PLA Navy news, pics and videos

ismellcopium said:

Was it elaborated on which specific ships/components of the PLAN this most affects? Eg for the newest built 052Ds/055s will there be a significant lag after commissioning until they're combat ready?

Honestly I find it a bit surprising the emphasis they're placing on this apparent problem, when the USN has not/did not seem to experience a similar bottleneck despite a larger fleet & smaller population.

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FriedRiceNSpice said:

The USN never underwent expansion at such a rapid pace - the USN was always big. The more trained personnel you already have, the faster you can train additional personnel.

Though I am surprised that the PLAN could not foresee this bottleneck in advance.

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We've heard of Yang Wei (Chief Designer of J-20) mentioning about the higher-ups of the PLA(AF) initial underestimation of the F-35's annual production rates before.

So yeah, sometimes it does happen. What matters more is whether they can remedy and rectify the problems as quickly and as effectively as possible.

FriedRiceNSpice said:

Did they discuss measures being taken to address this deficiency? Is PLAN expanding recruitment efforts?

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Yes—like transferring crew from other ships. Addressing this requires more than just a few measures, an overall systematic approach. And part of issue is with the higher-ranking personnel such as ship captains, people who have 10 to 20 years of experience. At a certain point, they just need more time

One example they gave is the 4th Type 075. They suspect that a shortage of personnel is one reason it hasn’t been commissioned yet. They also noted that finding new crew isn’t straightforward, and that transferring experienced crew from other ships, which they think will happen, results in a decrease in combined performance. I.e. if you replace half of a ship’s existing crew with new personnel, the ship doesn’t become 50% as effective, it becomes even less

ismellcopium said:

Was it elaborated on which specific ships/components of the PLAN this most affects? Eg for the newest built 052Ds/055s will there be a significant lag after commissioning until they're combat ready?

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They specified submarines and the aforementioned 075. Other comments suggest the effect is uneven across platforms, but nothing particularly specific was highlighted

ismellcopium said:

Honestly I find it a bit surprising the emphasis they're placing on this apparent problem, when the USN has not/did not seem to experience a similar bottleneck despite a larger fleet & smaller population.

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They did mention the USN during WWII, but they noted the difference. While it's true that perhaps the USN had combatants operating at "50% effectiveness", the opponents they faced weren't much better. This is not the case for the PLAN as we are facing the most powerful navy in the world from the get-go.

FriedRiceNSpice said:

Though I am surprised that the PLAN could not foresee this bottleneck in advance.

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They pointed out how this was basically impossible to foresee for the higher ranking personnel. Imagine it’s the year 2000: your country is poor, your best ships are those old Russian ones, and you go to your superior and say "we need to retain all these people because in 15 years we’ll undergo one of the largest naval build-ups in human history"

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I just want to be clear in case my wording is giving a wrong impression. It's not like this is a massive debuff and the PLAN is 30% less effective or something. But rather, it's something to take very seriously and be kept in mind.

I've always felt that more attention should be given to the human side of the PLA. It's partially rather difficult to observe, and partially quite boring as watching the "people things" isn't as fun as analyzing shiny new hardware. But at the end of the day, a military is still made up of people

00CuriousObserver said:

Yes—like transferring crew from other ships. Addressing this requires more than just a few measures, an overall systematic approach. And part of issue is with the higher-ranking personnel such as ship captains, people who have 10 to 20 years of experience. At a certain point, they just need more time

One example they gave is the 4th Type 075. They suspect that a shortage of personnel is one reason it hasn’t been commissioned yet. They also noted that finding new crew isn’t straightforward, and that transferring experienced crew from other ships, which they think will happen, results in a decrease in combined performance. I.e. if you replace half of a ship’s existing crew with new personnel, the ship doesn’t become 50% as effective, it becomes even less



They specified submarines and the aforementioned 075. Other comments suggest the effect is uneven across platforms, but nothing particularly specific was highlighted



They did mention the USN during WWII, but they noted the difference. While it's true that perhaps the USN had combatants operating at "50% effectiveness", the opponents they faced weren't much better. This is not the case for the PLAN as we are facing the most powerful navy in the world from the get-go.



They pointed out how this was basically impossible to foresee for the higher ranking personnel. Imagine it’s the year 2000: your country is poor, your best ships are those old Russian ones, and you go to your superior and say "we need to retain all these people because in 15 years we’ll undergo one of the largest naval build-ups in human history"

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I just want to be clear in case my wording is giving a wrong impression. It's not like this is a massive debuff and the PLAN is 30% less effective or something. But rather, it's something to take very seriously and be kept in mind.

I've always felt that more attention should be given to the human side of the PLA. It's partially rather difficult to observe, and partially quite boring as watching the "people things" isn't as fun as analyzing shiny new hardware. But at the end of the day, a military is still made up of people

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Sigh. Even a country with such a massive population (and pool of young adults) is faced with such recruitment issues. Even more so would be the problem becoming worse with the aging population.

Either the PLAN needs to take further steps in dealing with the recruitment side of things, or becomes more radical with integrating greater degrees of automation and intelligentization on her warships and equipment than they have ever been - Rivalling, if not even more aggressive than the JMSDF.

