By Jonathan Robinson

Introduction

In January 1974, in the tail end of the Vietnam War, the People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) and Republic of Vietnam Navy briefly clashed over control of the Paracel Islands in what became known in the People’s Republic of China (PRC) as the Battle of the Paracels (Figure 1). Despite Beijing securing their grip on the archipelago after the battle, the victory exposed a severe operational vulnerability. The PLAN was unable to rapidly evacuate and stabilize casualties from the conflict zone for follow-on care ashore. It also exposed the limits of the PRC ability to sustain their maritime power close to home.

This operational gap served as a catalyst for the development of the PLAN’s first ever hospital ships being launched in 1991, that today has grown into a fleet of twelve vessels. Operating across a range of environments, from blue water to littoral areas, the PLAN’s medical fleet is shaped by the legacy of their engagement in the Paracels, something that makes the PLAN’s vessels distinct from how U.S Navy platforms were developed.

Exploring the evolution of the PLAN’s hospital ship fleet since the 1970s, this article will argue the PLAN has not only resolved their historical maritime medical shortfalls today but could now also leverage lessons from newly launched forward-deployed civilian expeditionary assets – such as the Pinglan – to further strengthen their capabilities for sustaining combat operations at sea into the future.

Adaptation and Experimentation: PLAN’s Early Hospital Ships | 1991 – 2006

Prior to 1991, the PLAN did not operate a single dedicated hospital ship. In comparison, the U.S. Navy had been operating such vessels for over one hundred years. However, the short-lived Battle of the Paracel Islands changed this. While a tactical victory for the PLAN, the clash exposed severe maritime medical shortcomings. A PRC journal published at the time noted that the PLAN lacked specialized ships to rescue, rapidly treat, or evacuate the wounded, relying instead on requisitioned fishing boats and PLAN fast patrol boats. As a consequence, wounded sailors often waited up to 48 hours before being properly treated, leading to a number of PLAN personnel dying of infection and other preventable injuries.

Recognizing this shortfall could undermine Beijing’s ability to sustain their aggressive island-holding strategy in the South China Sea, the PLAN’s South Sea Fleet and Medical Logistics Department formally proposed in 1976 that the Central Military Commission acquire dedicated hospital ships. However, progress was hindered by the devastating aftermath of Chairman Mao Zedong’s devastating cultural revolution in the late 1970s and 1980s. In this resource scarce environment, the PLAN prioritized the development of combatant ships over auxiliary platforms as state spending focused on national economic reconstruction and countering land-based threats to the PRC.

But by 1991, this initiative delivered. Two Qiongsha class troop transports were adapted into two Nan Kang class hospital ships; the Nan Kang (832) and Bei Kang (833). These vessels began providing dedicated maritime medical support to PLA garrisons on islands in the South China Sea, laying the foundation for sustaining the PLAN’s forward power projection in the region.

Following these beginnings, in the late 1990s and early 2000s the PLAN began experimenting with modular containerized medical platforms to augment the capacity of their Qiongsha class hospital ships. This concept involved placing standard shipping containers painted white with red crosses and outfitted with clinical capabilities onto the decks of two PLAN auxiliary training vessels; the multi-role training ship Shichang (82) and the cargo transport Village River (865).

Although these modified platforms were confined to near-shore testing rather than real world deployments, their deeper drafts and greater lengths offered significantly larger capacity to treat and transport mass casualties over greater distances than the two Nan Kang vessels (Figure 2). This development signaled an important doctrinal shift. Moving the PLAN’s maritime medical ambitions away from purely localized island-and-reef medical support towards grander aspirations to support fleets in distant waters. However, the PLAN’s early solutions remained hindered by the reliance on aging or non-dedicated hulls, something that could affect the PLAN’s ability to sustain medical operations at sea into the future.

From Adaptation to Purpose Built: PLAN’s Dedicated Hospital Ship Fleet | 2007 – 2020

By mid 2000s, the PLAN moved beyond their reliance on makeshift platforms. They began constructing purpose-built solutions to addressing future maritime medical needs. This included launching the first Type 920 Anwei class vessel – Peace Ark (866) – in 2007 that completed a series of sea trials and a domestic medical mission, before transitioning to the high-profile maritime medical diplomacy missions around the world it is now widely recognized for. Since 2010, the ship has conducted ten of these Harmonious Missions, provided foreign humanitarian assistance in the aftermath of Typhoon Haiyan in the Philippines, and conducted at least one real world search and rescue mission.

While a common narrative is that the Peace Ark’s development was in reaction to the PLAN’s inability to respond to the nearby Indian Ocean Tsunami in December 2004, there are signs from that time that the PLAN was being more deliberate in their thinking. In May 2004, six months prior to the disaster, the PLA’s Naval General Hospital established a specialized 150-person maritime medical team tasked with supporting “new, under-construction, or reconstructed hospital ships”. The Peace Ark’s design was also being finalized before the 2004 tsunami and featured extensive triage spaces, multiple operating theaters, and advanced diagnostic suits as well as a relatively narrow hull. Coinciding with this, five Ankang class ambulance transport vessels were also being built for use in the North Sea, East Sea, and South Sea Fleets by the 2010s. These key logistical connectors enhanced the rapid transfer of casualties from a littoral or island combat zone to a larger medical platform before receiving definitive care ashore. Early versions of these shore-to-ship vessels have been documented exercising with the Peace Ark as early as 2009 (Figure 3).

