PLAN Aircraft Carrier programme...(Closed)

Jeff Head said:

Engineer, it all depends on hopw you look at it. Yes, the Indians do not have the Virkam yet, as the Chinese have the Liaoning. It is also true that the Indians have not flown off of the Virkam yet. However, the Indians have had their production Mig-29Ks for some time now and their pilots are training in them extensively. When the Virkam arrives this fall, the Indians will already have their entire wing of Mig-29Ks ready to go and they will immediately begin running up their pilots on the carrier and have the full air wing available to them. So, they will move ahead of where the PLAN is right now very quickly and actually are on schedule now to have a fully operational carrier with a modern airwing first.

Click to expand...

Once the Indians get the Vikramaditya, they will be at the same state as when the PLAN was getting ready for the first touch-and-go on the Liaoning. The Indians will have to go through the same learning curve that PLAN has went through since that time. By the time the Indians have reached the level where PLAN is at right now, PLAN would have moved on even further with the Liaoning. This makes the Indians behind, not ahead.

It was not that long ago when pictures of the first touch-and-go on board the Liaoning surfaced. Back then, many American members on this forum responded with skepticism, pointing out how the Liaoning was far from being an operational carriers. Some even said that many deaths will have to occur on board before competency can be reached. Yet, when it comes to India, baseless skepticism is replaced by baseless optimisms, even though India has a worse track record.

The Indians haven't even ran the Vikramaditya independently. Let's wait until the Indian Navy complete its first touch-and-go, then we can discuss whether the things are on schedule. Until then, let's not count the chicken for the Indians before their eggs have hatched.

chuck731 said:

They look very much that way when seen closer up. The standard of steel shaping on the side of the ramp along its entire length look to be decidedly crude.

Whether the Indians have experience operating a carrier or not, basic metal plate fabrication techniques common place in competitive commercial shipbuilding yards seem to push the envelope of expertise.

Click to expand...

Oh, hogwash, Chuck.

Pretty much all military naval vessels have variances and incongruities when viewed close up at various portions along their hulls and superstructures. Including US vessels. But these are not a hinderance or an issue.

Here are a few examples of modern vessels from all over the world:


As one who has been personally involved in the past, and carefully watched naval vessels for over 30 years, I am telling you that the bow of the Vikrant looks pretty good from a military vessels perspective.

And it is certainly bears no resemblance to your statement that they were, "hammered in place by hand."

Engineer said:

Once the Indians get the Vikramaditya, they will be at the same state as when the PLAN was getting ready for the first touch-and-go on the Liaoning. The Indians will have to go through the same learning curve that PLAN has went through since that time. By the time the Indians have reached the level where PLAN is at right now, PLAN would have moved on even further with the Liaoning. This makes the Indians behind, not ahead.

Click to expand...

Sorry Engineer, this is simply not true. the Indians have a full compliment of aircraft...production aircraft that their pilots are already trained specifically in flying. The Chinese do not. The Indian air wing will make substantially faster progress starting late this year after the carrier is delivered.

Engineer said:

It was not that long ago when pictures of the first touch-and-go on board the Liaoning surfaced. Back then, many American members on this forum responded with skepticism, pointing out how the Liaoning was far from being an operational carriers.

Click to expand...

The Liaoning is still quite some time away from being fully operational Engineer. They have to have operatuional aircraft to get there...they have not been produced yet.

Engineer said:

Yet, when it comes to India, baseless skepticism is replaced by baseless optimisms, even though India has a worse track record.

Click to expand...

Again, perhaps there are some you can level this at, but you cannot level it at me. I have been straight forward in my analysis, no matter which way it cuts. The Chinese have done fantastically with what they have. I have stated this many times, and I expect them to go forward very methodically and develop their expertise and equipment. But, they do not have many J-15s and this is holding them back. Until they get that airwing in place and available, they will continue to be held back.

