Re: PLAN Carrier Construction
I believe carriers can certainly be built at a much faster pace than the rate that US has at the moment. The US simply chose not to go that fast since the country has a sizable fleet already. US's objectives are to maintain a constant number of carriers and to maintain qualified personals who can build those carriers. China has completely different needs to that of US, so US's carrier build rate is a not a good benchmark to apply on to PLAN.
Hi Eng,
A Happy New Year to you.
I agree with your points above. That:
1. Carriers can be build at a much faster pace that what the US is doing right now. The truth is, almost every kind of vessels can be build faster if we assign more resources to the task.
2. The US chose not to build faster since the US Navy already has a sizable fleet, and to maintain qualified personals for building carriers. One just has to look at the Soviet/Russian carrier building capability to see what happen when the orders stopped coming.
3. Therefore, the US build rate is not a good benchmark for the Chinese.
As to LHAs for China, my opinion is that it is nothing more than fan boy's dream. The dream got repeated so often that people now believe it to be true. It is made up by those who want to see China building a fleet of mini carriers, because those people are too impatient to wait for proper carriers and mistakenly believe that effectiveness scales linearly with carrier size.
I however, don’t know enough about the application of LHAs, and especially for the PLAN’s requirement point-of-view to make a meaningful comment on whether or not this type of vessels is in the PLAN’s planning.
As for super carriers, or more to the point, “fan arts” of possible PLAN’s future super carrier design, have you seen the latest CG image of a design based on the ex-Soviet’s Ulyanovsk design? The artist most likely based that on rumors that the Chinese has acquired the “blue print” of the Ulyanovsk. That is some good CG indeed! Furthermore, I also recall a previous CG of a four catapults carrier, a twin-hulls design, and various others super carrier designs being circulated on the internet. However, the latest is the best yet (personal opinion). For smaller carrier design, I have only seen few basic (computer) drawings of a two catapults design with an island similar to the Liaoning’s (but shorten version, of her island). The authenticities of those drawings are still being debated today (I believe).
My point is that if there is any sense of impatient, it is our collective desires to see a PLAN’s equivalent of the US Navy’s super carrier; hey, I am pretty much one who share that sense of impatient often enough to understand. That sense of impatient has prompted many online “fan based artists” to produce excellent CG for our imaginations’ consumptions; and they do so free of charge too! So, if anything is true, it is this “dreams” that get repeated so often that, as you eloquently put it, people now believe it to be true, and more often then not dismisses any alternatives to it (even for the sake of discussion) as heinous heresies.
I don’t like to label others as “fan-boy”; although I wouldn’t mind doing so in jest and good humors, provided the other party understands so. However, I do believe if any of our self indulgent dream can be (for humorous purposes) label as “fan-boyish”, it is the one that we will see the PLAN build a fleet of big carriers to match the US Navy’s soon.
LHAs need carrier battle groups to provide air coverage. So, talk about putting the horse behind a cart if LHA were to be built before any battle group is readied. Also, since PLAN's budget is finite, a LHA project will eat right into the budget of actual aircraft carriers. With carriers having a much higher priority, I just don't see building of LHAs as realistic.
Personally I see the PLAN’s carrier program as follow:
1. for capability building (no further comments on my part here since I have never worked as a naval strategist before, neither in this lifetime or all my previous lifetimes … I think … OMG, I can’t remember!
).
2. for national pride building.
I agree that the PLAN’s budget is finite; everyone’s budget is finite, expect perhaps the CIA or NSA (Joke! Joke!
). So I believe they don’t necessary have a very high priority for this carrier project of theirs. After all is said, the PRC’s primary means of national defence is still diplomacy; and that is a good thing.
I also believe that recent years’ naval build-up has something to do with an event in 2008; that being the worldwide financial crisis. They likely already have plans for new ships before that, but the needs to keep their shipyards’ capability might very well have fast tracked many of those projects. This is just like how you have reasoned that the US builds their carrier slowly to maintain qualified personnel who can build those carriers: similar case for similar reasoning, but make no mistake, both are very different issues.
With regard to LHA (helo carrier?) and carriers, I don’t know which can be consider the horse or which the cart. I don’t see any relation or relevant of building one type before the other. I am of the opinion that each navy build or acquire vessels to fill their requirements. Otherwise we might see a repeat of the Battleships race before the second World War; that eventually shows nations were racing each other to build capability they do not need the most.
My point here is that there is no urgency on the PLAN's requirement; carriers included. So what is realistic for the PLAN (to build) depended solely on what the PLAN think they need in the long term. All existing "crisis" will be resolve by diplomacy, and all build-up activities were for capability maintenances. Honestly speaking, do any of us here (long enough) expect any "confrontation" between China and her neighbours? If so, then all talk of building up naval capability to meet those crisis' need are already too late. However, let's not discuss further on this point here as it bears little relevant to the purpose of this thread.
As a final point, Eng, I don’t quite understand your reasoning behind your attempt to label “those who wanted to see China building a fleet of mini carriers” as “fan boy”. If you did so as a New Year joke, allow me to join you in a dose good and healthy laughing
! If otherwise, I hope my rebuff above is sufficiently clear (and typo free) to conclude this kind of pointless exercise, and allow everyone to enjoy a brand new year for PLAN carrier watching; I personally see no point is furthering a discussion in such a scope limited subject in this thread, which should be on news related to PLAN carrier construction.
I certainly have had a good start to this year, and this is only day three! The first two days of this New Year have certainly provided plenty of eye candies, and thank you for sharing those excellent photos of the Liaoning’s interiors! My apology for this lengthy reply, for I don’t often get to access a notebook these days; fortunately I can still read and post short messages from my Smartphone from time to time (phew!)
Jovian ;D
