Chinese Naval Base in Seychelles?

It's the price needed to pay for capitalism, the sacrifice of self-sufficiency. China has no choice, regardless if wants to be interventionist or not, its dependence on foreign trade and energy makes it increasingly a necessity IMO. Particularly it is relevant now, with the Chinese suspicion of containment by so-called "Arc of Democracies" masterminded by the US.

plawolf said:

Jeff,

I fail to see how China's non-interference policy would clash with foreign military bases.

If the local government asked China to set up a base, and China did, how is that interfering in the host nation's internal affairs?

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Because this is the polciy they use when talking about America's foreign base strategy.

But I believe, like you do, that it will not interfere, no matter what they call it.

China has foreign interests, like the Somalia anti-pirating missions, and if the need a base and another country is willing, then they shall have one. As long as they are helping things internationally, and protecting their own rights without interfering with others, then I have no problem with it...but unfortunately, (or fortunately actually) you and I are not politicians and can speak directly over the issues without the political double speak, LOL!

MwRYum said:

The problem is: that's just one ship.

It's the same problem with that single big nice new cutter the Philippine just got from US - you need at least 3 to keep at least one on call / on station at any one time, and more to maintain a effective presence.

Then to make it useful they'd need onboard helicopter assets and/or UAV for beyond horizon surveillance, especially when what they're dealing with are fishing-trawler sized motherships with smaller boats on tow, or packs of smaller boats.

Seychelles just can't cough up that much manpower, whether they like it or not.

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Well, I see it more as a PR gesture and a supplement. Assuming China sets up a base/station/depot, unless China deploys a larger flotilla, the current size of two warships, one supply ship will still be needed to run convoys. That leaves nothing at the base to assist Seychelles in their local waters. So though it may be just be one ship, it would supplement the base as well as the existing SCG fleet. (The SCG has four primary operational vessels: the Italian-built Andromache, the Indian-built Topaz, and two Spanish-built Rodman patrol crafts donated by U.A.E.)

You could have a mix of PLAN and Seychelles crew for cross-training on the donated OPV. Ultimately, this all has to make sense for China and Seychelles but I'm merely brainstorming on one potential means of using soft/hard power.

Despite being only one cutter to the Phillipine Navy, I am sure it has increased their capacity tremendously as well as lift morale.

Hahaha, wolf, I almost agree with Geographer this time, word like that (yours) can't cut it, as uncle sam has made those lines of words like breakfast and lunch ever since end of WWII.

However, it is biased to call logistical depot (which mainly "owned" and operated by the host themselves) as what the thread title trying to call - a naval base. Hey, you own a car, you visit a gas station at a rural place which you and 2 other guys called mustafa and sam constitutes their whole customer source. You maybe an important guy to the gas station employees' perspective, but the gas station itself is not yours to own or to command.

Nice try medias of the world, and suck speech Ministry of Defense spokesman! but the yet to come "Seychelles operation" of China is just another typical hype of "The Chinese are coming!"

A possible use of the Seychelles would be to base a few small naval airships there to look for pirates around the Seychelles and to help protect the convoys. They are half as fast as the helicopters but have a much larger endurance and range. It would be a valuable extension of the current convoy system. I don't think PLAN has such airships but they are produced in China in a size that would be usable.

delft said:

A possible use of the Seychelles would be to base a few small naval airships there to look for pirates around the Seychelles and to help protect the convoys. They are half as fast as the helicopters but have a much larger endurance and range. It would be a valuable extension of the current convoy system. I don't think PLAN has such airships but they are produced in China in a size that would be usable.

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I've always been intrigued with the revival of airships for military use. Not like the past but in a 21st century way. Drones seem to be the new "in" thing but I always felt remote controlled airships with an electronics suite could loiter over an area for days if not more. Granted, an airship's service ceiling is much lower but there are areas of operation that are not as hot, piracy patrol is one (monitoring of the US/Mexico border is another). In fact, lining up a few airships over a shipping lane would provide better coverage. Heck, maybe even attaching a smaller drone to a larger airship would enable immediate limited response to a ship in distress.

I agree airships could be very useful for surveillance against a low-tech foe. They would need solar panels, wind turbines, or onboard gas generators to keep enough electricity for all the equipment for days. Radars and live video feeds require a lot of power.

The problem with the proliferation of UAVs is information overload. If they zoom in on a small area for greater detail in order to distinguish pirate skiff from fisherman, they cannot cover much territory. If they zoom out to cover large territory, they lose the ability to distinguish friend from foe. Operators need a lot more eyes or some kind of algorithm to distinguish pirate skiff from fishing boat in real time.

For an unmanned airship the use of hydrogen as a lifting gas can be no problem. Using liquid hydrogen as fuel for fuel cells would also allow you to reduce lift by consuming some of the lifting gas and you can increase lift by adding lifting gas from the fuel tank. As the electricity drives the propulsion motors as well the electronics you can reduce speed slightly to increase power to sensors, processing and communication. Such airship might also be valuable for fishery inspection in the very large economic zones of some countries.
I would put the motor(s) on the aft tip of the ship driving co-axial propellers for increased efficiency and use propeller blades that are controlled in a similar way to the rotor blades of a helicopter to steer the ship horizontally and vertically and avoid the weight and drag of tail fins.