The Indians on the other hand already have all of the production aircraft needed for the Virkamaditya and have already stood up an in-service squadron for the air wing and their pilots are flying those aircraft now. Unless the PLAN gets 12-18 in service J-15s very quickly the Indians will over take them in terms of having an operational carrier with its air wing. That's not a knock against the PLAN, it's just the way things stand at the moment.

Engineer said:

Let's wait until the Indian Navy complete its first touch-and-go, then we can discuss whether the things are on schedule.

Click to expand...

Fair enough. I am always the first one to indicate that time will tell.

While India lack experience running the vikram independently, they've had the russians to lead them through everything

They also have a fair few more Mig-29Ks than PLAN does J-15s at this stage (i.e.: they are flying production versions rather than prototypes -- even if PLAN may very soon commission their own first squadron of J-15s).

Jeff Head said:

Sorry Engineer, this is simply not true. the Indians have a full compliment of aircraft...production aircraft that their pilots are already trained specifically in flying. The Chinese do not. The Indian air wing will make substantially faster progress starting late this year after the carrier is delivered.

Click to expand...

That's a question I have -- up to this point, do we have any confirmation that the IN have had their own pilots make landings and take offs on their Mig-29Ks? Or have they all been Russian test pilots?


Also I think IN aren't that far ahead than PLAN in actually operating the entirety of their ship (from flight deck down to propulsion), and certainly they don't have enough planes to properly test how well they can manage a fully loaded flight deck, just like PLAN. Even if the Russians taught them all they knew about operating a STOBAR carrier, let's be fair, it probably wasn't that much.


The only very significant difference between PLAN and IN carrier aspirations, is in their respective escort fleets.
IN simply lack modern escorts. Their most recent destroyer class is the 1997 delhi class, which are basically a watered down sovremenny with a couple of Barak ciws VLS added, and they only have three of them.
Their newest frigate is the shivalik, of which 3 are active, and 6 talwars preceding them. The entire IN at the moment lacks an effective AAW ship with VLS, advanced PAR, and their longest ranged SAM is the 9M317 which has a range of 50km.
And the kolkata DDG's service date still looks delayed, even then it will only offer the 70km barak 8 SAM.

Compare that to the PLAN's operational 3-4 052Cs with 120km-200km HHQ-9 (not to mention sovremenny, 052B, 051C), and imminent commissioning of more 052Cs/Ds, and the 15 054As already in service, equipped with the 70km HHQ-16, and you start to see the difference in escort strength.
That's not even factoring in the PLAN's superior SSN fleet, whereas IN lacks not only SSNs, but even their SSK fleet has been cast in doubt (and their Kilos will probably be put under review after the latest sinking)

Bltizo said:

-- up to this point, do we have any confirmation that the IN have had their own pilots make landings and take offs on their Mig-29Ks? Or have they all been Russian test pilots?

Click to expand...

Pretty sure that all landings on the Virkam to this point are by Russians, though I had heard that Indian pilots had done some testing on the Kuznetsov.

Bltizo said:

and certainly they don't have enough planes to properly test how well they can manage a fully loaded flight deck, just like PLAN.

Click to expand...

Actually they do. The Indians had 12 Mig-29Ks already delivered by late 2011. and were training with them, flying them, and then performing exercises with them ever since. That number grew until they were able, after fully testing and qualifying them all, to the point where they commissioned the full air wing of 16 Mig-29Ks for the Virkamaditya as the "Black Panthers," in May of this year.

Bltizo said:

The only very significant difference between PLAN and IN carrier aspirations, is in their respective escort fleets. IN simply lack modern escorts. Their most recent destroyer class is the 1997 delhi class, which are basically a watered down sovremenny with a couple of Barak ciws VLS added, and they only have three of them.

Click to expand...

It is true with the 20 Type 054As and Six Type 052Cs that the PLAN has a stronger escort force. No doubt, but the Indians have commissioned a number of large, modern frigates. Six 4,100 ton Talwar class from Russian yards commissioned between 2003 and 2012. Three more Shivalik class FFGs, displacing 6,200 tons each commissioned between 2010 and 2012. All of these are very modern and very capable vessels. And yes, the range for their missile is 50km (30 miles) and although not truly a long range missile, they are still a decent missile and can provide medium range area coverage.