Taken as a whole, the above-mentioned purpose-built ecosystem that was optimized for rapid casualty evacuation underscores the view that this development was the result of a deliberate choice by the PLAN to address the operational gaps identified from the Battle of the Paracels rather than a reactionary decision to a nearby humanitarian disaster. It also indicates that the PLAN’s experimental modular medical platforms and aging Qiongsha-class hospital ships from the 1990s were not satisfactory for the PLAN’s long-term operational requirements. Ultimately, the commissioning of the Peace Ark and supporting Ankang class ambulance vessels cemented the PLAN’s strategic shift away from solely providing medical support to PLA troops stationed in the South China Sea. It signaled the PLAN’s aspiration to become a true blue-water navy, capable of projecting soft power and medical combat support in near and distant seas.

Next Generation: Expanding the PLAN’s Expeditionary Capabilities 2021 – 2025

In the 2020s the PLAN began significantly expanding their fleet of purpose-built hospital ships (Figure 4). Between 2021 and 2023, two new Type 919 Anshen class vessels were put into service; Friendship (861) and Friendly (862). Still designed for speed, these ships are slightly smaller than the Peace Ark and replaced the long-obsolete Nan Kang class ships previously operating in the South China Sea. In building and deploying these vessels, with the support of the Ankang-class ambulance transports, the PLAN firmly closed the operational gap identified after the Battle of the Paracels and ensured reliable maritime medical support from dedicated platforms for island garrisons in the South China Sea into the future.

By the end of 2025, the PLAN also launched two additional Type 920 Anwei-class hospital ships – Silk Road Ark (867) and the Auspicious Ark (868). Sister ships to the Peace Ark, these platforms significantly increased the PLAN’s operational depth in blue ocean environments. The Silk Road Ark recently concluded the eleventh Harmonious Mission in 2025 – 2026, visiting ten countries in the Pacific, Caribbean, and Latin America. The 234-day mission marked the longest cruise by this type of vessel to date and highlighted its role in consolidating the Peace Ark’s previous soft power gains from its ten previous Harmonious Missions between 2010 and 2024. With the Auspicious Ark’s recent medical support mission to the South China Sea mirroring deployments of the Peace Ark and Silk Road Ark prior to their involvement in Harmonious Missions, it implies this vessel’s transition to distant water operations could be forthcoming. It also gives the PLAN the capacity to conduct at least two concurrent maritime medical diplomacy missions a year, comparable to the scope of the U.S Navy’s Pacific Partnership and Continuing Promise global health engagement missions.

The three Type 920 class hospital ships have boosted the PLAN’s distant theatre medical support capabilities, ending a reliance on a single flag ship. Instead, the PLAN has transitioned to a model where multiple dedicated platforms can sustain maritime medical needs to fleets operating far from the mainland. This expeditionary capability has already been demonstrated in 2010, 2013, 2017 and 2024 when the Peace Ark provided medical services to the PLAN’s counter-piracy escort task force in the Gulf of Aden. Such deployments not only enhance the PLAN’s ability to project maritime soft power abroad but also strengthen reliable, forward-deployed medical care in distant theatres, a hallmark of a navy with global, rather than regional, ambitions.

Looking Ahead: Civil-Military Augmentation | 2026 onwards

The PLAN’s future maritime medical capacity will likely benefit from the growing number of civilian-built medical vessels emerging from the PRC’s shipbuilding sector. Recent years have seen the launch of several adapted passenger ferries by the China State Shipbuilding Corporation (CSSC) for international humanitarian organizations. These include the Global Mercy and Africa Mercy II (currently under development) for the U.S. charity Mercy Ships, as well as two unnamed vessels currently being constructed for the German non-governmental organization (NGO) Worldwide Hospitals.

These ships provide the PLAN with a valuable blueprint for scaling up maritime medical platforms in times of conflict, especially if stable, long term casualty support is needed (Figure 5). Designed with this in mind, these civilian vessels address a gap not currently met by the PLAN’s existing hospital ship fleet. Adding to this, in late 2025 the PRC launched the Pinglan. The first purpose-built civilian run hospital ship in the country’s history, it will be used by the Beijing Peaceland Foundation. Appearing to be modeled on the Type 919 class design, the ship will be reportedly used for long-range expeditionary missions to Africa, the Middle East, and Asia.

By observing the implementation of these civilian platforms, the PLAN could gain valuable data on the endurance and logistical support required to maintain these types of vessels during long-term, expeditionary forward deployments. In particular, the two Mercy Ships that will be stationed in West Africa will offer the PLAN an opportunity to study how these types of hospital ships perform far from the support of home ports and established logistics chains. Should the Pinglan successfully adopt a permanent forward-deployed posture like the two Mercy Ships, it could provide the PLAN with an additional data point in testing the expeditionary capabilities of a hull closely resembling their Type 919 class vessels.

These civilian operated platforms not only strengthen the PRC’s ability to project maritime soft power across the civilian and military realms but also provide a redundancy within the PLAN’s overall maritime medical network. In the event of a conflict, the PLAN could rapidly augment their existing dedicated hospital ship fleet with these civilian platforms to support maritime medical needs in both near and far waters. This redundancy moves the PLAN beyond the medical gaps identified from the Battle of the Paracels and into a new era of modernization.

