On the occasion of the 75th anniversary of the founding of the Chinese People's Liberation Army Navy, the People's Navy's first submarine-themed propaganda film "Hidden in the Deep Sea" was released. This propaganda film, which lasts for 7 minutes and 40 seconds and is particularly well-made, allows us to intuitively feel the superb quality, strong combat effectiveness, and bravery and fearlessness of the officers and men of the PLA Navy in the face of various difficulties and obstacles. On the whole, there are many "easter eggs" in the propaganda video, including a "real combat mission" of the submarine force 2 years ago.
Footage from the promotional video
Footage from the promotional video
According to the disclosure of the propaganda video, a certain unit of the submarine force of the PLA Navy carried out an actual combat mission two years ago, and before the submarine set off, all the crew members had to take pictures in turn, leaving the last photo before they carried out the mission. What is the significance of this move, many people must have guessed. As the saying goes, "the wind is sluggish and the water is cold, and the strong man will never return once he is gone", in order to protect the family and defend the country, groups of Chinese sons and daughters full of blood have never hesitated in the slightest for thousands of years. However, some people may wonder, now is a hard-won era of peace, what will be the actual combat mission carried out by the Navy's submarine force in the era of peace?
PLA Navy submarine forces
We know that submarines that can stealthily and stealthily underwater have a natural high degree of concealment, so even in peacetime, submarines will still be used to perform many tasks that are not suitable for surface ships, such as collecting hydrological intelligence and submarine information in politically and militarily dangerous sea areas, tracking and monitoring the whereabouts of surface ships or submarines of other countries, collecting acoustic signatures and electromagnetic signals of surface ships or submarines of other countries, and actively driving away surface ships or submarines of other countries when necessary.
Submarine underwater warfare
Among them, the first three tasks basically require the submarine to hide itself as much as possible, and it is best to complete it "in a low-key" manner without being detected and return to sea. The last mission is much more "high-profile", because it is to make the deported target realize that it has been exposed, and can only honestly leave the relevant waters. Of course, in this process, when the "potential initiator of the attack" of its own submarine is warned by means of active sonar, it has already revealed its existence and identity to a large extent, and the other party will inevitably be aware of it. But generally speaking, before issuing a warning, your own submarine will first seize the advantageous position to ensure that the situation is favorable to you before turning on sonar, which is a kind of underwater game rules in peacetime.
USS Connecticut, a nuclear submarine of the US Navy
From the perspective of time, the "actual combat mission" disclosed in the promotional video of "Hidden in the Deep Sea" took place 2 years ago. If we recall carefully, in October 2021, about two and a half years ago, there was an incident in the waters of the South China Sea that can be called "global attention", that is, the "underwater collision" of the US Navy's "Seawolf"-class nuclear submarine "Connecticut". In the U.S. Navy's accident investigation report, it identified the accident as "a nuclear submarine traveling at high speed underwater and hitting an undersea mountain that is not marked on the chart."
The bow crashed into the mountain damaged "Connecticut".
It is true that this conclusion is credible, but the US authorities have never responded positively to an important question, that is, why did the US nuclear submarine, which was supposed to be hiding after diving into the waters around China, carry out high-speed maneuvers underwater? You must know that the faster the submarine sails underwater, the louder the noise it emits and the higher the probability of revealing its whereabouts. Therefore, there has always been speculation in the outside world that the "Connecticut" has long been exposed, and it may be to raise its course to get rid of the tracking of China's anti-submarine forces, and then hit the mountain headlong in a "panic".
PLA submarine forces
When it comes to anti-submarine forces, not only our common surface ships and anti-submarine aircraft, but also submarines are one of the effective anti-submarine equipment. Therefore, was the "Connecticut" trying to get rid of the tracking of the PLA nuclear submarines? I am afraid that the truth of the matter will not be declassified for many years. But it is precisely for this reason that we should never easily rule out the possibility of PLA submarines performing such "real combat missions". In the cold and quiet deep sea, the submarine force of the People's Navy always guards the integrity of the country's territorial sovereignty, and the merits and contributions of these officers and men of the Navy deserve to be remembered forever.