Bltizo said:

That's not even factoring in the PLAN's superior SSN fleet, whereas IN lacks not only SSNs, but even their SSK fleet has been cast in doubt (and their Kilos will probably be put under review after the latest sinking)

Click to expand...

The single Akula II Class SSN that the Indians have is a much stronger vessel than the Han or Shang Class SSNs in the PLAN. Having a single Akula II class SSN escorting their carrier would be a strong addition. They simply do not have enough. With the 3-4 Hans remaining, and the 4-6 Shangs the PLAN is much stronger in numbers.

Air Force Brat said:

There is very little doubt that it will increase the public desire for China to ramp up her own carrier production, and to be frank, I believe that is one reason that the J-20 is presently languishing, as is the J-31, the push is on for more Carriers and J-15s, and some of these other less viable projects are taking a back burner, Don't doubt me on this! brat

and Steve I think you've made an interesting and cogent observation!

Click to expand...

I doubt if it is even possible to move significant resources from the fighter program to the shipbuilding program in the time frame we're talking about.

Jeff Head said:

Sorry Engineer, this is simply not true. the Indians have a full compliment of aircraft...production aircraft that their pilots are already trained specifically in flying. The Chinese do not. The Indian air wing will make substantially faster progress starting late this year after the carrier is delivered.

The Liaoning is still quite some time away from being fully operational Engineer. They have to have operatuional aircraft to get there...they have not been produced yet.

Again, perhaps there are some you can level this at, but you cannot level it at me. I have been straight forward in my analysis, no matter which way it cuts. The Chinese have done fantastically with what they have. I have stated this many times, and I expect them to go forward very methodically and develop their expertise and equipment. But, they do not have many J-15s and this is holding them back. Until they get that airwing in place and available, they will continue to be held back.

The Indians on the other hand already have all of the production aircraft needed for the Virkamaditya and have already stood up an in-service squadron for the air wing and their pilots are flying those aircraft now. Unless the PLAN gets 12-18 in service J-15s very quickly the Indians will over take them in terms of having an operational carrier with its air wing. That's not a knock against the PLAN, it's just the way things stand at the moment.

Fair enough. I am always the first one to indicate that time will tell.

Click to expand...

Putting aircraft on board is not the same as having an operational carrier. The J-15 is just the Su-33 which is no less mature than the MiG-29K that India got. PLAN could have stuff the Liaoning full of J-15s, but they don't because they understand an operational carrier has more to do than just showing a full complement of aircraft on board.

As for the sort of trainings that the Indians have been doing with MiG-29K, the PLAN has been doing those for years with J-15 before the Liaoning was even put into sea trials. Those trainings are nothing special and unique to India. PLAN has moved well past that point now and is also conducting actual trainings on an actual carrier. So, what India does with the MiG-29K now only highlights how far India is lagging behind.

American members on this forum including you pointed out how these land-based trainings are not realistic unless they are done on a carrier. A common assertion that I encountered claimed how Chinese pilots cannot begin landing on the carrier unless they actually performed landing on the carrier before. There were also a lot of talks about pitching and rolling motion of the carrier, as if Chinese pilots have to manually take in account of a degree or a centimeter of change of the flight deck. The amount of skepticism displayed was simply ridiculous. Now when it comes to India, all these obstacles are forgotten and there are grand talks of how India is going to get ahead. This is just the same problem at the opposite end of the spectrum, which is over-optimism.

Ultimately, the Indian Navy will have to put the carrier and aircraft out in the sea for trainings, just as what the PLAN does right now. When that time comes, the number of aircraft on board is not going to be the bottle neck in achieving operational status. The main bottle neck is going to be the rate at which the deck crew can launch and recover aircraft, and that rate isn't going to be 30 planes an hour. This means only a limited number of pilots can be trained simultaneously. Even if India has a full complement of aircraft on board the Vikramaditya, the number will be meaningless.