Conclusion

The evolution of the PLAN’s maritime medical platforms from the 1970s to the present day is a study in implementing a methodical and deliberate modernization strategy. From the complete absence of dedicated maritime medical capabilities in the Battle of the Paracels, the PLAN’s trajectory has taken it to makeshift adaptations in the 1990s and early 2000s, to a robust, layered network of twelve dedicated vessels today. This fleet looks set to be increasingly augmented by a growing PRC-built civilian capability, providing a blueprint for scaling up platforms as required (Figure 6). This diverse ecosystem provides the PLAN with a dependable maritime medical capacity for routine operations in the South China Sea; a dedicated capability to rapidly service large numbers of casualties in the event of a regional contingency close to the mainland (such as a Taiwan conflict scenario), as well as support PLAN ambitions to project maritime power around the world in the coming years.

A central thread throughout the PLAN’s evolution of their maritime medical platforms has been the unwavering focus on addressing the gaps identified after the conflict in the Paracels. That was the need to have hospital ships that can rapidly transport casualties away from the conflict zone and can also sustain island garrisons in the South China Sea. These origins fundamentally shaped the PLAN’s design philosophy, marking their hospital ship fleet distinct from the U.S. Navy, which historically prioritized large, stable platforms capable of long-distance transport across the Pacific or Atlantic Oceans based on experiences from the World Wars.

However, the growth in PRC’s civilian medical platforms in recent years that mirror this U.S design philosophy indicates another strategic shift in the PLAN’s maritime medical development could be underway. If lessons from the expeditionary performance of these forward-deployed civilian vessels are successfully integrated into the PLAN’s fleet in the future, it will provide an even more robust underpinning for their ongoing transformation from a regional-focused force to a truly global navy.

Jonathan Robinson is an assistant professor in International Programs at the U.S. Naval War College. A specialist in civilian-military operations, conflict analysis, and human security, Jonathan has provided operational advice and in-depth analysis to numerous U.S. and international organizations for over 15 years, including spending a decade working in conflict and post-conflict settings in the Middle East. He has also supported pre-deployment efforts for the U.S. Navy’s Pacific Partnership missions in 2021, 2022, and 2024. His research currently focuses on the PLAN’s maritime medical platforms and Russia’s use of humanitarian aid as a soft power tool.

Opinions, conclusions, and recommendations expressed or implied within are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of the U.S. Naval War College, the Department of the Navy, the Department of Defense, any other U.S. government agency, or any of the author’s previous employers.

Featured image: People’s Republic of China, People’s Liberation Army (Navy) ship Peace Ark (T-AH 866) steams in close formation as one of 42 ships and submarines representing 15 international partner nations during Rim of the Pacific (RIMPAC) Exercise 2014. (U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 1st Class Shannon Renfroe)

By Helge Adrians

Recent conflicts in the Middle East highlight how maritime kill chains from ashore impose risk on global shipping. However, Western navies have yet to fully grasp that within these loosely integrated sensor-to-shooter networks, land-based Anti-Ship Missile (AShM) systems have become the decisive instruments by which littoral actors — both state and non-state — generate coercive effects at sea. It is through these systems that such networks translate dispersed sensing and targeting into episodic operational effects, thereby producing conditions that resemble artificially generated chokepoints or barriers in narrow seas.

Typically consisting of mobile, often truck-mounted launchers, sensor inputs, and command-and-control elements, land-based AShMs — whether ballistic or cruise configurations — facilitate a form of selective sea denial. Rather than enforcing broad area exclusion, they allow actors to threaten specific shipping lanes, vessels, or temporal windows of opportunity, thereby imposing calibrated risk, delay, and uncertainty while avoiding decisive confrontation.

While this approach is not new in principle, its contemporary expression is shaped by the growing integration of land-based AShMs with both traditional and emerging elements of coastal defense, including unmanned systems (UxSs). These combinations enhance target acquisition, extend operational reach, and complicate defensive planning by saturating attention and forcing continuous trade-offs in detection, prioritization, and engagement, thereby creating conditions in which AShMs can be employed to greatest effect — not necessarily through technological sophistication alone, but through dispersion, redundancy, and temporal unpredictability. Within such configurations, AShMs remain the central kinetic enabler, translating otherwise transient sensing and targeting opportunities into tangible maritime effects. Even limited successful engagements can therefore generate disproportionate operational, psychological, and economic consequences, particularly in narrow seas and heavily trafficked maritime corridors.

Accordingly, this form of selective sea denial is more than a tactical adaptation. It reflects a recurring but under-theorized pattern in evolving conflict: the use of land-based strike capabilities, operating in a distributed manner and under the protection of terrestrial topography, to disrupt global maritime trade flows and generate political consequences. Yet Western military thinking still tends to treat land-based AShM systems within sensor-to-shooter architectures as supporting assets rather than as the central coercive instruments, leaving a gap in conceptualization and countermeasures — one that is particularly acute in other narrow seas, especially in inland seas such as Baltic. Closing this conceptual gap demands moving beyond kinetic countermeasures alone and instead finding ways to contain the political utility of AshMs. 

Land-Based Anti-Ship Missiles in Practice: From Tactical Denial to Political Leverage

Land-based AShM systems have often been viewed in the West through the lens of China’s defense posture in the Western Pacific — labeled as ‘anti-access/area-denial’ since 2003 — where they were popularized as ‘carrier killers.’ Although other states also began to acquire or modernize such weapons during this period, their significance has only become globally visible in recent years.

