Underground warfare could challenge China’s early-warning reliance on satellites and ground-based radars, think tank says
2-MIN READ2-MIN ListenLiu ZhenPublished: 9:30pm, 30 Jul 2026The United States could be developing underground warfare powers and China should guard against the potential threat to its national security, Chinese think tanks have warned.As drones and precision-guided weapons increasingly dominate ground combat in conflicts, military theorists are exploring the strategic potential of subterranean space as a possible dimension of future warfare.Palmer Luckey, founder of defence technology company Anduril, has promoted the concept of a “subterrene” – a vehicle capable of moving through the Earth’s crust in much the same way that submarines navigate under water.
The open-source military technology analysis platform Guodong Think Tank said in a report that should the subterrene concept materialise, it could present an “unprecedented” challenge to China’s long-standing defence strategy which relies heavily on geographic depth and natural terrain.
Such capabilities could enable an enemy to bypass China’s mountainous southwestern and northwestern border regions to directly reach the hinterland through underground tunnels, hugely undermining the country’s geographic advantages.
China’s existing early-warning systems rely on satellites, ground-based radars and signal sensors.