In any case, the India has yet to receive the Vikramaditya. Let's wait until that ship is delivered and touch-and-go performed by Indians before we come back to this discussion.

Engineer said:

Putting aircraft on board is not the same as having an operational carrier. The J-15 is just the Su-33 which is no less mature than the MiG-29K that India got. PLAN could have stuff the Liaoning full of J-15s, but they don't because they understand an operational carrier has more to do than just showing a full complement of aircraft on board.

As for the sort of trainings that the Indians have been doing with MiG-29K, the PLAN has been doing those for years with J-15 before the Liaoning was even put into sea trials. Those trainings are nothing special and unique to India. PLAN has moved well past that point now and is also conducting actual trainings on an actual carrier. So, what India does with the MiG-29K now only highlights how far India is lagging behind.

American members on this forum including you pointed out how these land-based trainings are not realistic unless they are done on a carrier. A common assertion that I encountered claimed how Chinese pilots cannot begin landing on the carrier unless they actually performed landing on the carrier before. There were also a lot of talks about pitching and rolling motion of the carrier, as if Chinese pilots have to manually take in account of a degree or a centimeter of change of the flight deck. The amount of skepticism displayed was simply ridiculous. Now when it comes to India, all these obstacles are forgotten and there are grand talks of how India is going to get ahead. This is just the same problem at the opposite end of the spectrum, which is over-optimism.

Ultimately, the Indian Navy will have to put the carrier and aircraft out in the sea for trainings, just as what the PLAN does right now. When that time comes, the number of aircraft on board is not going to be the bottle neck in achieving operational status. The main bottle neck is going to be the rate at which the deck crew can launch and recover aircraft, and that rate isn't going to be 30 planes an hour. This means only a limited number of pilots can be trained simultaneously. Even if India has a full complement of aircraft on board the Vikramaditya, the number will be meaningless.

In any case, the India has yet to receive the Vikramaditya. Let's wait until that ship is delivered and touch-and-go performed by Indians before we come back to this discussion.

Click to expand...

Full agree with your statement. Jeff is just running contradicting statement regards to IN carrier wing abilites. They have not demonstrated any of the touch and go and probably competent in anti-shipping and sea naval ops but short of the actual real landing ,take off and operating from real carrier decks.

Can I say PLANAF Su-30MKK pilot is already competent and they just short of knowing the landing, take off and operating from carriers? So what makes them different from IN Mig-29K? I know IN are traning them but its on simulator only. Simulator beats nothing compare to real sea salty sortie. Don't believe, ask our dear experience moderator popeye.

There is nothing concrete support of IN STOBAR ops and wing ahead of PLAN. If jeff you cant bring up any other concrete proof of your statement, I suggest you drop your claims. Its highly flammable bait claim which you brought on this thread and yet you have nothing to back up but just keep insisting it despite clear analysis from many clear explanation of contradicting to your statement.

Nothing from IN STOBAR beat this. Mind you, all this is carried out by Chinese personnel.
[video=youtube;ZLXgK3QFvLM]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZLXgK3QFvLM[/video]

Jeff Head said:

Pretty sure that all landings on the Virkam to this point are by Russians, though I had heard that Indian pilots had done some testing on the Kuznetsov.

Click to expand...

In that case, IN pilots still have that benchmark to cross.

Actually they do. The Indians had 12 Mig-29Ks already delivered by late 2011. and were training with them, flying them, and then performing exercises with them ever since. That number grew until they were able, after fully testing and qualifying them all, to the point where they commissioned the full air wing of 16 Mig-29Ks for the Virkamaditya as the "Black Panthers," in May of this year.

Click to expand...

I suppose it is a matter of opinion as to whether 16 mig-29ks constitute enough of an airwing to be considered enough to test the mettle of,the flight crew.

It is true with the 20 Type 054As and Six Type 052Cs that the PLAN has a stronger escort force. No doubt, but the Indians have commissioned a number of large, modern frigates. Six 4,100 ton Talwar class from Russian yards commissioned between 2003 and 2012. Three more Shivalik class FFGs, displacing 6,200 tons each commissioned between 2010 and 2012. All of these are very modern and very capable vessels. And yes, the range for their missile is 50km (30 miles) and although not truly a long range missile, they are still a decent missile and can provide medium range area coverage.