This shift is illustrated by the Houthi campaign in the Red Sea since late November 2023, which shows how rapidly limited military capabilities can generate outsized maritime effects.

What began with drone-based harassment soon expanded into a layered approach that included the recurrent use of land-based AShMs, drawing mostly on Iranian technology, itself rooted in Chinese designs. While UxS established presence and imposed friction, it was the integration of these missiles within a broader multi-vector threat environment that fundamentally altered the character of the battlespace. The coexistence of different trajectories — high/fast for anti-ship ballistic missiles, low-altitude high-speed sea-skimming anti-ship cruise missiles, and low/slow for UxSs — creates a persistent strain on sensor management, as systems can no longer exclude entire kinematic regimes from consideration. This forces continuous tradeoffs in detection, classification, and resource allocation, increasing processing load and degrading overall situational awareness. The destructive characteristics of AShMs — particularly the speed, range, and terminal flight profiles of ballistic variants — introduce a qualitatively different layer of risk, in which even limited successful engagements carry the potential for sudden kinetic loss at sea.

As attacks grew more frequent and less discriminate, the Houthis translated localized military means into broader economic and political consequences. Crucially, these effects were achieved mainly from the mountainous hinterland of Western Yemen, highlighting how even episodic missile employment can exert continuous pressure on commercial traffic.

In response to the escalating situation in the Red Sea, the United States — together with partners — launched multiple rounds of strikes against Houthi targets beginning in early 2024, building on earlier efforts to contain the group’s regional activities. The objective was not solely to eliminate land-based AShMs, but to degrade the broader ecosystem enabling maritime attacks, from sensors to shooter platforms. Precision strikes from the air and the sea hit suspected launch sites, storage facilities, and command elements, yet failed to produce a decisive reduction in the threat. Houthi forces adapted quickly, relying on mobility, concealment, and redundancy to preserve operational capacity. As a result, attacks on commercial shipping persisted, and the risk environment remained largely intact. Within this evolving campaign, land-based AShMs continued to play a central role, illustrating how even under sustained military pressure such systems can endure as instruments of regional disruption.

Structural limitations already visible in operations against the Houthis were reinforced in the joint U.S. and Israeli campaign against Iran since the end of February 2026.

Although U.S. and Israeli forces faced little difficulty in achieving theater entry — again demonstrating the limited effectiveness of Iranian anti-access measures, the ‘outer ring’ — this initial advantage did not translate into control over the threat environment within the ‘inner ring(s).’ This was evident in the maritime domain. For instance, while conventional Iranian naval forces were quickly degraded through stand-off strikes, this did little to affect the more resilient layer of land-based AShMs and UxSs. These dispersed capabilities, likely supported by foreign target acquisition, continued to pose a credible risk to merchant vessels transiting the Persian Gulf, maintaining a persistent sea-denial threat despite continued operational pressure. Operational and public attention, however, remained disproportionately focused on the possibility of mining in the Strait of Hormuz, diverting attention from the more immediate and lethal challenge posed by missile-based sea denial. Air-centric efforts — including strike aircraft and rotary-wing assets operating within a loosely integrated kill web — failed to fully neutralize these systems, highlighting the difficulty of suppressing mobile, land-based AShM threats without escalation or ground presence.

Repeated efforts to suppress these capabilities have highlighted their resilience once dispersed, as well as the limits of strike-centric approaches in countering land-based AShM threats in littoral environments. More importantly, their persistence preserves their value as a coercive instrument: by sustaining risk, they drive up insurance and operating costs, shaping maritime behavior without requiring the physical interdiction of shipping, while allowing actors to effectively switch maritime access on or off at short notice.

Targeting Flows: The Economic Consequences of Selective Sea Denial

Maritime commerce warfare, or the selective targeting of merchant shipping is not a new phenomenon. However, the time-compressed execution from dispersed, protected coastal or peripheral sites introduces a qualitatively higher level of uncertainty regarding when and against which vessels attacks may occur. This situation is structurally reinforced by the inherent difficulty of detecting, locating, and pre-emptively neutralizing modern land-based AShM systems, even for advanced militaries.

Significantly, their effectiveness does not depend on frequent successful strikes, but on the persistent possibility of sudden, high-impact AShM engagements generated by land-based, heterogeneous, sensor-enabled kill chains. Unlike other forms of coastal maritime disruption, such as piracy, these systems derive their strategic effect from their ability to disturb and compress naval decision-making processes under conditions of multi-vector uncertainty. That is, their strategic utility lies less in missile performance than in inducing cognitive overload, misallocation of defensive resources, and degraded engagement sequencing within shipborne combat systems.

This risk environment is rapidly translated into economic calculations through maritime insurance mechanisms, where elevated perceived risk leads to adjusted war risk premiums and the redefinition of high-risk zones along global shipping routes. In this sense, the proliferation of land-based AShMs in geographically constrained maritime environments takes on significance beyond the military domain, informing insurance assessments of emerging high-risk maritime areas.

Rising war risk premiums and associated operating costs undermine the economic viability of transiting affected sea lines of communication. Crucially, these effects are expectation-driven, as perceived rather than actual risk shapes insurance pricing and routing decisions. Even low-intensity or sporadic activity can therefore sustain elevated risk perceptions, allowing the mechanism to persist over time without escalation to major conflict.

