But again, it also depends on the intensity of the writing. What those requirements are for supplies and ammunition and medical support and that sort of thing but the pla knows what that is so planners can hopefully if theyre playing right anticipate what those operations are and then reposition those supplies or do whatever planning they need to put them in friendly countries or whatever so that they could provide support to those units. If they got into combat. Thank you. Vice chairman bartholomew. Thanks very much and thank you to our witnesses. I have two questions. One of which might be not fair to ask you guys but thats the second one but the first one is theirs and want to talk about limited capability and i wonder, limited compared to what . As far as i understand the chinese have basically the second largest ability in the world so what is the limitations . What are we talking aboutwhen we talk about limitations . Thats any of you and let me do you want the second question is, this is where its a little unfair , i ask you to come up here and talk about chinese capabilities but when we think about the wartime context we have to think about us capabilities to the center for orthopedic and budgetary assessments without report on valentines day expressing serious concern about the state of our ability to carry out sealift operations. We have a dramatically dwindling merchant marine core, ships, a limited number of ships that we could use. We have to turn to foreign owned ships, foreign crude ships, thats not exactly the best for us area and can you imagine thecircumstance in which the Chinese Government would ever put themselves in a position like that . I suppose ill start with your first question, what do we mean by limited capabilities . While its true that relative to the United States and the rest of the world chinese capabilities are rapidly expanding and getting closer to the United States, i think one of the major things is that when we look at overseas operations in particular, there are relatively limited number of and different types of operations that p. L. A. Has undertaken so much of the data we can use to make assessments is based on the goal of aden deployments, noncombatant operations and other kinds of humanitarian and Disaster Response missions so i think to some degree a lot of our projections about limited capabilities are based on those kinds of missions china has performed various levels in the past. And we just have limited data to go on in terms of getting their ability tosustain other kinds of operations. But besides that, i would also mention that just as i mentioned in my testimony, the fewer number of replenishment assets that the p. L. A. Currently has and the p. L. A. In particular limits their ability to sustain operations that have no experience with the force packages that would be necessary for any kind of, whether it be Amphibious Assault for instance and when i mentioned the possibility of a marineexpeditionary unit , kind of Amphibious Assault, theres severely limited particularly in their air assets. So in their helicopters in particular, even with the introduction of the landing helicopter. There are, it appears that the pla and marine corps are fighting for helicopter production with the rest of the armed forces. One of the reasons for this is because we have limited indications of their pursuing the vertical replenishment to ships that the us uses. If they had tested this style of replenishment at sea, that might be an indication that they had the helicopters necessary to conduct an amphibious operation so in that sense, it wanted to do some kind of Amphibious Assault, maybe on a night that was under siege, following the terrorist event or some other nonstate actor, we dont have a lot of evidence that they have the replenishment assets or the actual offense of assets necessary to conduct that operation for a long period of time. Anybody else mark. As far as the limitations, as far as logistics go, i think the focus has been most on mostly so far on developing a regional capability and especially joint capability or the theaters but again, ina sort of regional context. And they really are normally now looking at projecting forces and supplying forces over longer distances and that seems to be the real issue and i think thats why many of the logistics articles on porting rejection forces are focused on project delivery because thats i think one of the real weak links for the logistically is just getting stuff at a Long Distance because as weve heard, there are air force and naval capabilities are somewhat limited now. But even the civilian integration of civilian assets is to support these operations are even though they have a large airport, largecivilian air force and a large civilian shipping enterprises , many of the ships even though the laws say they are supposed to be to military specifications, they are not in any of the sources i look at our complaining that many of the ships, many of the aircraft are not suitable for supporting military operations and this is based on their construction. And for example, they have a large civilian cargo transport fleet. That a source from 2019 said that only 143 of them were capable of supporting military operations. The other limitation as far as civilian ships and aircraft go is the training of the cruise. Sort of ironically, several pla sources complain that the civilian enterprises were more interested in making money and supporting the military so they arent really spending time on having the cruise train to support the military and this is especially so to support combat type