055 DDG Large Destroyer Thread

[AndrewS]

China might be looking at a base in Vanuatu, because OBOR isn't just, on the sea side, to Africa and the Middle East, but also to Latin America, with China's growing economic links to Brazil, Argentina, Venezuela, and the rest of the continent. OBOR is going to be a global belt, with the land routes to Central Asia, Russia, Europe and the Middle East, sea based routes to the Middle East and Africa, and a sea based routes to Latin America, which by the way, is also a major supplier of food stuffs to China in a scale that rivals the US.

I believe that China is increasingly looking at itself as the maintainer of the global mercantile order that the US is now abandoning with its isolationist, protectionist policies. It is also moving into the position what a true symmetrical naval power is all about. By symmetrical I mean the three pillars, only one of which is military naval power, the other pillar is the merchant navy, and the third pillar, the shipbuilding industry. The US has lost two of these, although strongly holding on to one.

Historically the world's largest seaborne trading nation ends up building the world's largest navy to protect that trade.

And we see China moving up the value chain with an exceptionally high level of R&D spending (2.1% Of GDP), which no other middle-income country is anywhere near, and which places China in the company of high-income hi-tech countries. In the next 5-10 years, we should see China start spending more on R&D than the USA.

So whilst China is still somewhat protectionist now, soon it will have domestic hi-tech global companies that can stand on their own, in every industry.

So yes, it will be in China's interests to maintain the global mercantile order, as the USA finds that it doesn't benefit from it as much as China does.

 

[AndrewS]

The two 052s were refitted not too long ago. I don't think they will be retired even 10 years from now, but they might be doing training duties. The 051B has recently came out of its refit, and the four Project 956s will be heading for refits. I expect the two 052Bs to follow for refits as well.

The naval budget is sure to rise over the years, as the defense budget will, even if it will just follow 2% of the GDP, which continues to grow each year. By the 2030s, China's growth potential isn't close to being fully used up, given its reservoir of cheap labor and a growing massive middle class, and at some point, China's defense budget will grow to meet and then exceed that of the US as its GDP exceeds the US in absolute dollar terms (it already exceeds the US in PPP terms.)

Then the problem becomes, what are they going to do with all these so many ships.

If we go with Chinese military spending of 2% of GDP, then in 10 years time, the Chinese Navy will likely still be significantly smaller than the US Navy. However, China will be able to offset this with land-based aircraft and missiles in the Western Pacific. Plus the USA has to reserve forces for other theatres.

So China won't be in the position of having too many ships, as it would still want to secure its far seas trade routes. Plus a significantly larger Chinese navy means China can get what it wants without a war, simply by overawing Taiwan/Japan/SK.

In the 19th century, the Royal Navy faced the same problem with the rapidly growing US Navy, whose construction was fueled by the much larger US economy.

 

[hkbc]

If we go with Chinese military spending of 2% of GDP, then in 10 years time, the Chinese Navy will likely still be significantly smaller than the US Navy. However, China will be able to offset this with land-based aircraft and missiles in the Western Pacific. Plus the USA has to reserve forces for other theatres.

So China won't be in the position of having too many ships, as it would still want to secure its far seas trade routes. Plus a significantly larger Chinese navy means China can get what it wants without a war, simply by overawing Taiwan/Japan/SK.

In the 19th century, the Royal Navy faced the same problem with the rapidly growing US Navy, whose construction was fueled by the much larger US economy.

It's always difficult to predict the future, the Chinese seem to have worked out a Naval plan for where they need to be and how to get there in the next 15 to 20 years. The same can't really be said for the US which has had budgetary issues (famine to feast) and a fair few self inflicted errors of late. In the next decade its unlikely the Chinese will have a larger Navy than the US using just build rate but if current/future US governments continue to waste their defence dollars in the same manner they have been for a decade or more (expensive programs that don't yield enough ships) and don't show some general fiscal discipline (how big is that deficit again!) then it might be the case that the US fleet size ends up moving down towards the Chinese one rather than the Chinese one racing upwards to catch it.

BTW think you either have the century or Navy wrong the Royal Navy was never concerned with the size of the US Navy in the 19th Century, they viewed it with the kind of distain that the US Navy viewed the Chinese one in the 20th Century, Mahan didn't publish till 1890 and the two-power standard enacted in the 1889 Naval Defence Act was to counter France and Russia then the 2nd and 3rd largest Navies.

 

[AndrewS]

It's always difficult to predict the future, the Chinese seem to have worked out a Naval plan for where they need to be and how to get there in the next 15 to 20 years. The same can't really be said for the US which has had budgetary issues (famine to feast) and a fair few self inflicted errors of late. In the next decade its unlikely the Chinese will have a larger Navy than the US using just build rate but if current/future US governments continue to waste their defence dollars in the same manner they have been for a decade or more (expensive programs that don't yield enough ships) and don't show some general fiscal discipline (how big is that deficit again!) then it might be the case that the US fleet size ends up moving down towards the Chinese one rather than the Chinese one racing upwards to catch it.

BTW think you either have the century or Navy wrong the Royal Navy was never concerned with the size of the US Navy in the 19th Century, they viewed it with the kind of distain that the US Navy viewed the Chinese one in the 20th Century, Mahan didn't publish till 1890 and the two-power standard enacted in the 1889 Naval Defence Act was to counter France and Russia then the 2nd and 3rd largest Navies.

I should have been more specific about the time period I was referring to, which was the late-19th century

That was when US passed the UK to become the world's leading industrial nation (28% larger in the year 1900 as per Kennedy), yet US industry was still booming.