Shipping companies are thus forced into costly trade-offs between absorbing higher premiums, rerouting vessels, or suspending operations. Such adjustments increase transit times, fuel consumption, and logistical complexity, reducing supply chain reliability even in the absence of sustained kinetic disruption. Insurers, in turn, aggregate localized threat perceptions into broader high-risk maritime zones, translating tactical developments into systemic market signals. In the wake of repeated conflicts in the Middle East, land-based AShMs have emerged as a distinct risk category within maritime insurance assessments, alongside established threats such as piracy or naval mines.

Insurance markets thus act as amplifiers of localized military signals. Even limited and visible deployments, as well as indications of the acquisition or modernization, of land-based AShMs can generate disproportionate macroeconomic effects. Such actions are incorporated into insurers’ assessments of emerging maritime risk through a feedback loop between perceived threat and commercial behavior. In this dynamic, maritime traffic is redirected not through physical denial, but through the imposition of cost and uncertainty. Over time, this produces not only disruption but a gradual reconfiguration of global shipping routes, as land-based AShMs shape maritime behavior indirectly through economic pressure rather than direct control of sea lines of communication.

From Effects to Strategy: The Political Logic of Selective Sea Denial

The economic effects outlined above are not yet globally diffused in a uniform manner, but are instead mainly concentrated in three regions where land-based AShM capabilities are either already fielded or undergoing sustained modernization: the Middle East, the South China Sea, and the Baltic Sea.

The South China Sea resembles a contested archipelagic space with layered maritime claims. Should a conflict arise there and maritime kill chains — including land-based AShMs — be activated, shipping traffic could still be diverted, as was the case in the Red Sea.

In contrast, the Baltic Sea constitutes a quasi-enclosed maritime corridor with severely constrained routing flexibility, as alternative routes are few — primarily the Kiel Canal and the White Sea-Baltic Canal — and subject to state control. As in the Persian Gulf, disruption to maritime traffic in this region and its associated supply chains would have consequences for the global economy, not primarily through energy exports or trade flows, but through the activation of mutual assistance obligations among European states and the resulting increase in financial market uncertainty.

Building on this systemic exposure, the political significance of land-based AShMs in narrow inland seas lies primarily in their role within escalation dynamics rather than in their direct employment.

Both in the Baltic Sea and in the Persian Gulf prior to the outbreak of the current conflict, these systems remain embedded in broader coastal defense postures of the respective littoral states but continue to be relatively underweighted in crisis planning when compared to more immediately visible instruments of maritime disruption such as warships, naval mines, or naval aviation. Where they are considered, the focus tends to lie on the capabilities of Russia and Iran rather than on those of other regional actors. For instance, the land-based AShM capabilities of Baltic NATO members have so far received comparatively less analytical attention.

The Iranian case nevertheless illustrates that such systems can retain a persistent deterrent effect even under conditions of sustained military pressure, due to their mobility, dispersion, and survivability. Their relevance is therefore not static but contingent, functioning in a manner that can resemble an on/off logic depending on perceived targeting pressure and operational visibility. As such, they can serve as instruments for shaping the order of a maritime space and for exerting coercive pressure in both peacetime and crisis, by enabling a controllable form of escalation.

This is also relevant for Russian strategic considerations in the Baltic Sea, where perceptions of NATO’s qualitative superiority — reinforced by recent Ukrainian tactics and operational innovations in the Black Sea, and concerns about its ‘shadow fleet’ tanker flows — may further incentivize caution in exposing naval assets to comparable attritional dynamics. This translates into land-based AShM deployments in Kaliningrad and around St. Petersburg in the Gulf of Finland, where geographical conditions may generate episodically visible but structurally persistent deterrent effects.

Across these cases, escalation unfolds not as a binary transition but as a staged process, ranging from signaling and sensor deployment to targeting preparation and eventual kinetic employment. Within this framework, the political value of land-based AShMs derives less from their actual use than from their integration into credible escalation pathways that remain visible yet only partially suppressible. This generates a cognitive effect in which perceived survivability and latent operational availability enhance deterrence and coercive leverage even in the absence of engagement.

Selective Sea Denial as a Persistent Condition of Maritime Conflict?

The patterns observed in the Red Sea and the Persian Gulf indicate two transitions. First, they reveal how networked and distributed technologies shape conflict. Second, they demonstrate a shift from episodic disruption to a structurally elevated level of risk in key maritime corridors. Both are defined by the ability to calibrate maritime access through temporally and spatially bounded threats rather than area-wide denial. Looking ahead, other powers, notably China and Russia, may adopt and evolve selective sea denial in regions such as the South China Sea or the Baltic Sea. If this approach becomes a persistent rather than exceptional condition, it is likely to diffuse further as an attractive model of limited escalation under conventional constraint.

The demonstrated effectiveness of land-based AShMs is likely to accelerate their proliferation across multiple channels in the coming years, reinforcing a current structural dilemma for Western militaries. Stand-off strike campaigns and maritime defensive measures have so far proven insufficient to neutralize such capabilities, while the deployment of human ground forces remains politically and operationally unattractive, despite its doctrinal relevance in scenarios such as the South China Sea. This proliferation is likely to be accompanied by operational and doctrinal adaptation, as both state and non-state actors refine how these systems are integrated into broader sensor-to-shooter architectures. As long as traditional arms control and non-proliferation efforts are unlikely to gain traction given the simultaneous offensive and defensive character of these systems, and Western approaches do not overcome risk aversion or find new ways to counter them, they will increasingly have to operate within the constraints of remote and low-visibility forms of warfare.