Preferably both, of course. And this issue likely isn't isolated to the PLAN, either.

ACuriousPLAFan said:

Sigh. Even a country with such a massive population (and pool of young adults) is faced with such recruitment issues.

Either the PLAN needs to take some further steps in dealing with the recruitment side of issues, or become more aggressive with adapting automation and intelligentization on her warships and equipment than they have ever been - Perhaps even more aggressive than the Japanese.

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Well even if you recruit people now, it'll take a minimum of 10-15 years before the current crop of cadets can become captains. Doesn't sound like the issue is with enlisted sailors, as in that case the PLAN can quickly recruit from the CSG or merchant marine. The bottleneck lays with experienced senior officers, which is impossible to remedy in a short span of time. Hopefully the PLAN's s significant qualitative advantage in terms of cadets can translate to at least somewhat less time needed for these cadets to mature into experienced officers.

I think the problem with naval personnel is that they do not have experienced high level personnel with understanding on advance naval technology rather than PLAN's ability to recruit and train more people.

All older personnels, including captains and senior ranks from type 51, type 052 and type 053 era will find it hard to adjust their skills and habits to serve on advance type 055, type 075 and etc. Old habits simply are hard to die. This is the problem when PLAN advance too fast technologically from type 051 to type 055.

While the new recruits do have the new knowledge from universities, they simply lack the experience, especially on the level of commanders and captains. The fusion of experience and new technology, plus new era combat strategy will take time.

As more new ships are built, PLAN need more commanders and captains with decades of experience, which they may face difficulties to fill as many older commanders are not qualified. A new recruit with PhD or Master degree won't do to fill in the commanding positions either.

00CuriousObserver said:

Some notes from the latest paid 察话会 episode:

• Fujian has launched planes with its EMALS and they (soft) confirmed there are 16 055s. I've made comments in the respective threads
• They have no info on the 3rd Type 901 and Yankee is perplexed by this as well. There are 2 more 903s, however it's theorized that these are for the CCG
• It's only a matter of time before the number of 052Ds exceeds 40
• There is a 5th 075
• A shortage of personnel, especially higher ranking experienced personnel, is a serious issue with the scale of PLAN's expansion
  • They went in depth on this, but the severity of the problem cannot be overstated
  • It also has huge implications on procurement and types of weapons equipped, as slower iterations in ship and weapon acquisition make it easier and faster to train personnel
  • It's not as big of an issue for submarines due to their nature, as well as PLAN's nuclear submarine development taking longer than intended/planned

They said explicitly that the personnel issue is the takeaway for the audience, because it has severe implications for PLAN's strength, more than just having a few more ships.

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Edit, a couple other things

• The navalized version of GJ-11 is called GJ-21 (I heard this from 约克 a while ago so credibility +1)
• The Type 076 is not a "Taiwan-oriented" or """Taiwan-related""" ship, and this raised some debates during its procurement process

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You would have probably mentioned it, but asking anyway if did they say anything about the 004 CVN and any idea how many 076s LHAs are planned to be built?

mack8 said:

You would have probably mentioned it, but asking anyway if did they say anything about the 004 CVN and any idea how many 076s LHAs are planned to be built?

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They did talk about the 004 but it's not anything we don't already know. And no idea on the number of 076s

I think this is a really good episode and I recommend everyone to buy it if they can

00CuriousObserver said:

I've always felt that more attention should be given to the human side of the PLA. It's partially rather difficult to observe, and partially quite boring as watching the "people things" isn't as fun as analyzing shiny new hardware. But at the end of the day, a military is still made up of people

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It's always the unglamorous mundane stuff which makes the difference between victory and defeat. For example, how much attention is paid to PLAN Reserves? They've gone through major reforms in recent years, and in any conflict these are the guys who are called up first.

lcloo said:

I think the problem with naval personnel is that they do not have experienced high level personnel with understanding on advance naval technology rather than PLAN's ability to recruit and train more people.

All older personnels, including captains and senior ranks from type 51, type 052 and type 053 era will find it hard to adjust their skills and habits to serve on advance type 055, type 075 and etc. Old habits simply are hard to die. This is the problem when PLAN advance too fast technologically from type 051 to type 055.

While the new recruits do have the new knowledge from universities, they simply lack the experience, especially on the level of commanders and captains. The fusion of experience and new technology, plus new era combat strategy will take time.

As more new ships are built, PLAN need more commanders and captains with decades of experience, which they may face difficulties to fill as many older commanders are not qualified. A new recruit with PhD or Master degree won't do to fill in the commanding positions either.

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training, training, and more training!

more anti piracy missions. more circumnavigation around australia. more "readiness" exercises around taiwan. short of direct combat (like the americans do in the middle east), this is the best PLAN can do.

PLAN really needs another major navy to exercise with and get exchange personnel from. Right now it's just Russian Navy, which has had an underwhelming performance in the Black Sea in recent years.

I think keeping smaller vessels like 022 is actually useful for PLAN in order to give junior officers early command opportunities. Same goes for SSP/K in the undersea world.