BEIJING – The Chinese Academy of Sciences recently disclosed thatunderwater acoustic sensors have been monitoring sea activity near Guamsince 2016, the South China Morning Post reported Monday.
“All great powers put sensor arrays at the bottom of the oceanfor anti-submarine warfare,” James Lewis, a former US government officialand vice president at the Center for Strategic and International Studies,told the Hong Kong-based news outlet. “China has become a great power andis acting like one,” Lewis added.
The sensors collect water temperature and salinity data that impact howsound moves through water, which ultimately enhances Beijing’s capacityto keep tabs on US submarines. One of the sensors is situated on the floorof the Marianas Trench, the deepest part of the world’s ocean, while theother is located off the coast of an island in Micronesia.
The sensors are both located within 500 kilometers of Guam and have asignal detection capability of 1,000 kilometers, according the Chineseacademy in charge of overseeing the underwater surveillance program.McMaster Warns Beijing After Guam Bomber Missions by China Come Too Closelink>
The surveillance network has watched the movements of the US Navy’s fastattack nuclear submarines operating near Guam, according to the South ChinaMorning Post.
However, Yu Yongqiang, a researcher who works on the panel overseeing theunderwater surveillance network, stated last month that the surveillancenetwork was dwarfed by systems the US operates. “We have just made a smallstep in a long march,” Yu said.