Restoring the manageability of risk, effective management of the threat will depend less on eliminating elements of land-based AShM systems than on constraining their political utility. Rather than attempting to dismantle the networks in which these systems are embedded, planners must pursue deterrence, resilience, and the protection of critical shipping flows. This requires reducing systemic vulnerabilities to temporally and spatially limited disruptions of global trade, as well as greater resources for managing distributed sensing and engagement demands. Consequently, land-based AShMs should be understood not primarily as tactical enablers, but as relatively easy-to-use instruments of controlled strategic escalation. Accordingly, the strategic focus must shift from targeting platforms to shaping the behavior of the actors and networks that employ them.

Commander Helge Adrians, German Navy, M.A., is a Visiting Fellow at the German Institute for International and Security Affairs.

Featured image: An Iranian Qader missile being fired during an exercise in 2020. (Photo via Fars Media Corporation/Wikimedia Commons)

By Benjamin Massengale

Introduction

Much has been written over the last two decades about how cost-effective naval mine warfare can be for the U.S. Navy in great power war. Mines have demonstrated their utility in the Ukraine conflict by both deterring Russia from executing amphibious landings and interfering with Ukrainian grain exports. China has repeatedly cited it as the “assassin’s mace” and followed through with significant resources to deploy them via traditional means.¹ However, the current focus for American offensive naval minelaying is done either as a prelude to open hostilities, or when the U.S. has uncontested air and/or undersea superiority of the battlespace, an unreasonable assumption to maintain against a peer adversary. The U.S. Navy needs a realistic means to quickly deploy naval mines against a peer adversary in a contested environment.

Current U.S. capabilities to deploy mines are limited. B-52s and F/A-18 aircraft can deploy the Quickstrike mine by air and require suppression of enemy air defenses or uncontested airspace to enable minelaying. Undersea deployment via fast attack submarine or ORCA Extra Large Uncrewed Undersea Vehicle (XLUUV) is constrained by a limited number of proficient units available to conduct the mission, restricted abilities when operating in shallow depths, and comparatively slow time to establish the minefield. At the same time, platform survivability is dependent on not being detected, which is a major assumption against adversaries with modern anti-submarine warfare capabilities. Regaining the ability to deploy mines over the side from surface ships like was done during WWII will be unsuitable against a peer competitor in the missile age unless the vessel has effective protection from attack, is somehow undetected deep in the battlespace, or is deploying them in an area where adversary forces cannot respond in time (essentially an uncontested environment). Helicopter delivery does not offer a better option than already certified air platforms.

Naval mines need a new kind of delivery platform, specifically by either rocket or missile. Mine missiles will be used here to describe this delivery method and differentiate it from rocket-propelled naval mines activated after deployment, like the Chinese EM-52/T-1.

Mine Missile Advantages

Deployment of naval mines by missile significantly speeds up the deployment process, improves the ability to penetrate airspace, and increases the standoff distance between the minelayer and the field, making it the least risky minelaying method. Interpolating from a Naval Postgraduate School (NPS) paper, the fastest means to deploy 40 mines is using two or more B-52 platforms, but it would take over twenty hours to complete (working only at night and accounting for transit time).²

Alternatively, Vertical Launch System (VLS)-equipped platforms (surface, submarine, or land-based) already forward in the region could deploy the same number of mines in less than an hour, significantly minimizing the window for counterattack or detection while restoring more operational flexibility. Just as planners will rely on Tomahawk and other cruise missiles to eliminate the hardest fixed air defenses to lower the risk of losing attack aircraft, the same argument should apply to offensive mining. Missiles are significantly harder to engage than other mining platforms if detected, and the window to stop them before the delivery of their payload is narrow. By making mining more survivable and shifting the delivery mechanism to penetrating missiles, minefields could be laid in areas that would otherwise be inaccessible to traditional delivery platforms.

Possibly the easiest conversion option for a mine-delivered missile would be from existing Anti-Submarine Rockets (ASROC). The current U.S. ASROC system is capable of carrying a 600-pound payload (based on the weight of Mark 54 Torpedo which would put it on par with the MK 62 Quickstrike mine.^3,4 Other nations have ASROC systems with greater throw weight, like the Japanese Type 07 vertical-launch ASROC, which can carry a 700-pound payload (based on the weight of the Type 12 torpedo) to either carry a larger mine or extend the range of mine deployment.⁵

While these may be the easiest to convert, they suffer from significant range limitations compared to other missile systems and were designed to engage individual contacts rather than work as a salvo for minefield placement. Converting ASROC-like mine missile could still be useful for coastal batteries, where defensive minefields can be deployed within territorial waters, negating the need for extended ranges.

A better option against a peer adversary would be a long-range missile system like the existing Tomahawk system. While it has the capability of carrying a 1000-pound payload (equivalent to the MK 63 Quickstrike mine), we should conservatively assume a smaller mine to account for the modifications needed to ensure safe separation from the missile and landing in the water. It still has significant benefits over an ASROC system in that its range is measured in the hundreds of miles, is designed to operate in contested airspace, and the existing strike planning systems could be more easily modified to support minefield planning. Additional value could be gained from a new system if it were possible to develop a missile and mine combination capable of delivering two or more mines per launch. For Tomahawk, this may require not just modifications to the missile but a new mine design with a better form factor to support at least two mines per missile.

