Chinese RoRo ferries and Amphibious Vehicles

Another blog post from Geoffrey Clark addressing details of amphibious possibilities for an invasion of Taiwan. These discussions are not coordinated, but it is a nice supplemental piece to my blog post: The RoRo Ships – The Dupuy Institute. The bolding in the text below is mine.

———————

Title: Chinese RoRo ferries and Amphibious Vehicles

Vehicles

The Chinese PLA has long considered the use of civilian vessels to augment their “PLAN-proper” amphibious ships and craft. In military exercises in 2020 and 2021, this became more apparent, as they demonstrated some of their concepts of operations.

The previous posts on this blog have shown some if the limitations to these concepts. There are three distinct methods to use these ships as amphibious lift:

1. Capture a working port, so vehicles can simply drive off on to a pier. This is how these vessels operate in peacetime, and this requires both the pier facility, as well as a very permissive environment, which we can assume would be challenged in wartime unless the Chinese can well establish sea and air control to a high degree, and at a distance of hundreds of kilometers to avoid the impact of long-range Anti-Ship Cruise Missiles (ASCM) on a very large and easy target of a docked civilian ferry.
2. Use the floating causeway that they demonstrated in their exercises in 2021. The ferries would unload vehicles away from the shore, which would then drive on these causeways to the beach. This is rather like the famous Mulberry harbors used by the Allies in the Normandy invasion, during which Allied sea control was absolute, and air dominance achieved. Yet, Mother Nature still managed to put the mulberries out of commission more than once. Given the Chinese engineering capabilities demonstrated with artificial island building in the South China Sea (as well as their prowess in heavy manufacturing in general), it seems the capability is within reach for them. The question again is can they sufficiently protect these structures from determined Allied attack?
3. Use the reinforced rear ramps on these vessels to launch amphibious vehicles such as the ZTD-05, which would then “swim” to shore on their own. The idea is to do this at a significant range from shore, perhaps at least 25-30 nautical miles (nmi), and perhaps greater. The ZTD-05 is said to have a swimming speed of about 30 knots, so this might take about one hour to cross the distance. The ferry would be less exposed to Allied fire, trying to stay away from the radar horizon, however these vessels are large, they sit out of the water at a significant height, meaning the radar horizon, along with other variables, like radar ducting, over-the-horizon (OTH) capabilities, or any kind of aerial or space-based platform would see these vessels fairly easily. And, as previously stated on the blog, the movement away from their highly regular civilian operations would arouse suspicion about military purposes. Other surprise operations have been successful, such as the Egyptian crossing of the Suez Canal in 1973, so we can never say never … but the bar seems pretty high.

The idea, it seems, might be to conduct these ferry operations in a defended environment… If through a combination of local sea control, local air superiority, and defended by many of the capable anti-air warfare (AAW) destroyers, frigates and/or corvettes that the PLAN is fielding in every increasing numbers … perhaps the Chinese feel there will be a right time in their war plan to risk this type of operation.

As the aptly named “Chinese Ferry Tales” report number 16 from the China Maritime Studies Institute (CMSI) concludes:

Notwithstanding these developments, this report concludes that as of 2021, China’s merchant fleet is unable to provide the amphibious landing capabilities or the maritime logistics in austere or challenging environments necessary to have a significant impact in an amphibious landing operation on Taiwan.

Additional points of note from the same report:

• As of 2021, the PLA and its reserve civilian merchant fleet are probably unable to provide significant amphibious landing capabilities or the maritime logistics in austere or challenging environments necessary to support a large-scale, cross-strait invasion of Taiwan.
• The PLA’s use of civilian shipping in amphibious exercises appears to be limited to select ships demonstrating nascent capabilities, but not the capacities necessary to support a cross-strait invasion. However, capacities could increase rapidly after initial capabilities are formally adopted and exercise participation expands to a larger number of civilian ships.
• 2020-2021 exercise events appeared to be scripted and focused on establishing procedures and coordination among military units and civilian components.
• The 2020 JLSF exercise featured experimentation with a number of novel logistics capabilities that have been slow to develop and have likely not yet matured probably due to a lack of investment. In a possible change in that trend, 2021 activity saw the introduction of the first new amphibious landing technologies in over fifteen years.
• In most cases, civilian shipping support to amphibious exercises was provided during daylight hours; events were timed for when tides and weather conditions were favorable; many evolutions took place in the sheltered waters of an inner harbor.
• In the 2020 JLSF exercise, there was no evidence of simulated combat conditions during the exercise; no defensive actions (e.g. convoying, escorting, evasion or diversion) were observed. In the 2021 amphibious landing exercises, civilian ferries appeared to be deployed and positioned to mitigate potential threats to these vulnerable ships.
• These 2020-2021 exercises likely provide a baseline for the PLA’s use of civilian shipping to support large-scale amphibious logistics and provide a roadmap for the types of capabilities and capacities the PLA may need for future operations.

From CimSec, estimates of the capacity of these ferries:

With … spatial limitations in mind, a conservative estimate of the total capacity of the ships identified in this article adds on capacity sufficient for half the PLA army’s primary amphibious combat forces (12 amphibious combined arms battalions). This places one battalion on each vessel, with room for additional supporting elements from their respective brigades. Depending on internal space constraints, vessels like the Pu Tuo Dao could probably deliver a single battalion, while some of the larger vessels could likely carry up to two battalions if the PLA accepts the risk.

The text below is part of an interview and Congressional testimony by Thomas H. Shugart, Adjunct Senior Fellow, Defense Program at the Center for a New American Security.

