"In October 2006, a Chinese Song-class submarine evading escorting vessels of the American Kitty Hawk carrier battle group, surfacing 8km away and within torpedo range of the huge aircraft carrier itself. The ripples from this event reached all the way to the Pentagon, and since then China's naval forces have continued to make waves around the world. Several recent episodes in the development of the People's Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) are causing furrowed brows of U.S. military officials, including its first ever long-range operational deployment."