Another Pacific Nation Increases Sub Fleet Size

It is not uncommon to read someone asking serious questions about the value of US Navy submarines. At a very high cost of over $2 billion and with very little information regarding the capabilities of the Virginia class submarine discussed in public, a reduction in the number of US submarines is an easy target for folks who wish to take a political shot knowing that there will be no official push back.

But the trend in submarines is not one anyone, anywhere, can deny. We observe in imagery the growth of the Chinese submarine force on this blog. Authors here have also noted the increase in the submarine force of Malaysia, Australia, South Korea, Indonesia, Vietnam, Singapore, Russia, and India. Now we see news from Japan.

The Defense Ministry said a bigger submarine fleet is under consideration, with a firm proposal likely to come as early as December. Officials who spoke to The Associated Press on Tuesday refused to give further details because the plan has not yet been formally tabled.

According to Japanese media reports, the number of submarines would be increased from 16 to 22 over the next four years, a substantial rise that could generate concern from neighboring China.

Though well outnumbered by the Chinese — who have about 60 subs — the Japanese navy's submarine fleet is significantly augmented by U.S. subs deployed throughout the region. Japanese subs are generally believed to be better equipped than many of the Chinese vessels and are hard to detect.

The submarine industry in Japan is remarkably healthy, indeed the way Japan has built and modernized submarines over the last many years is quite admirable. Basically, Japan builds a new submarine once a year every year, with 16 operational and a few used for training, with submarines constantly being retired at a rate of once a year - and never older than 20 years when retired (long before hull life expiration).

It is unclear if Japan is actually increasing the construction rate of submarines, or simply extending the life of submarines and training new crews - but the point is they have options. In theory Japan could build 2 per year for three years, extend the life of submarines by three years, and in three years add 6 submarines to the force. The hard part isn't the technology, rather adding new, experienced crews.

Why Japan is increasing the size of their submarine force? The simple answer is China, because China is replacing old, easy to detect submarines with modern submarines. The problem with that theory is that China is not actually increasing the number of submarines, simply the quality of their submarines. Or are they?

And that's the point, isn't it? We don't know how many submarines China is producing for two reasons: China is not transparent on military developments and the US has traditionally been very slow to offer any intelligence not already available to open source observers. Maybe China is increasing the size of their submarine force at a rate greater than retirement of old systems, but maybe the reason isn't only China. One has to believe that at some level this also has to do with the plans by Russia to operate more nuclear submarines in the Pacific, not to mention the recent activities of North Korea. In other words, China is the easy and obvious reason, but not the only reason Japan would want to increase their number of submarines.

As a nation without aircraft carriers, and unlikely to develop or operate aircraft carriers anytime soon, submarines makes a lot of sense as an insurance policy to hedge bets against the naval developments taking place in the Pacific region. In many ways, the 'insurance policy' reason is the same reason the US Navy builds 2 Virginia class submarines every year for the next several in the shipbuilding budget, although the US Navy leadership is unlikely to articulate it in that way.