POLITICO NATSEC Daily, September 21, 2026
China’s military has added sabotage of undersea telecommunication cables in the Indo-Pacific to its toolkit of tactics to disrupt communications traffic between U.S. allies and partners in the region, according to a new report by the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission and the nonprofit China Strategic Risks Institute, seen first by NatSec Daily.
Beijing is developing a range of crewed and uncrewed systems that its military can deploy to damage cables that link the U.S. with Taiwan, Japan, the Philippines and the U.S. territory of Guam, said the report. Alongside the report, the two organizations are launching a Trans-Pacific Cable Gray Zone Vulnerability Index , a visual tool mapping cables most vulnerable to possible Chinese sabotage.
Taiwan cable links have suffered damage repeatedly since 2023 in incidents that suggest possible sabotage .
“Politicizing and securitizing submarine cable issues does not contribute to global connectivity or cybersecurity,” Chinese embassy spokesperson LIU CHANG told NatSec Daily in response to the report’s findings.
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