PLA Navy news, pics and videos

I think the future number of Chinese navy ships depends very much on China's defence doctrine and perceived threat to China from the seaward sides.

Thus rather than keeping on building ships at current rates or at a slightly lower rates than we are seeing today, I am expecting the building rate to slow down considerably after a few years from now. One obvious reason is that before the current spike in ship building, most of PLAN ships were out-dated type 051 DDGs and type 053 FFGs that were needed to be replaced urgently.

Thus after all these obsolete ships have been replaced, and also after all needed escorts and auxiliary support ships for current and future aircraft carriers have been built, the future naval ship buildings rates will be basically based on replacing ships that are retiring from active service. This is the expected scenario if the current external threat does not escalate.

Having 50 to 60 DDGs and 60 to 80 FFGs is more than sufficient, unless a global scale war is expected to be unavoidable, or China decided to become a global policeman.

lcloo said:

... or China decided to become a global policeman.

Click to expand...

China has chosen to be a global economic power. And to protect this economic power, China is building a global navy.

PLAN's large training ship returning to port.

(2048 × 1365)

Since 2017 JNCX and DL have done

12 x Type 052D
6 x Type 055

Total 18 with 150,000 tons launched

thats 50% more tonnage than Bath Iron Works and Ingalls did with Areligh Burke programme in 1990s which saw the fastest pace

however the American shipyards have done it for a longer prolonged time since 1988 to be specific

Let’s see how 2020-2030 is for Chinese shipbuilding

if the last 5 years are anything to go by the next years will will be the Chinese up the tempo

would anyone comment on "the fourth generation of destroyers"

context is
China's first Type 055 destroyer Nanchang commissioned
Xinhua| 2020-01-12 13:20:52

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and I'm curious what would be attributes of "the fourth generation of destroyers", specifically

(please don't tell me the fourth gen destroyers were preceded by the third gen or something like that)

3 x Type 055 + 5 x Type 052D

Ammo handling and loading.

Did not know where to post this but here is a relatively recent count of the PLAN by numbers per shiptype and tonnage in commission via horobeyo on twitter. Total tonnage right now at about 2.1 million tons in service.

The 33rd and 34th Gulf of Aden task forces sailing together. All images are high-resolution.