Click to expand...

Good vessels, all, but ill suited for escort missions compared to many other ships in other navies. They don't even have a VLS capable MR SAM!

Unless IN kicks their shipbuilding up a notch in both quality and quantity, their carrier fleet will be not be first rate.

Engineer said:

Putting aircraft on board is not the same as having an operational carrier. The J-15 is just the Su-33 which is no less mature than the MiG-29K that India got.

Click to expand...

Engineer, there is no Official, in-service squadron of J-15s. There is a full squadron of Mig-29Ks representing the full airwing of the Virkamaditya. The Indians are not behind in their naval fighter development and deployment.

Engineer said:

PLAN could have stuff the Liaoning full of J-15s, but they don't because they understand an operational carrier has more to do than just showing a full complement of aircraft on board.

Click to expand...

No, they could not. They have not built the aircrft yet.

Engineer said:

As for the sort of trainings that the Indians have been doing with MiG-29K, the PLAN has been doing those for years with J-15 before the Liaoning was even put into sea trials. Those trainings are nothing special and unique to India. PLAN has moved well past that point now and is also conducting actual trainings on an actual carrier. So, what India does with the MiG-29K now only highlights how far India is lagging behind.

Click to expand...

No, the PLAN has trained all of six pilots on the initial, daylight landings and takeoffs, with no ordinance. They may train another batch with this next voyage, we will have to wait and see. And they have only used one LRIP aircraft to this point in doing so.

Engineer said:

American members on this forum including you pointed out how these land-based trainings are not realistic unless they are done on a carrier.

Click to expand...

No, I never said they were not "realistic," they are absolutely real. They just are not the same, and landing on the carrier is something they would ultimately have to do. Same holds for India.

Engineer said:

A common assertion that I encountered claimed how Chinese pilots cannot begin landing on the carrier unless they actually performed landing on the carrier before.

Click to expand...

What? You might read that again. It makes no sense. I do not believe anyone said that they cannot land on the carrier until they had already landed on the carrier.

Engineer said:

Now when it comes to India, all these obstacles are forgotten and there are grand talks of how India is going to get ahead. This is just the same problem at the opposite end of the spectrum, which is over-optimism.

Click to expand...

No, they are not forgotten. The Indians will have to do it too. The difference I am trying to point out to you is that the Indians already have a full air wing of production aircraft to do it. The PLAN does not. So, when the Indians get their Vikramaditya later this fall, they will be able to move rapidly in training an entire air wing of pilots with the production aircraft they will fly off of the carrier.

I do not believe that the PLAN will have 16 or 24 production aircraft by the end of this year...or by the end of next year for that matter. That's not a slam on the Chinese...it's just a statement of fact and reality.

Engineer said:

The main bottle neck is going to be the rate at which the deck crew can launch and recover aircraft, and that rate isn't going to be 30 planes an hour. This means only a limited number of pilots can be trained simultaneously. Even if India has a full complement of aircraft on board the Vikramaditya, the number will be meaningless.

Click to expand...

Actually. not. Certainly they will not launch 30 an hour. They don't have to. The point is, they can go out with 12 aircraft and train 24 pilots at a time over a 4-6 week exercise, then go into base and re-provison, and then do it again...and again...until they have achieved their training and operational goals over a couple of years probably. The PLAN can not do this now. So the number of aircraft available can make a big difference.

Again, this is not a knock on the PLAN or their expertise...or what they have accomplished so far. It is just an objective assessment based on the reality of how many aircraft are available to train with during each exercise.
.

Engineer said:

In any case, the India has yet to receive the Vikramaditya. Let's wait until that ship is delivered and touch-and-go performed by Indians before we come back to this discussion.

Click to expand...

I agree. They have not received the carrier yet. I will be happy to revisit it after they start doing their work ups.