In 2027, China still won't have a large enough Air Force and Missile Force to achieve something like air superiority over all of the 1st Island Chain.
Given how geographically close Japan and the Philippines are to China, it is more important to build up the Chinese Air Force than to build a larger fleet of aircraft carriers for distant operations. Plus any Chinese carriers have to pass through the 1st Island Chain, so you had better have air superiority over these areas before trying to push carriers through.
This also offers an alternative theory of victory. If China can conduct an indefinite air/sea blockade of Japan and the Philippines, they should collapse in a matter of weeks because they are small island(s), but densely populated, with almost no natural resources and likely have their electricity grids under attack.
In comparison, China is geographically the same size as the continental US and could survive indefinitely.
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In terms of costs, my guestimate is <$80 Mn now for a J-20.
So for the cost of a Type-002 and 36 J-15s (54 Bn RMB ($7.7 Bn)), you could buy 3x the number of fighter jets based on land.
Plus these are 5th Gen J-20 stealth fighters, so they are far more effective than 4th Gen J-15s on a carrier.
It doesn't change the overall analysis in terms of availability over a long campaign.
The US would have significantly more carriers available than China, and each of the US carriers would be more capable as well.
Given that China can already achieve an air and sea blockade of Taiwan - the USN is forced to battle its way right up to China's coastline to relieve Taiwan anyway.
That forces the USN to go up against China's land-based Air Force, which is a losing proposition.
Suppose the USN puts together a large carrier group with 4 carriers. That is essentially equivalent to 4 land-based airbases with 200 aircraft. But there are many more airbases and aircraft located in China. And as noted before, the US would be facing a cost disadvantage of at least 3x when using US carrier fighters against Chinese land-based fighters.
I'm quoting from the USN and Royal Navy statements, when I say that naval battles tend to have a catastrophic result for the smaller side.
There was a news article from years ago about the cost of the Type-002 carrier.
And I think you have the PoW cost down incorrectly.
£3.5 Bn = $4.2 Bn = 31 Bn RMB
So the Type-002 would be the same cost as the PoW, not twice as expensive.
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That is plausible, because if 2 PoW costs £7 Bn, that implies the cost of a single carrier would have been £4.4 Bn ($5.5 Bn or 50 Bn). That is based on the shipbuilding rule of thumb where if you double production, you typically see a 20% cost reduction per unit
So if you were to only produce 1 unit of each carrier, the costs would be
Type 002 = 30 Bn RMB
PoW = 50 Bn RMB
Of course. That is why I listed the cost of the airwing on the same line as the carrier.