operations. They dont have the training that you would need to operate under, conditions. Also the civilian ships need to have military communications deployed to them. They have to have some military personnel deployed to them so Living Spaces have to be made available to support those military personnel and those things are being done. A number of the sources i look at complained that even though the new transportation mobilization walk was issued in 2017 theyre saying it needs to be revised. They didnt say specifically how but i think its the enforcement angle of it that the other civilian enterprises are simply not complying with the law and youre instructing their aircraft and ships to meet constructions or training their crews to support the military so this is a big limiting factor in the area oflogistics. I would reinforce the comments of my copanelists in various dimensions of those limitations and add at least anecdotally you can see in chinese reporting you can see the types of exercises they are trying to do to exploit that civilian capacity and the complaints that you have about standing legislation and regulation that allows them to do it and i think last year or the year before we had the first instance of having a costco live ammunition in the east see i believe. But i think watching these developments gives you a sense of certainly the ambition to use these civilian adjuncts also the long road towards doing it, i think thats thelatest assessment i said about which ships are suitable for these purposes. And just to put a stamp on the point about that that admiral blair made and im trying to deliver through looking at the commercial ports is that they are able to provide a lot of civilian style supplies that are of course necessary but when you start thinking about hiring combat operations and sustaining them, its not obvious that that model will be sufficient. Its not to say that its not possible in the long term that they would develop those facilities far out of area that allow us to sustain it but the strategic factor to add into this consideration about why theres a limitation is that one of the reasons why the United States operates so widely around the globe is because of the relatively security of our near broad and thats going to be a persistent vulnerability for china into longterm frankly so in terms of, theres going to be a question of scarcity of resources. Theres going to be a question of whether they want to have that type of engagement far away from china in this context and i think thats going to continuously be a drag on overseasexpeditionary operations. On your harder question, certainly i wouldnt weigh in on the us domestic politics of it but devon reminds me theres some 5100 chinese owned merchant vessels out there. In the case of china, thinking about the way a firm like casco or china merchants organized his Large Industrial conglomerates that have vertical integration across the whole transport sector and able to make lost leader decisions about certain lines of business that i think are challenging in the u. S. And i dont think that trying to conduct chinese style industrial policy here in washington is a winning bet but certainly should call our attention to the fact to that or lack of capacity in the event we needed to lean on Merchant Shipping and it is something the chinese are explicit about thinking of as a strategic and meaningful. Thank you very much. Senator goodwin. Thank you, gentlemen for your time today. I will follow my colleagues lead and asked an unfair question outside of your respect and i will dive into domestic politics in a bit. In my questions prompted is by your testimony, mr. Macauley, you talk about the need or necessity to pay special attention to the efforts of the chinese in entering into these Technology Transfers and business relationships with American Companies and companies around the world and the need for the u. S. To develop a strategy to educate and influence our allies about some of the consequences of these relationships. At the same time giving the Civil Military integration here at home so vs should strongly examine a certain sales, do technology, logistic sales in areas and you list several in the one that jumped out at me was the oral Pipeline Technology software, distribution and the like. That is interesting because it may seem to some less obvious than investment in hypersonic aircraft or ai or big data but certainly important and the reason it jumps out at me in my home state that Chinese State owned enterprise is announced and investment 80 milliondoll 80 milliondollar, where they plan to build Electricity Generating facilities and that is facility and huge underground storage hub with the stated goal of developing the infra structure and extracting Raw Materials and sending allout with expertise along the way back to china. Suffice it to say, the assumption has been that and has run into difficulties of anticipated difficulties attaining cfius today theres a piece of legislation pending in my state legislator that would establish an Investment Fund to allow the state owned enterprise to invest in the fund as opposed to direct investment with the stated objective of hopefully avoiding concerns and difficulties with cfius. My question is in addition to influence and education efforts abroad do we need to have influence in education efforts at home . To be fair, the pressure is on the other side. For governors, mayors, local economic elements officials they want to attract investment and create jobs and most, certainly in my home state, they turned down an announcement of 80 billiondollar investments. How