“Will China close its gap in sealift capacity? While some may take comfort that China may appear to lack sufficient amphibious lift to conduct a cross-Strait invasion, for example, this is not a factor upon which our allies’ and partners’ defense should rest, as China may be able to close this gap faster than may be commonly understood.”

The above is what Shugart said in testimony before the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee on 2021-03-17 …

China would well be able to utilize commercial shipping such as roll-on/roll-off (Ro-Ro) ferries. The Bohai Ferry Group, the major ferry operator in the Bohai Gulf, for example, operates eleven Ro-Ro ferries. These actually form the Eighth Transport Dadui of the strategic projection support ship fleet. Each vessel displaces around 20,000 tons and can carry 200 vehicles plus 1,280 passengers. Bohai also operates larger 35,000-ton ferries able to carry 300 vehicles and 2,038 passengers. Of its commercial fleet, the group constructed seven large Ro-Ro specifically to national defense specifications, allowing them to be commandeered for military operations. These ferries have been used more than 40 times in military exercises to date. Indeed, the Bohai Ferry Group’s capacity to move vehicles has multiplied 100 times over the past 20 years. By way of example, it appeared a mobilization and amphibious exercise was held off the coast of Guangdong Province in mid-July, involving the 2nd Combined Arms Brigade of the 71st Group Army, as well as the 6th Brigade of the PLAN Marine Corps (PLANMC).They were using two large vessels plus other cargo vessels near Rizhao port, southwest of Hong Kong, where there are sandy beaches of an amphibious training area. Shugart claimed these Ro-Ro ferries (the 33,000-ton Bo Hai Ma Zhu and 16,000-ton Hu Lu Dao, would normally be plying waters 1,000 miles away in the Yellow Sea.

He concluded, “My guess: the PLA’s efforts to integrate China’s world-class merchant marine into its amphibious assault forces continue. If successful, this could potentially increase its cross-Strait Taiwan sealift capacity immensely, removing one of the major obstacles to invasion of Taiwan.”

The American also noted rather ominously: “…We would be wise to assume that China will bring all of its tools of maritime power to bear in ensuring success in a regional conflict, including the use of the China Coast Guard, the world’s largest such force; and its fishing fleet, specifically in the form of the People’s Armed Forces Maritime Militia (PAFMM). In something like the form of a reverse-Dunkirk, we should expect that instead of only dealing with dozens of gray-painted PLA Navy amphibious vessels and their escorts, we would likely see an effort supported by many hundreds of fishing boats, merchant ships and Coast Guard and Maritime Safety Administration vessels.”

As seen above, the use of effective amphibious vehicles greatly improves the flexibility of how these ferries can be used in a military sense; the reduced dependence on fixed structures like piers or floating causeways permits additional operational options. This is possible through the investment that the PLA has made in amphibious armored vehicles, Type 05 amphibious vehicles:

China publicly unveiled the world’s fastest amphibious armored vehicle, the Type-05, in late 2009, with reports of its water speed ranging between 27 and 45 kilometers per hour. This family of amphibious armored vehicles reportedly includes assault, infantry fighting, command, reconnaissance, medical, and obstacle-clearing variants, among others. Both the PLA Army (PLAA) and PLA Navy Marine Corps (PLANMC) use the Type-05, but the PLAA would very likely operate the majority of these amphibious armored vehicles during large-scale landing operations against Taiwan.

This chart, adapted from Wikipedia, shows all of the variants of the Type 05 vehicle family.

According to Jane’s data from June 2023, the Type 05 Assault Gun type (ZTD-05) is operated by the PLAN at 350 vehicles and also operated by the PLA Army (PLAA) at 670 vehicles. The Type 05 Infantry Fighting Vehicle (ZBD-05) is operated by the PLAN at 152 vehicles and PLAA at 672 vehicles. It seems as though these quantities might not fill out their order of battle, deliveries are likely to continue, per the analysis below.

Despite the Chinese defense industry’s efforts to develop world-class amphibious armored vehicles, external factors may diminish the PLA’s ability to effectively use these vehicles in an invasion of Taiwan, including the PLAN’s sealift capacity, the weather conditions and sea state in the Taiwan Strait, and Taiwan’s geography, among others. For example, experts have assessed that the PLAN does not have enough landing ships to sufficiently support a cross-strait invasion. Estimates of the PLAN’s current fleet suggest that it is capable of generating enough sealift for around 670 ZTD-05 amphibious assault vehicles, which is nowhere near enough sealift for the number of amphibious armored vehicles operated by the PLAA’s six amphibious combined arms brigades under the 72nd, 73rd, and 74th group armies. As noted earlier in this report, the 48 amphibious assault gun companies and 48 amphibious mechanized infantry companies under these brigades are estimated to operate roughly 1,340 vehicles at full strength, not to mention the other amphibious armored vehicles present in these brigades and the PLANMC’s amphibious armored vehicles. PLAA coastal defense forces are expected to supplement the PLAN’s sealift with their landing craft, but these craft are reportedly “older, smaller, and slower” than PLAN vessels, and so experts have suggested that “watercraft units must modernize to provide more reliable cross-strait lift options to the PLA”. Moreover, PLAA coastal defense landing craft are likely optimized for delivering forces to the shore rather than deploying amphibious armored vehicles on the sea. China has also been experimenting with using its civilian merchant fleet to provide further sealift PLA forces, including Type-05 amphibious armored vehicles, but the use of civilian vessels would very likely create additional challenges for the PLA.

This imbalance between the supply of sealift and demand for sealift by these amphibious vehicles might describe why the Chinese are experimenting with civilian RO-RO vessels launching amphibious ships from some distance away from the shore.  

Thanks for reading, and for your comments!