PLAN Carrier Strike Group and Airwing

Re: What will the 1st PLAN Carrier Battle Group (CBG) look like?

thunderchief said:

I still believe that participation of LPD in recent Chinese exercise was not a mistake , photo-op or whatever . Simply saying , mission and doctrine of PLAN is vastly different then mission and doctrine of USN . Currently , PLAN is not tailored to project power in distant oceans . Instead , focus will be on disputed territories and first island chain . Primary task of Chinese aircraft carriers would be to support landings and give air cover to them . In their mission , now and in near future , they would be more like escort carriers from WW2 then American super-carriers of today .

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With that said, do you think the three PLAN fleet will have a certain particular use and mission whenever they each had a carrier? For instance, the Northern Fleet would deal with anything on the ECS, therefore no LPD attach to the CBG, meanwhile the Southern Fleet had the task to safeguard the SCS has the LPD.

Re: What will the 1st PLAN Carrier Battle Group (CBG) look like?

thunderchief said:

I still believe that participation of LPD in recent Chinese exercise was not a mistake , photo-op or whatever . Simply saying...focus will be on disputed territories and first island chain . Primary task of Chinese aircraft carriers would be to support landings and give air cover to them.

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I agree. I do not believe it was a mistake either.

The PLAN has been exercisinig with Type 071s in the SCS. With the Liaoning in the area, it is only natural that the LPDs and their escorts would work with the Liaoning and her escorts in formations that would include them and her escorts as a part of a joint task force.

There are areas in the SCS where they could be called on to perform missions that would be much more benefited if they had air support from a carrier like the Liaoning than having to depned on land air.

So, that exercise...at least to me...and the photo op that went along with it, were a natural in that regard.

Re: What will the 1st PLAN Carrier Battle Group (CBG) look like?

While I agree that it was only natural for the 071 to be in that CVBG and that its presence wasn't just to make the photos look cool, I think we are over analysing why it was there.

That is to say, we are looking for explanations why the 071 is there in a "CVBG" but rather we should be looking for reasons why an 071 shouldn't be there. If the PLAN is ever called upon to conduct a power projection mission and involves LPD, carrier, etc, then it would only be natural for such assets to be grouped together in a single task force on the voyage to the theater in question.


So I don't see the 071s presence as necessarily having to do with the South China Sea situation, but rather just an exercise for a manner of future scenarios.

Re: PLAN Carrier Construction

latenlazy said:

I'm often pushing the idea that China might be further along with its EMALS research than we might think, but I wonder about where all the current needed to operate those things will come from. It may end up being that gas turbines might be the bigger bottleneck that we'll have to look out for.

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It is misconception that using gas turbines or nuclear power would magically result in more power output. The power output is only as high as the engineers made it to be. Also, a nuclear reactor is essentially a boiler which produces steam to drive steam turbines. So, using gas turbines would be a huge detour if the ultimate goal is to build a nuclear powered carrier.

Re: PLAN Carrier Construction

Engineer said:

It is misconception that using gas turbines or nuclear power would magically result in more power output. The power output is only as high as the engineers made it to be. Also, a nuclear reactor is essentially a boiler which produces steam to drive steam turbines. So, using gas turbines would be a huge detour if the ultimate goal is to build a nuclear powered carrier.

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Well, not magically, but I'm somewhat doubtful that a conventional steam boiler can generate enough instantaneous power for EMALS and still fit inside a carrier efficiently. I could be wrong, since I don't know much about the capabilities of contemporary steam turbines (You're welcome to educate me on this matter, I wouldn't mind learning more.

Re: What will the 1st PLAN Carrier Battle Group (CBG) look like?

Equation said:

With that said, do you think the three PLAN fleet will have a certain particular use and mission whenever they each had a carrier? For instance, the Northern Fleet would deal with anything on the ECS, therefore no LPD attach to the CBG, meanwhile the Southern Fleet had the task to safeguard the SCS has the LPD.

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That is a good question . I actually think that for now ,when operating , PLAN carriers will be mainly attached to Southern Fleet - despite Liaoning's home port in Qingdao . Strategically , East China Sea is still dangerous for PLAN . I don't see any scenario they could freely use carrier(s) except blockade of Taiwan from eastern side (of course without US intervention) .Therefore , instead of Southern Fleet and Northern Fleet each getting one carrier , IMHO both Liaoning and next carrier will spend most of the time as part of Southern Fleet , with attached LPDs .

Re: What will the 1st PLAN Carrier Battle Group (CBG) look like?

Bltizo said:

So I don't see the 071s presence as necessarily having to do with the South China Sea situation, but rather just an exercise for a manner of future scenarios.

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Two things.

1) The Liaoning was specifically sent to that area to do formational exercises, so it is easy to presume that she naturally was meant to do so with the LPD that was there. I believe it was one of the principle reasons the exercises were held.

2) The SCS is the most likely place where the PLAN/PRC will find such operations necessary in the near to mid term.

Re: PLAN Carrier Construction

latenlazy said:

Well, not magically, but I'm somewhat doubtful that a conventional steam boiler can generate enough instantaneous power for EMALS and still fit inside a carrier efficiently. I could be wrong, since I don't know much about the capabilities of contemporary steam turbines (You're welcome to educate me on this matter, I wouldn't mind learning more.

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No power source can provide the instantaneous power you mentioned anyway. With nuclear power, you are dealing with boilers. With gas turbines, there is spool up time which you have to deal with. The energy to power catapults is always stored somewhere, then released instantaneously when needed. For steam catapults, accumulators are used for energy storage. For EMALS, flywheels play the role of capacitors for energy storage.

Re: What will the 1st PLAN Carrier Battle Group (CBG) look like?

Jeff Head said:

Two things.

1) The Liaoning was specifically sent to that area to do formational exercises, so it is easy to presume that she naturally was meant to do so with the LPD that was there. I believe it was one of the principle reasons the exercises were held.

2) The SCS is the most likely place where the PLAN/PRC will find such operations necessary in the near to mid term.

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I respectfully disagree on those two points.

1: while the liaoning was indeed sent to the SCS, I do not think she was sent there specifically to do exercises with the LPD. It might have been one of the secondary reasons, but I think the primary reason was because the SCS is the only one of two "near sea" deep water zones that the PLAN could exercise in, the other being ECS, and considering how turbulent the ECS situation was around December, exercises there was actually the less provocative choice.

2: I do not think the PLAN will like to send in a major power projection force like a carrier and an LPD to the SCS for the near to mid future for any kind of extended "stationing" or deployment inside the SCS itself. There is no doubting they will be invaluable in scenarios involving actual conflict against any nations in the area, but china has been relatively low key in its SCS deployment of naval vessels there and have thus far mostly sent maritime law enforcements vessels there and a few older frigates. Deploying a task force like what we saw to the SCS during peacetime would be massively inflammatory. And that leads me to my belief that the PLAN's "deployments" of the liaoning and other future aircraft carriers may be more further afield, say, the Indian Ocean. Places where they can test their mettle an have interests I'm but not invoke unnecessary regional chafing of close neighbours. Of course, they will still train in SCS and other closer to home areas, but not maintain a very permanent presence at all.

Re: PLAN Carrier Construction

Engineer said:

No power source can provide the instantaneous power you mentioned anyway. With nuclear power, you are dealing with boilers. With gas turbines, there is spool up time which you have to deal with. The energy to power catapults is always stored somewhere, then released instantaneously when needed. For steam catapults, accumulators are used for energy storage. For EMALS, flywheels play the role of capacitors for energy storage.

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Ah I see. So IEPS offers no particular advantages on this matter?