do we educate about the risk involved with these sorts of investment . Yes, sir, i do agree with you. I think there is some education going on as far as military integration in china and the impact on purchases here with hawaii and whatnot and i think more needs to be done and i think, you know, influence abroad to counter the chinese belt and Road Initiative and some of the methods they are using which are driving this move to be able to operate overseas and it needs to be countered to limit the development of ports and Access Points but internally and needs to be done to that we have to realize these varying companies will mobilize reserve forces to support the military and im sure a lot of people really do not understand that, i think and i think there are hard questions that have to be made good obviously, we want to do business that with pros and cons need to be addressed whether boeing transports to china is better to support a u. S. Company making sales or do we want to risk supporting the poa strategic delivery ability which it would ironically many of those 143 aircraft poa identified as being able to support their operations were, in fact, different types of boeing cargo aircraft and people above my pay grade eight to look ahead and make a decision on the pros and cons. Anybody else . Weighing in on this, maybe take it out of the United States and think about what are the lessons your state is learning to this and what are the particular areas of Critical Infrastructure decided are vulnerable or should be easily opened to Foreign Investment and that may provide a useful template for other states where we have concerns about their security. One of the recommendations i make is i dont think theres a viable way to deny China Commercial access to most countries in the world that have not i gave the example of israel and you could easily think about the uk or juror germany with 5g technology in these, i think, are examples of the limits that china has put a stopper in and a more appropriate strategy has to do with exploiting it. There is a lot of Chinese Capital floating around and some of it very carefully, strategically developed and some of it not so much and i think the real payoff and maybe we can learn that by looking at ourselves in the game what are the things we really care about maybe that would help us think about other states is how do we structure these contracts and ways may be more sophisticated than just creating a fund to launder the money as it were in thinking about what are the areas of this infra structure that genuinely pose a Security Risk and what are the things we could do to mitigate it and i cant speak to Power Infrastructure but certainly from a port standpoint you can identify the ways that it can be utilized by the military and make sure that your local Port Authority has control over it. I believe admiral bear pointed out absence and very clear legal restrictions, it seems like it would be awfully easy for a host state to just say okay, we are taking over this warehouse because we have had reports of this that or the other thing and this is a downside of dealing with countries that have high levels of corruption or lack of transparency. I would point out that as you will see in the appendix a that i cemented that there are chinese ownership stakes rather than operating leases for a number of ports in the United States and it has gone cfius process has been something on the radar and you will probably recall saga in 2005 and im not in a position to see whether or not people are fully satisfied and the Critical Infrastructure has been secured what i suspect they have thought through this specific aspects of the structure deals that they are essentially getting the better end of the deal and Getting Better capital and able to get infrastructure important for the United States. Being a little bit it feeds into a package that we can offer other states were confronting similar questions. Commissioner campos. I just wanted to make sure and answer your question about influence. The Chinese Government is actively has active influence campaigns globally to support their positions and i think the u. S. Should consider developing a unified concept and plan to not only counter the chinese influence globally but also, as you said, educate organizations and businesses locally. During the soviet era there was a centralized Information Office to both analyze and respond to soviet disinformation and active measures and maybe considerations toward developing an office to have a more coherent and consistent message provided globally and internally would be a recommendation. I would just like to quickly add, spirit move a little over, commissioner. With respect to my colleagues i thought i would ask a couple questions about your testimony. Im supposed to get a laugh, it is 2 10 mr. Peltier, on your written testimony on page seven you say the poa is likely currently capable of supporting two ship packages at once for roughly six months deployments. Are there roughly two ship like passages to be supported . Not currently. So, currently such a package would include the helicopter docs for those currently are not enough in service that would fill out such a package and i think that is still far in the future. What does that suggest to you about the intent to develop the supporting ability before the actual operational capability. Im interested and this isnt a leading question. No, not at all. That is a very interesting question and in part because you look at the number of that have been produced over the last seven years and you think that is probably more