A unit of the PLA Navy recently organized a confrontation exercise under close-to-real-combat situation by dividing its troops into the "Red Army" and "Blue Army". The reporter saw at the command post of a submarine chasers formation of the "Red Army" that, although the "Blue Army" did all it could, the "Red Army", by adopting flexible and changeable fighting methods, succeeded in pinning down its opponent in a anti-submarine area within a radius of several nautical miles.
Not long after the commencement of the exercise, the wind power increased to level 5 whereas the sea wave was as high as 2 meters. The inclement weather had added new difficulty to anti-submarine operation. Commander of the submarine chaser group immediately ordered the formation to form a searching formation and formed a blockade line of several nautical miles long on the sea. After nearly 2 hours of repeated contention of strength and resourcefulness between the two sides, the "enemy" submarine eventually failed to escape.
The first-rate anti-submarine capability stems from the repeated training at peacetime. In recent years, as submarines in the world have become more and more advanced, the group has increased the difficulty and intensity in its training of its troops while at the same time strived hard to build up the overall quality of its officers and men. It lays emphasis on making innovation in training and strives to make breakthrough in fighting method applications. So far it has innovated 14 fighting methods, by which it has effectively upgraded the overall anti-submarine capability of its troops.
By Hu Zhihua
(Apr. 27, PLA Daily)