Mine missiles would allow any U.S. Navy ship or submarine with VLS capabilities to lay mines, eliminating the need for a dedicated minelaying vessel and greatly expanding the options for delivery platforms. Developing a capability to deliver naval mines via missiles allows more platforms and joint partners to deploy naval mines, including Army and Marine units. Because delivery would be much faster, deploying craft could quickly shift to other tasking or more effectively evade retaliation. Additionally, by expanding mine delivery to VLS, submarines could execute any mining mission both further away from enemy patrols and in deeper waters while making it harder for invading forces to intercept them.

UUVs have been seen as the future of offensive mining, given the reported success of Ukraine’s SeaBaby system in delivering mines against Russian forces.⁶ But UUVs have limits and restrictions that traditional platforms or mine missiles do not have. Small to midsize UUVs are more susceptible to electronic and cyber warfare attacks that can disable them compared to traditional minelayers. Additionally, in the Ukrainian conflict, 60-70 percent of Ukrainian naval drone attacks were self-assessed to be defeated while fewer missile and rocket attacks were intercepted by Russian air defense systems, making a mine missile a more reliable means to reach the target area, especially as empty coastlines or channels are unlikely to be covered by point defenses.⁷

A missile-delivered minefield can be an expensive option to deliver a field, given how the cost of the missile is added to the mine. Using the previously cited NPS paper, using two B-52s to deploy 40 mines will cost about $11.6 million, assuming $88,000 per flight hour.⁸ Considering a single Tomahawk missile costs about $3.8 million (including payload), seeding the same 40 mines would cost $152 million.⁹ Alternatively, using a cheaper missile like the older RUR-5 ASROC at $1.85 million each (after adjusting for inflation) or $74 million for the field would cost less, though it has other operational drawbacks like reduced range.¹⁰ Either option is still cheaper than losing a single aircraft or submarine and related crew if an opponent detects and successfully engages the platform during a mine-laying operation in a contested environment. The loss of an ORCA XLUUV (at an adjusted $124.4 million each) might be more fiscally palatable compared to high-end missiles, however, the limited number of ORCAs expected to join the fleet, the time it takes to bring a new ORCA on station, and the uncertain production plan for replacement units could make their destruction as undesirable as any other platform.¹¹

Concepts of Operation

Developing the mines via missiles allows allied nation coastal batteries under threat of amphibious attack to rapidly reseed an area previously thought cleared. Mines could also be launched against an adversary’s ports to delay the deployment of an invasion fleet without involving other naval units. For added deterrence, coastal mine missile batteries could also be positioned to launch on warning and sow preplanned minefields while causing the enemy to waste ordnance on launchers that have already delivered their payloads, similar to how some nations operationalize nuclear deterrence. These would provide better deterrence against amphibious landings than standard coastal batteries, which could be destroyed by asymmetric platforms before they have the opportunity to engage a target.

The defense of Tawain scenario is an example where mine missiles could be used effectively. As soon as the defenders have indications of PRC attacks, pre-planned minefields are immediately deployed by coastal batteries (ideally by transport-erector-launchers, TELs) either against opposing ports (mustering amphibious forces) or defensively against projected landing locations before the launchers can be destroyed. Any surviving TELs can reposition and reseed the minefields as required.

A possible alternative to the mine missile is conducting missile strikes directly on ships and facilities. However, one of the primary objectives of a minefield is to shape the battlefield and influence enemy psychology, not just eliminate the enemy force. With the proper employment, a limited number of mines properly deployed can redirect forces and remove resupply/repair ports from consideration, or hazard enemy ships more effectively than if those vessels or ports were attacked directly. In WWII, one bomber in October 1943, between two sorties, dropped only six mines, which resulted in two ships destroyed, redirected a convey (allowing it to be mostly destroyed), and closed that port for the rest of the war.¹² In May 1972, 32 mines were dropped into the North Vietnam harbor of Haiphong, a significant shipping hub, under complete observation and anti-aircraft fire. As a result, all shipping through that port was stopped for 300 days.¹³

Both cases show that a modest number of mines were more cost-effective in suppressing enemy operations than a conventional assault because of the deep uncertainty they inflict on the commander’s mind. This effect could be further amplified if a mix of mine missiles and land attack cruise missiles strike a harbor where the adversary is unsure if it shot down a land attack missile or just missed stopping a missile from dropping a mine. Forcing this unknown variable on the enemy commander’s calculations should adequately justify the higher cost to quickly and assuredly deliver the mines in limited quantities.

Iran is already moving in this direction for mine warfare with the Fajr-5 rocket system, demonstrating the ability to deliver naval mines from a coastal launcher in January 2025.¹⁴ Little is known about the type, number, or size of the naval mines that were deployed, though they appear to be floating mines based on an Iranian state video.¹⁵ The Fajr-5 rocket system has a maximum range of approximately 65 nm, which is useful for standoff deployment in territorial seas and confined waters, but is limited to a 198-pound payload.¹⁶ While light compared to U.S. or Chinese naval mines, they are still heavier than diver -delivered limpet mines and could conceivably disable a ship if struck by enough mines from the field. Most importantly, this field could be delivered rapidly and with little warning. Even though the explosive capacity of this mine individually is small, the psychological impact from inflicting minor damage on a small number of merchants could still be enough to force shipping companies to avoid the area. While distressing for nations relying on free transit through the Strait of Hormuz, it does provide an operational example that Taiwan could use in a defensive contingency.

