Practical, psywar aims behind latest Chinese drone incursions: Experts
ROC Central News Agency
05/08/2023 07:59 PM
By Sean Lin, CNA staff reporter
When People's Liberation Army (PLA) drones recently took the unprecedented step of circling around Taiwan, local media speculated that China might be using the new approach to spy on Taiwan's military facilities and deployments.
Military and drone experts believe Beijing had other motives in mind, however, including familiarizing itself with flight paths over waters in the Western Pacific and stepping up its campaign of psychological warfare against Taiwan.
On both April 28 and May 3, a PLA drone flew around Taiwan in its air defense identification zone (ADIZ).
The first drone, the TB-001 "Twin-Tailed Scorpion," flew in a counter-clockwise direction on April 28, starting south of Taiwan then flying along the eastern boundary of the ADIZ before heading back to China in airspace north of Taiwan.
The second drone, a BZK-005, followed roughly the same path on May 3 but in a clockwise direction, according to flight paths released by the Ministry of National Defense.
Chieh Chung (揭仲), an associate research fellow with the National Policy Foundation in Taipei, told CNA in a recent interview that because the drones were flying at some distance from Taiwan's shores, the flights were probably not aimed at gathering military intelligence.
Rather, Chieh said, the fly-bys were likely aimed at familiarizing the PLA with airspace east of Taiwan because monitoring Taiwan's east coast and nearby waters would be critical to the PLA before or during wartime.
If a war were imminent, Chieh said, the Republic of China (ROC, Taiwan's official title) Air Force and Navy would likely move fighter jets from air bases in western Taiwan to Jiashan Air Base in Hualien County and naval fleets to maritime zones off Taiwan's east coast, to protect them from being destroyed by ballistic missiles.
PLA aircraft carriers and bomber squads would need drones to locate those naval fleets and fighter jets and other military facilities to take them out, Chieh said.
It was no coincidence, therefore, that according to some retired Navy officers Chieh talked to, the drones deliberately flew through two or three maritime zones critical to Taiwan's deployment of naval fleets for force preservation in the event of a war with China, he said.
The drone deployment, and the presence of China's newest aircraft carrier, the Shandong, in waters just 120 nautical miles southeast of Taiwan on April 24, were also aimed at delivering a message to Taiwan and other countries that Taiwan's force preservation zones are no longer safe, Chieh said.
Su Tzu-yun (蘇紫雲), a research fellow at Taiwan's Institute for National Defense and Security Research, argued that the incursions were intended to intimidate Taiwanese and were part of the PLA's psychological warfare campaign against Taiwan.
One tell-tale sign, Su said, was that the two types of drones that buzzed around Taiwan had a low chance of surviving a war.
"Neither type of drone has stealth capability, and they fly at low speeds of between 180 kilometers and 300 km per hour, making them easy targets," Su said. "Taiwan would never let them get close [in a war]."
Apart from exerting psychological pressure, the fly-bys also had a more practical purpose -- to lower the cost of the PLA's routine incursions into Taiwan's ADIZ, Su said.
The Russian-made Saturn AL-31 engines widely used in China's "J" family of fighter jets and Sukhoi fighters and Chinese-built Shengyang WS-10 engines used in many "J" fighters have a lifespan of only about 1,500 hours, so deploying drones in place of fighter jets can ease the PLA's maintenance burden, Su said.
Meanwhile, Lo Cheng-fang (羅正方), CEO of Taiwan-based drone manufacturer Geosat Aerospace & Technology Inc., told CNA that the latest drone incursions were a new form of PLA "gray zone" tactics that had the PLA systematically advancing east.
That advance can be seen from PLA planes routinely crossing the Taiwan Strait median line since former U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's visit to Taiwan in August last year to the detection of the Shandong and the latest drone incursions, Lo said.
That poses a graver dual threat to Taiwan because the PLA is now attempting to use drones to wage both asymmetric and cognitive warfare against Taiwan, Lo said.
Drones cost less to produce than aircraft, and routine PLA drone flights close to Taiwan that force the Air Force to scramble fighter jets in response would put a heavy burden on Taiwan's pilots and military, Lo said.
While the two types of drones that recently circled Taiwan could not conduct reconnaissance missions from where they were flying, China will one day develop electronic warfare drones designed specifically for reconnaissance, and Taiwan must be prepared for that, Lo said.
To counter China's drone incursions, Chieh recommended equipping domestically produced drones with signal jamming equipment to prevent PLA drones from transmitting military intelligence back to PLA command centers.
Deploying fighter jets would not be a good option, Chieh said, because fighter jets fly at a much higher speed than drones, a lesson South Korea learned in its attempts to down North Korean drones.
Instead, some countries have successfully knocked down intruding drones with drones, Chieh said, but that would only be an option if the drones entered the ROC's territorial air space or in the event of a war.
Lo suggested developing more advanced drones with combat and reconnaissance capabilities to alleviate the burden on crewed aircraft, describing that as a more time-efficient approach than developing 4.5- or 5-gen fighters.
Domestically produced drones such as the Albatross and the Teng Yun could also prove useful in shadowing intruding PLA drones should incursions become a norm, especially after compatible weapon systems have been developed, Lo said.
Su agreed that locally made drones should be deployed to shadow PLA unmanned aerial vehicles and complement existing radar systems, which he said would boost the reconnaissance capabilities of Taiwan's military and lower the cost of patrolling airspace around Taiwan.
State-run weapons developer National Chung-Shan Institute of Science and Technology is developing a high-energy laser weapon that only costs about US$2 each time it is fired, making it an even more cost-effective deterrence should PLA drones breach Taiwan's territorial airspace or were war to break out, Su said.
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