PLAN Fleet supply vessels
- Thread starter delft
- Start date
What is so difficult about supplying your fleet with the massive tankers china builds in huge numbers every year? Just re-inforce them and give them bigger propellers or something so they tear through the oceans faster. You could fit 5,000 troops on one of those oil tankers and huge supplies. Mount a few weapons systems on them too.
It's not like military grade supply ships can defend themselves any better.
It's not like military grade supply ships can defend themselves any better.
Red___Sword
Junior Member
But military ships systematically response to the chain of command even in peace time, while civilian ships' main purpose of existance is to make a fortune / business thus not "command" but "needs" drive these ships around.
Not to mention fielding one extra supply vessel into military service, maned by serviceperson, in a dollar and cent sense, would be much cheaper than hiring (one way or another) civilian cargoships into "service provider" for the same amount of years the military supply vessel can in service, maned by sailers who measure their load of work by salary and all kinds of "if no deal, I will go" keep-them-on-the-job benifits.
In a sense, Danmark have the biggest cargo ship fleet of the world, but we can't say it is then straight away Danmark having the biggest (military) supply fleet of the world, right?
Ok so what stops the PLA navy from commissioning some of these oil tankers into the fleet? Maybe have some built just for the navy, under the ownership of the navy? The financial budget exists and so does the civilian construction capacity. Just buy-out and then modify a few civilian ports that produce these monsters.
Red___Sword
Junior Member
I take your point you are emphasising China's ship building capability, that I agree. But please take my point that military ship got its own requirements that civilian shipyard can't pop them out like candies. As mighty as China's shipbuilding industry, there is still huge time and resources needed for civilian ships to be transformed into what standard PLAN is call for, which is not feasible in the non-world-war peace time.
The 903A is a ship built like a civilian tanker, it fully utilized GSI's superior civilian ship building capabilities, that's why it only took about five months from manufacturing modules to launch. PLAN already uses its civilian cargo ship fleet in military operations, there are plenty of evidence of civilian ships supporting exercises, also in the first few Gulf of Aden deployments the PLAN task force routinely get resupplied (mostly fresh water, food, and other dry goods) from COSCO and China Shipping vessels. I don't think PLAN will ever replenish fuel from civilian ships though, after impurities in fuel almost ruined 112's visit to the United States.
after all said and done, end of the day a Sailor serves on a ship that's named after a rich coastal city would get more benefits than a sailor served on a ship that is named after a poor-er interior city.
that's not fair.
and what's worse is that's not efficient and can go down in a slippery path of weakened central contro.
in old day in European Land-Armies, it's its called cantonment system, where a regiment is specifically raised in certain local. guess what local interest colluded with regiment colonel and it became a nice hotbed of vested interests and corruptions.
So the european state modernized and placed the control of the purse directly with central state.
samething in China's modern naval history.
Beiyang Fleet was financed by tax and customs revenues from northern provinces, specifically the Zhili Province around beijing which Li-Hongzhang controls personally.
while the fleet in Fujian and Nayang Fleet was financed and by Fujian and Canton.
officially they were suppose to listen to the Government in Beijing. but since they are financed locally. they became personal property of local governers. During FIrst Sino-Japanese War, the southern fleets dragged their fleet after they were ordered to go north to join the fight. So instead only Beiyang system and only the immediate resources that's controlled by Li-Hongzhang was mobilized vs. Japan.
I would hope that lesson is being learned. and you are just not defending it because it is the status quo.
---------- Post added at 09:06 AM ---------- Previous post was at 09:04 AM ----------
If the local government wants to display their patriotism, that's all fine and well.
they can simply just give up a bigger share of tax-revenue.
China needs to become a Frederickan Absolute State before it becomes a democracy.
MwRYum
Major
That's because navy AO ships do more than just carry fuel, they carry munitions and supplies as well, think of them as floating ammo dump+fuel dump+cold storage all into one package.
Not only that, AO ships need to run at the same speed as the fleet so they can keep up in the formation instead of the fleet slow down to accommodate the AO ship; in that regards, AO ships are oil tankers that designed and built with such requirements, normal commercial oil tankers are not designed as such.
Red___Sword
Junior Member
There is a saying, 陆军土，海军洋，空军个个是大流氓。 Army sucks, Navy rocks, Air Force are legal jerks. Basically soldier's black joke about welfare inequality among different units.
The fact is, people live with it.
I like the historical part stated in #57 post. PRC (of all the other comes-and-gos dynasty) learnt from it the best, that's my main concern in post #46, people (soldier) live with the welfare inequality facts, while fat chance that amount of inequality would result in any political and military rebellion.
Edit:
Think this way: you actually believe, 999, Jin Gang Shan, the current crow jewel of PLAN, named after a mountan in geographical terms and a dirt-poor county in administrative terms - their service person, got a dirt-poor benifit coverage... You actually believe that?
The fact is, people live with it.
I like the historical part stated in #57 post. PRC (of all the other comes-and-gos dynasty) learnt from it the best, that's my main concern in post #46, people (soldier) live with the welfare inequality facts, while fat chance that amount of inequality would result in any political and military rebellion.
Edit:
Think this way: you actually believe, 999, Jin Gang Shan, the current crow jewel of PLAN, named after a mountan in geographical terms and a dirt-poor county in administrative terms - their service person, got a dirt-poor benifit coverage... You actually believe that?
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