Conclusion

The U.S. Navy does not have a strong mining strategy for operating in a contested environment today against a peer adversary. Current air platforms are too vulnerable against modern air defense systems and require enabling capabilities and operations to reach minelaying areas. Submarines might be capable depending on the circumstances, but the consequences of them being sunk in a contested area would discourage all but the most vital mining operations. UUVs might be a viable strategy eventually, but require a radically different procurement plan to develop them cheap and in mass that has not been observed in the ORCA XLUUV. Iran, an adversary best known for asymmetric power projection, is demonstrating interest in this concept and how it could be done cost effectively. It is time for America and like-minded countries to usher naval mines into the missile age.

Ben Massengale is a Submarine Officer and was the AY25 Visiting Navy Fellow to the Stimson Center. He is a graduate of Texas A&M Galveston and holds a Masters in Defense and Strategic Studies from the Naval War College.

These opinions are expressed in a personal capacity and are not intended to reflect official views or policies of the U.S. Defense Department, the Department of the Navy, or the U.S. government.

References

1. Erickson, Andrew S, William S Murray, and Lyle J Goldstein. 2009. Chinese Mine Warfare: A PLA Navy ‘Assassin’s Mace’ Capability. Newport, Rhode Island: China Maritime Studies Institute, U.S Naval War College. https://digital-commons.usnwc.edu/cmsi-red-books/7/.

2. Holder, John T., IV, Adrew M Murray, Jason P Pinnow, Grant Rodgers, and Samantha Sperry. 2023. ASSET SUITABILITY ASSESSMENT IN SUPPORT OF OFFENSIVE MINING OPERATIONS. Systems Engineering Capstone Report, Monterey: Naval Postgraduate School, 77. https://hdl.handle.net/10945/72545.

3. Lockheed Martin. 2019. “Baseline VLA Product Card.” Lockheed Martin. Accessed March 5, 2025. https://www.lockheedmartin.com/content/dam/lockheed-martin/rms/documents/naval-launchers-and-munitions/Baseline_VLA_Product_Card_8.5x11_042219.pdf.

4. U.S. Navy. 2023. MK 54 – Lightweight Torpedo. November 15. https://www.navy.mil/Resources/Fact-Files/Display-FactFiles/Article/2167937/mk-54-lightweight-torpedo/.

5. The Type 12 Torpedo – Japan’s Latest Submarine Killer. May 12. Accessed March 5, 2025. https://therandomjapan.com/type12-torpedo/.

6. Marson, James. 2024. How Ukraine’s Naval Drones Turned the Tide in the Battle of the Black Sea. June 25. https://www.wsj.com/world/naval-drones-innovation-warfare-ukraine-russia-ce35adfa?st=rreeu9omyfcpc68.

7. Rennolds, Nathan. 2023. Ukraine’s hi-tech naval attack drones have paralyzed Russia’s Black Sea Fleet, spy chief says. Augest 26. Accessed March 13, 2025. https://www.businessinsider.com/ukraine-sea-drones-paralyzed-russia-black-sea-fleet-spy-chief-2023-8.

8. Mizokami, Kyle. 2022. “How Much it Actually Costs to Fly U.S. Military Aircraft.” Popular Mechanics, November 16. https://www.popularmechanics.com/military/aviation/a41956551/cost-per-hour-to-fly-us-military-aircraft/.

9. USD Chief Financial Officer. 2024. Program Acquisition Cost by Weapon System United States Department of Defense Fiscal Year 2025 Budget Request. Department of Defense, Washington: U.S. Government. https://comptroller.defense.gov/Portals/45/Documents/defbudget/FY2025/FY2025_Weapons.pdf.

10. Global Security. 2017. RUR-5 ASROC. June 12. Accessed March 11, 2025. https://www.globalsecurity.org/military/systems/munitions/vla.htm.

11. United States Government Accountability Office. 2022. EXTRA LARGE UNMANNED UNDERSEA VEHICLE Navy Needs to Employ Better Management Practices to Ensure Swift Delivery to the Fleet. Report to Congress, Washington: United States Government Accountability Office, 25. Accessed March 10, 2025. https://www.gao.gov/assets/gao-22-105974.pdf.

12. Greer, William L, and Bartholomew C James. 1982. Psychological Aspects of Mine Warfare. Professional Paper 365, Naval Studies Group, Alexandria: Center for Naval Analyses, 15.

13. Ibid.

14. The Maritime Executive. 2025. https://maritime-executive.com/article/the-naval-show-of-force-that-wasn-t. January 26. https://maritime-executive.com/article/the-naval-show-of-force-that-wasn-t.

15. News Military. 2025. Iran Demonstrates Fajr-5 Rocket Launcher for Sea. Febuary 22. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wGlQe1sRZNY.

16. Army Recognition Group. 2025. Fajr-5 Fadjr-5 333mm MLRS. Febuary 3. https://armyrecognition.com/military-products/army/artillery-vehicles-and-weapons/multiple-launch-rocket-systems/fadjr-5-333mm-iran-uk.

Featured Image: The U.S. Navy Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer USS Mustin (DDG-89) launches an RUM-139 VL-ASROC anti-submarine rocket during a live-fire exercise off Guam. (U.S. Navy photo)