Issue is no one has "necessary capability" to build ones that are better than normal jets. Could China have wasted time on building a crappy no payload pilot killing stovl jet decades ago that's like a Harrier or yak-38? Yes. But what function would it serve? None. Its not like China lacks the infrastructure to launch many fighter jets and have to rely on highways.
Type 076 LHD/LHA discussion
- Thread starter banjex
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Issue is no one has "necessary capability" to build ones that are better than normal jets. Could China have wasted time on building a crappy no payload pilot killing stovl jet decades ago that's like a Harrier or yak-38? Yes. But what function would it serve? None. Its not like China lacks the infrastructure to launch many fighter jets and have to rely on highways.
This is making a lot of sense, when we consider China has a relatively strong ship building industry and weak aviation industry
I think in the initial phase of a west pacific conflict when offensive sea control will be the primary operation, 076 will be used together with CATOBAR in a CVBG, where manned fixed wing a/c on the carrier mainly performs a2a mission, naval strike sorties will be offloaded to cheaper 076+GJ-11.
After destroying bulk of enemy sea control force , 076 can change its load out to amphibious operation and bring the war into the next phase.
There is substantial benefit of both cost saving and flexibility by combining these 2 roles to 076 (UCAV strike carrier + LHD)
I agree that the size and layout of the flight deck is a constraint in sortie rate generation.
For full-scale carriers with manned aircraft based on the carrier, sortie rate generation is also influenced by pilot availability.
But ultimately, it is aircraft maintenance requirements which drives the need for more flight deck space and hanger space.
Current manned fighter aircraft need a lot of maintenance time, which takes up space.
However, if aircraft maintenance is primarily conducted on land rather than on the carrier, and there's no need for pilots, then these 2 constraints disappear.
Sortie rate generation is then limited to how fast aircraft can recovered, refueled, rearmed and then launched again.
The requirements for flight deck space and hanger space (for aircraft parking/maintenance) are reduced substantially.
Other displacement for support activities are also reduced as well.
So a smaller carrier can still achieve high sortie generation rates, as long as the ground crew is scaled up.
And it's useful if the ship has a large number of spare crew billets (like we see on LHDs or on the French/British carriers)
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This analysis between manned/unmanned aircraft applies to equivalent carrier sizes - whether they are full-sized or LHD-sized.
But if you were to build a large carrier optimised for UCAVs/UAVs on this model, you're probably looking at an excessive number of aircraft (100+) dependent on that platform, and you may encounter the limits of having a single landing strip on a carrier.
Hence my statement that the optimum size of a UCAV/UAV carrier (which leverage land-based aircraft) is smaller than the current crop of carriers.
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I see the additional cost of an air-control Type-076 as being reasonable, whilst being able to vastly increase the reach of land-based UCAVs deep into the Pacific.
In terms of finances, SIPRI have estimated that China has consistently spend about 2% of GDP on the military over the past 20 years.
But we've now seen China has departed from a situation where military spending increases are in line with economic growth.
If there was even a modest increase in Chinese military spending to a still-modest 2.5% of GDP in 5 years time, we're probably looking at a 50% increase in the overall Chinese military budget in the next 5 years.
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In retrospect, I do think the current large amphibious ships are a suboptimal use of resources, conceived in a time when relations between China and the USA were cordial, and when the Chinese military could afford to take a longer-term view.
To be fair, I don't think anyone expected the US and China to descend into a cold-war type situation so fast and so badly.
To be fair, although the Chinese, like everyone else, have finite resources, it dies still have a long way to go if push comes to shove. The USA spends nearly $2000 per person on defence, whereas Chinese spends less than $200 per person. So China has room to expand expenditure if they do wish.
At this level of difference in flight operations capability - it seriously isn't. QE may be a strange concept, but it really is designed to squeeze possible maximum of output from its airwing.just a couple of hundred of nms disadvantage in range is no big deal at all. Believe me!
Btw, hundred of nms of advantage is only for those who can deploy their assets equally. AEW is a constantly emitting, highly desirable and vulnerable target.
You seriously will. Surviving Astute happily operating at silent speeds alone will be a worthwhile achievement.
You want to operate AWACS from straight deck LHD? I'll believe it when i see it.
p. s. international situation for f-35b is quite decent, as far as i can remember.
One country can build ones which are roughly equal, and that's basically the main problem in this topic.
Just a question. Since the number of full-sized carriers is supposed to go up, would LHD/LHA's actually need full blown AWACS of their own? I mean, I'm guessing nobody's going to send off these ships to run the gauntlet by themselves, right? It's been almost 80 years since Leyte. So there's bound to be some proper CV support for the LHDs. Wouldn't the hypothetical UCAVs from the LHDs benefit from AWACS deployed by the CV just as much? And if there really is a need for some sort of EW, wouldn't a helicopter platform, similar to Ka-31 be more suitable?
It looks like UK, SK and Japan are looking weird now, especially Japan which is bragging about converting their LHD into mini CVs.just a couple of hundred of nms disadvantage in range is no big deal at all. Believe me!
thanks but I won't need it.
oh wow. How about we make something that is smaller, carries less equipment, has way smaller range, way lesser power and is easily manipulated by the enemy?
that is the kind of blunder that almost matches the F35 project (except for the unmanned part, but the crap aerodynamics almost makes up for it).
On the bright side, the F35 may be the beginning of the end of the alliance between the US, UK, SK and Japan etc. Imagine being forced to buy that boondoggle. I would be very mad. Should've bought Chinese.
lol I was saying that if you brought a knife and I brought a gun I would destroy and your reply was "it depends on a lot of factors."
ok
By that token, GL to the QE surviving the 039B.
"silent"?
just because navies show restraints on sonar use in peace time to preserve ocean life, it doesn't mean that it will work that way during a war.
it will be decent until the 076 hits the water and launches some jets. And then those nations will start questioning the meaning of their existence.