Why China’s drone fleets should shift our defence thinking

China unveils the Zhu Hai Yun in a ceremony held last month. Picture: Screengrab/YouTube

Many labour under the illusion that drone wars belong to a galaxy far away, with apologies to Star Wars. Yet they are here and operating on our doorstep, in possibly menacing terms. It’s time we paid far greater notice, in the context of fraught Australia-China relations, beyond recent aerial and traditional naval tensions.

Defence Minister Richard Marles rightly identifies bridging the defence capability gap as “just about the No.1 priority” for his portfolio. He was referring to the 20-plus year gap between the identified need for submarines and expected earliest delivery. However, the gap already may be wider than many appreciate.

On May 18, the Chinese Communist Party launched a new class of ship: a semi-autonomous drone carrier, the Zhu Hai Yun (or Pearl Sea Cloud). The Zhu Hai Yun carries a fleet of surface, air and underwater drones. It comes just a year after China’s Zhong­tian Feilong first tested an airborne autonomous drone carrier.

The technology piloting China’s new ship is termed the Intelligent Mobile Ocean Stereo Observing System; its development kickstarted in 2019. Construction of the ship began less than a year ago. It’s on the water, being tested.

The drone capabilities of the Zhu Hai Yun (below right) are shown in sequences from an animated video. Pictures: Screengrab/YouTube

It is built by the state-owned China State Shipbuilding Corporation at its Huangpu Wenchong Shipyard in Guangzhou and is owned by Southern Marine Science and Engineering Guangdong Laboratory (Zhuhai). China Daily describes it as a government-run lab jointly managed by the China Shipbuilding Industry Corporation, China National Offshore Oil Corporation and Guangdong Ocean University.

In essence, the Zhu Hai Yun is a large self-driving yacht (remote pilots are required for parking) that carries dozens of smaller autonomous drones for oceanic surveillance. The aim is for mass deployment of drones across air, surface and submarine domains.

It means China soon will be able to monitor large areas of ocean, above and below the surface, in our region with limited risk or effort.

This way of thinking about drones is different to what we have seen from the recent Ukrainian deployment of Turkish Bayraktars or the US Predators. China’s approach is more focused on swarms of relatively low-cost drones. Because they are controlled by artificial intelligence, they operate collectively.

Their effectiveness is demonstrated in simple applications, such as light shows that China has been operating for several years, where thousands of drones create highly complex and dynamic formations that make fireworks look prehistoric.

The Zhu Hai Yun multi-domain drone carrier is labelled a research vessel intended to contribute to “marine scientific research and marine economy development”. But its owner is a state-owned body and the “mother ship” has military capability.

Initial missions are likely to focus on surveillance and oceanic mapping, with dozens of drones collecting data over a far wider area than a single ship could achieve. Mapping the ocean will help with identifying resources.

The ship also may play a role in offshore wind farm maintenance. But it also will help identify likely routes between Australia and the South or East China seas where Western navy vessels (including submarines) may operate. If called on to support Japan, South Korea or Taiwan, large swarms of surveillance drones may be difficult to pass undetected.

Capabilities are not limited to surveillance, however. Ukraine already is making effective use of US-made Switchblade “kami­kaze” drones. These are essentially video-guided grenades that hover and fly very quickly with a range of about 80km: capable enough to destroy a truck or a tank, depending on the model, and small enough to avoid air defence systems. A few thousand such drones operating as a co-ordinated swarm is something the CCP likely already has or could develop quickly.

These developments raise serious questions for Australia’s short and long-term defence capability planning. The types of nuclear-powered submarines discussed in relation to AUKUS cost several billion dollars each and are not expected to be built for at least two decades. But large fleets of autonomous submarine drones could potentially neutralise the stealth advantage that is assumed in defence planning.

While it is likely that swarm counter-methods will be developed, we need more open discussions about our nation’s options as we begin a possible $100bn, 20-year project that will need to provide capabilities that remain viable as far ahead as 2090.

The US nuclear submarine, PCU Virginia. Picture: File

AUKUS was announced as an advanced technology sharing arrangement, not just a contract for subs. Australia should embrace these emerging technologies, including AI and distributed defence platforms. The government can enhance partnerships with the university sector. For instance, the Australian Institute for Machine Learning is a world-leading research centre in autonomous technology. We should invest in our own research and innovation, and not be shy about directing it to meet our needs (including limiting sensitive technology exports), or our capability gaps will widen.

At the least, Australia needs to be aware that the rapid pace of technological change demands that our defence forces frequently verify our strategic assumptions and build in a degree of flexibility and adaptiveness so our plans do not become obsolete before they’re even complete.

National security is bipartisan terrain. It’s time we thought more amphibiously and quickly.

Nick Dyrenfurth and Dominic Meagher are, respectively, executive director and deputy director of the John Curtin Research Centre.