than necessary for operations that is currently undertaking and as you added which is focused on caregroup operations you see significant number of the punishment [inaudible] i read your page to advertise money when it talks about type 903 as to suggest the plan was interested in supporting more gulf of aden Like Operation so dry stock fuel, not so much emphasis on ordinance and we see the nine oh ones thats where we need to be more concerned. My guess it would be dependent on the introduction of new carriers i would imagine would want to have the wanted to type 901s for each additional carrier and we havent seen too much use of the type 901s for the assets yet and particularly over the next after 20, 30 that would be the primary replenishment ship time. Okay. And that on page three you say by 2035 and you list the type of capabilities that would comprise your estimate of what the pla navy would have in Expeditionary Combat capabilities. I think that is helpful for giving us the context and it is interesting though if right now they are capable of supporting to music but do not have the ships to comprise the muse might we see this pattern continue where the support ships would proceed the larger formations of capabilities . I think so. I also think as the other panels have noted that the sense of use of civilian ships [inaudible conversations] okay, doctor, its a treat that we get to have you twice a year and a lot of your testimony builds on what you talked about last june so this is a very unsophisticated question about to ask. Appendix a, what is the question you want us to ask about appendix a . You start your paper in your testimony with a brief overview but you dont address the implications what is the question you want us to ask and then i will ask you to answer it so you can frame it however you would like. I was promised there would be only sophisticated questions so i am happy to feel that. [laughter] appendix a is extorted from a much bigger and heavier dataset that covers all the relevant characteristics of these commercial ports and we are in the process of doing sophisticated analysis of it to try to winnow down a list of facilities in terms of both physical characteristics and host country and political and diplomatic relations and their ownership structures seem like most likely cases and that is the question that i would that is the output that would come out of it and even make tentative judgments about it now and cases that have repeatedly come up and you do not need to necessarily do the analysis and say its interesting and unusual as i knew in the test when he and thats state owned enterprise that has no other activity on the globe that we were able to identify with is it unusual but i think i wanted to give you and your staff both a bit of descriptive backgrounds to support the claims and i hope this will encourage other researchers to dig in and try and use this for their purpose. For my purposes, again, it will be about stratified the facilities and capabilities that can be got out of them. And later i will move on to the next commissioner. Commissioner lewis. Thank you for helping educate us. I have two questions. One relates to the ports and one to the South China Seas. As far as the ports go have you discovered when we learned the Chinese Government or Chinese Companies controlled ports this is Public Information or do you have to dig it out and secondly if you analyze the ports that the Chinese Companies or government has leases or controls or owns there are certain characteristics of these ports that are common, for example, the part in haifa is near the Submarine Base so have you analyzed what the characteristics are of the ports the chinese have operations in and as far as the South China Sea goes the questionnaire is what did the chinese announced as the reasons why they are doing what they are doing in the South China Sea in what should the u. S. Do to deter them doing more of it . I will take a swing at the first question. The concessions for ports and investments in the Portfolio Investments in ports are publicly available and a lot of cases it was through commercial data that we bought but essentially it is all in open sources and some of them, for example, terminal and west africa and there are not a lot of reported that his eye on the list of Industry News and that requires scraping through chinese sources and basically identifying the firms that are engaged in Terminal Operations is a start to doing it but its pretty laborintensive. In terms of the characteristics that is one thing that will come out of the broader study in the works now and proximity to chokepoints is one of the descriptive characteristics are brought out and in this testimony certainly proximity to u. S. Places and faces is another one of the variables that we will test the data against. Like the one yeah, that stands out as that is where the submarines and the men like to go and the United States is explicitly set as much and i believe the white house and the senate and many others have been talking to the israelis about it and reviewed it and decided to go ahead with the deals. I think it is a instructive case on the limits of persuasiveness on this and we are paying close attention to what those arguments and why didnt they work. South china sea is a big question and i better unless there is a small piece you would like me to pick up. Go ahead. I will also say that i will point to some disagree but the one thing i would note is that while the obviously it has some value i do believe there is still increased potential for the United States to leverage additional