So the Royal Navy flatly refused to prepare contingency plans for a naval war against the USA, because the admirals knew it would be a losing proposition given the latent industrial capacity of the USA to produce more warships than the UK. There's historical documentation to that effect. It also leaves aside how Canada shared a long and vulnerable land border with the USA.

And on a factual note, in 1890 (just after the 1889 Naval Defence Act which mandated the 2 power standard), the largest warship tonnages after the UK were France (180K tons) and then Italy/USA (both at approx 242K tons each). Then it was Russia as the 5th largest (180K tons).

 

[antiterror13]

deleted

 

[Tam]

If we go with Chinese military spending of 2% of GDP, then in 10 years time, the Chinese Navy will likely still be significantly smaller than the US Navy. However, China will be able to offset this with land-based aircraft and missiles in the Western Pacific. Plus the USA has to reserve forces for other theatres.

So China won't be in the position of having too many ships, as it would still want to secure its far seas trade routes. Plus a significantly larger Chinese navy means China can get what it wants without a war, simply by overawing Taiwan/Japan/SK.

In the 19th century, the Royal Navy faced the same problem with the rapidly growing US Navy, whose construction was fueled by the much larger US economy.

Currently the Chinese Navy already has more ships than the US Navy, on the other hand the US Navy far outweighs the Chinese Navy in terms of tonnage.

Other brute oversimplication measures of power include the number of aircraft and helicopters, the number of VLS and missile launchers. The US should be ahead of both, with China coming second globally. There was at one point the Russians were ahead of China in tonnage but that was overtaken.

 

[AndrewS]

Currently the Chinese Navy already has more ships than the US Navy, on the other hand the US Navy far outweighs the Chinese Navy in terms of tonnage.

Other brute oversimplication measures of power include the number of aircraft and helicopters, the number of VLS and missile launchers. The US should be ahead of both, with China coming second globally. There was at one point the Russians were ahead of China in tonnage but that was overtaken.

In the old days, tonnage used to be directly correlated with the amount of armour and gun armament.

Now, VLS and missile launchers and the missiles count in terms of lethality. And I would that electronics matters equally as much. These don't really correlate with tonnage.

But going forward, we're moving away from a situation of small numbers of highly capable ships being the optimal structure. Instead large numbers of lower-cost and lower-capability networked ships and/or autonomous drones will determine the lethality of a navy.

 

[Gloire_bb]

In the 19th century, the Royal Navy faced the same problem with the rapidly growing US Navy, whose construction was fueled by the much larger US economy.

Only it was 20th century, not 19th.

To be precise, it really became serious in late 1910s.

So the Royal Navy flatly refused to prepare contingency plans for a naval war against the USA, because the admirals knew it would be a losing proposition given the latent industrial capacity of the USA to produce more warships than the UK.

More than the British Empire till the end of the ww1?
Unlikely. Industrial output is fine, but industrial output couldn't be readily converted into capital ships(which is why they're capital ships to begin with), and the UK just had more of these than anyone else.
It's economy was crumbling, though.

 

[plawolf]

Pure spending is going to be a poor measurement of fleet power.

Not only would China enjoy a PPP multiplier, it is leagues ahead in terms of budgetary discipline and cost control.

Although to be fair to the USN, their recent procurement disasters have largely been the result of comprehensive complacency at the political and naval command levels.

After the demise of the USSR, the USN has become largely a solution looking for a problem.

Without a clear threat to counter, and with unrivalled dominance, both the political and naval leadership suffered from perverse incentives, whereby the political leadership started looking at naval contracts as a juicy source of funds and jobs and their main priority became how best to pork barrel off those contracts. OTOH, for the naval leadership, their biggest preoccupation became how to defend their budgets and spend what they have been allocated to avoid creating possible reasons for future budget cuts.

Thus, they favoured big, flashy, sexy looking and sounding projects designed to capture the imagination of the politicans and voters, and so threw concerns about cost effectiveness out the window.

These are nasty habits to kick, but far from insurmountable. However, I suspect it will require a bit of a system shock to get everyone (or enough) in the US on board about the need to curtail the excesses of the past and move back to sound and cost effective project selection and management.

The big question is just how big a shock is needed to convince enough in the US to give up their current personal/political beneficial arrangements in favour of the national greater good.

Going by past form, it is going to take quite something, but it is still a possibility, and a reason why China has been seeking to avoid direct military showdowns as much as possible to avoid highlighting the extent of the narrowing gap.

Although that too is changing, as the recent naval review shows.

With bullyboy Trump, it is hard to downplay your strengths as he will just perceive weakness and seek to take advantage.

Beijing has evidently concluded a show of force to deter Trump is preferable to have to use force to defend yourself from his unwise advances.

 

[AndrewS]

Only it was 20th century, not 19th.

To be precise, it really became serious in late 1910s.

More than the British Empire till the end of the ww1?
Unlikely. Industrial output is fine, but industrial output couldn't be readily converted into capital ships(which is why they're capital ships to begin with), and the UK just had more of these than anyone else.
It's economy was crumbling, though.

No, I did mean the 19th century. By 1900, the US had a larger industrial sector (and economy) than the British Empire. Plus the US was still in the middle of a boom.

Industrial output ultimately is convertible into capital warships. It just takes a few years.

And in 1914, the UK economy wasn't crumbling. Average per capita income in the UK was still growing and was second only to the USA. France and Germany were much lower still in terms of incomes. But the UK was clearly suffering from overstretch as it was no longer alone.

The US economy had grown 3x larger than the UK and the Germany economy had also grown larger by 10% as well