China’s maritime robotics narrative is not a single innovation but a pattern. Over the last several years Beijing’s industrial and academic ecosystem has stitched together demonstrations in three complementary directions: large autonomous motherships that host mixed drone fleets, increasingly capable armed and sensorised unmanned surface vessels, and the software primitives for coordinated swarms. Each development matters on its own. Taken together they signal a deliberate exploration of how inexpensive, networked maritime robots can reconfigure the geometry of naval power.

The most visible elements are concrete. Small and medium USVs have proliferated in Chinese industry and research labs. Startups such as Yunzhou Tech moved early from civilian tasks like water quality monitoring to nearshore security craft and publicised high-profile demonstrations of coordinated formations, sometimes described in Chinese media as “shark swarms.” Those displays, first widely reported in 2018 and revisited in later company and state outlets, showed dozens of craft manoeuvring in formation for survey, escort and interception tasks. The developer rhetoric emphasises cooperative confrontation modes that can “besiege and expel” intruding vessels. Operationally this is dual use. Techniques for coordinated navigation and distributed sensing are as useful for marine science as they are for asymmetric harassment. (See reporting on Yunzhou Tech demonstrations and interviews in regional press.)

At the other end of the scale China has shown larger combat-oriented USV prototypes that blur the line between a patrol boat and a remote weapon station. Models presented publicly and trialled since 2018 and 2019 included platforms equipped with phased-array radars, electro optical suites, vertical launch cells and even torpedo tubes on a much smaller hull than a conventional corvette. One such design was widely described in Western media as a small, multi-role unmanned combatant during sea trials in 2019 and 2020. These platforms are not yet replacements for major surface combatants, but they are purposefully modular. The intent is clear: provide additional distributed sensors and weapons, especially in littoral zones where numbers and persistence matter more than the punch of a single platform.

Between the extremes sits an especially important Chinese contribution: the notion of an unmanned mothership. In mid 2022 Chinese press and industry reporting described the launch of a large autonomous research vessel designed to carry and launch dozens of aerial, surface and submersible unmanned vehicles. The vessel’s stated ambitions were scientific. But the architecture is precisely what a navy would want for persistent, networked operations across the undersea, surface and air domains. From a systems perspective it is an envelope for live testing of distributed command, control and shared sensing over large maritime areas.

How should Western navies read these moves? First, they should not be surprised. The technical elements on display are the predictable result of cheaper sensors, better autonomy software and economies of scale in small craft construction. More important is recognizing the operational logic: a distributed, attritable layer of unmanned systems amplifies surveillance and forces an opponent to expend high-value munitions to defeat low-cost nodes. That is both a tactical headache and a strategic lever.

Western responses have three complementary strands: experimentation and force design, countermeasures and doctrine, and legal and diplomatic measures.

1) Experimentation and force design. The United States and allied navies accelerated experimentation with their own USVs and unmanned architectures. The United States in particular transitioned demonstrator programs into fleet experimentation. Programs such as the DARPA ACTUV Sea Hunter effort and later the Department of Defense Ghost Fleet Overlord initiative sought to prove long endurance autonomous transits and integration with fleet command and control. By 2021 and into 2022 Overlord prototypes completed long, largely autonomous transits and were formally transitioned for further naval experimentation. These steps matter because they are less about one platform than about developing doctrine for manned and unmanned teams, distributed lethality and persistent surveillance. The West is not merely mirroring hardware; it is probing how to operationalise autonomy safely and coherently alongside complex rules of engagement and international maritime law.

2) Countermeasures and layered defence. The growth of commercially available small USVs and swarm tactics forces practical countermeasures at the ship level and in the task force. Electronic warfare, robust communications security and scalable C2 architectures are immediate priorities because many cheap platforms rely on radio links and GNSS. Hard-kill options remain necessary. The trend is toward layered defences where human crews and AI-enabled sensors decide when to jam, physically intercept or engage. Equally important are land and shore-based measures that deny adversaries sanctuary for operating or testing such systems.

3) Law, norms and alliance politics. Western response is not purely military. Beijing’s use of ostensibly civilian platforms for dual use activities complicates legal remedies. Diplomatically the West has debated stronger norms to prevent destabilising uses of autonomous maritime platforms. Building collective anticipatory strategies with allies and partners who face immediate exposure in the Western Pacific is an essential part of deterrence by denial.

Assessment and hazards

China’s successes are real but bounded. Demonstrations of swarming and mothership concepts show technical competence but not yet a mature, fully autonomous kill chain operating in contested, GPS-denied or heavily jammed electromagnetic environments. At present the more credible Chinese advantage is operational concept and scale: numbers of small boats and the readiness of a commercial-industrial base to produce and adapt them quickly.

The West’s vulnerabilities are organisational as much as technical. Democracies must reconcile the need for rapid acquisition and iterative experimentation with procurement rules and legal oversight. They must also avoid the temptation to fetishise autonomy as a cure for strategic imbalance. Platforms alone will not generate decisive advantage. Doctrine, secure networks and logistics that sustain dispersed operations will determine whether unmanned fleets are a force multiplier or a collection of expensive prototypes.

Ethical and strategic reflection

We should not let novelty obscure enduring political questions. Unmanned maritime systems lower the threshold for persistent surveillance and harassment. They allow less risk to friendly sailors and operators, but that risk displacement can increase temptation for coercive uses below the threshold of open war. A shipping lane shadowed by unmanned craft is a different political environment than one patrolled by conventional warships. The ethics of delegating surveillance and, in future, lethal effect to machines at sea demand immediate attention. We need allied discussions not only about capability but about constraints and verification.

Policy prescriptions for Western actors

  • Invest in integration, not just platforms. The West should prioritise open architectures, common data standards and shared C2 so allied unmanned assets can operate coherently. Demonstrators are useful only when their outputs feed decision cycles.

  • Harden the kill chain and communications. Jamming resilient comms, anti-spoofing for navigation and robust electronic warfare tools are urgent priorities to blunt the effectiveness of low-cost swarm tactics.

  • Scale experiments in realistic conditions. Long endurance autonomous transits and exercises with manned task groups are necessary to reveal brittle points in autonomy and command arrangements.

  • Lead on norms. Democracies should initiate diplomatic efforts to clarify acceptable uses for autonomous maritime systems and to create avenues for transparency. Without a normative frame, dual-use maritime robotics will expand in a contest of ambiguity.

Conclusion

China has not produced a revolutionary singular weapon at sea. It has, however, advanced multiple complementary strands of maritime autonomy that—when combined—move the strategic problem. The West must respond with a mixture of technical investment, doctrinal change and political governance. The uncomfortable truth is that the contest over the character of future naval warfare is already partly decided by those who can experiment fastest and learn publicly. If democracies allow legal process and procurement orthodoxy to ossify into paralysis, they will surrender learning advantage. Conversely, if they match prudence with speed and anchor experiments in clear policy, they can shape a maritime future where human judgement, allied interoperability and legal restraint govern the use of robotic force at sea.