nonmilitary assets and strategies in the South China Sea particularly through the use of various International Organizations and economic ties with other interested parties in the region. Im not sure that those relationships i think the u. S. Could better foster those relationships using military means. I want to thank the panel that we are at the end of this and to try to sum up what at least what i am hearing and i think it was absolutely superb research and it was very well written that a lot of the capabilities that might come into play remain aspirational and to a certain extent experimental at this point in time. I want to thank you very much and we will take another ten minutes and be back for the final panel. If you have any responses that you would like to put into the record of questions that were asked oh, we will. [inaudible conversations] the full day hearing on china taking a quick break, witnesses and discussing chinas power and influence. We wait for this to be convened we will take a look at the earlier comments in the hearing from the Deputy Assistant secretary of defense for china. Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to the second hearing of the u. S. China Economic Security review commissions. 2020 annual report cycle and thank you for joining us, especially to our witnesses for the time and effort that they put in to the testimonies. You will be treated to some really good thinking here today. We would also like to thank the House Foreign Affairs committee for securing this room for our used today. Todays hearing examines chinas ability to project military power and influence beyond its shores. And the indications of these growing capabilities for u. S. Interests. In january 2016 after communist Party Journal secretary and Central Military Commission Chairman president xi reorganized the Liberation Army and this commission explored the push to making the pla a force more capable of conducting Global Operations anti think that the commissioner was the cochair for that one, too. Four years later we are examining what progress the pli has made in fulfilling chairman shes admonition to the military to be able to protect chinas international interests. As a part of the commission contracted Research James is preparing a report on chinas logistic capabilities for expeditionary operations. That should be published in about a month we hope. This afternoon you will hear from chad peltier who is the lead author of the james report and he will discuss some of its main findings. I think that is at 1 00 oclock. But let me stop a minute and say, first of all, the sky is not falling and this is not a chicken little exercise here. The peoples Liberation Army is not on the cusp of ruling the high seas or the airspace above them. There have been pretty significant improvements and equipment, manpower and refined strategies that enable the pla to reject force and potentially have resupplied points for its Expeditionary Force in various parts of the world. Today our distinguished witnesses will address these issues and with that we turn to the commissioner, my colleague and cochair. Thank you, doctor brady thank you everyone. To our witnesses i want to thank you for being here to share your insights on chinas Power Production and expeditionary capabilities. The recent history of chinas military modernization is replete with underestimation. Just as it is marched toward democracy is replete with exaggeration. The rise of all great powers requires them to develop the ability to project military power. There is little question that china and the rest of the world perceived china as a rising power. To the centuries developing naval power was a necessity for all rising powers. Today the exercise of glittery powers is vastly more completed and uncertain. There is little question that chinas ability to marshal significant military strength in its own neighborhood is significant. Today our hearing will seek to better understand china views its future expeditionary capabilities. This will, of course, involve a discussion of military hardware but perhaps more importantly our witnesses will also discuss diplomatic economic and political circumstances china seeks to create to build the foundation for a reliable Power Production capability. We will also explore in the series and in others to follow is how chinas strategy to be a World Military power hinges upon u. S. National interests. Thinking realistically about this now is critical to developing National Security policies in this and in future decades. Before we begin i would like to let everyone know that todays testimony and transcript will be posted on our website www. Usa. Gov. Our next channel beijings alternative global norms and standards will be march 13. In q again for joining us today and we will proceed with our first panel. Before we start with our first witness our chairman has a word to say. Good morning good i wanted to welcome our new commissioner from houston, texas. It is our last and final appointed member and we are delighted to have him on board and look forward to his contribution. Our first witness today will discuss how the department of defense views the peoples Liberation Armys growing Power Production and expeditionary capabilities and the applications for u. S. Interests and double military operations. Chad is Deputy Assistant secretary for china at the department of defense and he is responsible for advising Senior Leadership within the department on all policy matters related to the development and of limitation of defense strategies, plans, policies and bilateral security relations for china