China’s Aircraft Carrier Ambitions (original) (raw)
China's Aircraft Carrier Ambitions: An Update
2010
his article will address two major analytical questions. First, what are the necessary and suffi cient conditions for China to acquire aircraft carriers? Second, what are the major implications if China does acquire aircraft carriers? Existing analyses on China's aircraft carrier ambitions are quite insightful but also somewhat inadequate and must therefore be updated. Some, for instance, argue that with the advent of the Taiwan issue as China's top threat priority by late 1996 and the retirement of Liu Huaqing as vice chair of China's Central Military Commission (CMC) in 1997, aircraft carriers are no longer considered vital. 1 In that view, China does not require aircraft carriers to capture sea and air superiority in a war over Taiwan, and China's most powerful carrier proponent (Liu) can no longer infl uence relevant decision making. Other scholars suggest that China may well acquire small-deck aviation platforms, such as helicopter carriers, to fulfi ll secondary security missions. These missions include naval diplomacy, humanitarian assistance, disaster relief, and antisubmarine warfare. 2 The present authors conclude, however, that China's aircraft carrier ambitions may be larger than the current literature has predicted. Moreover, the major implications of China's acquiring aircraft carriers may need to be explored more carefully in order to inform appropriate reactions on the part of the United States and other Asia-Pacifi c naval powers. This article updates major changes in the four major conditions that are necessary and would be largely suffi cient for China to acquire aircraft carriers: leadership endorsement, fi nancial affordability, a relatively concise naval strategy that defi nes the missions of carrier operations, and availability of requisite
China's Aircraft Carrier Dilemma
2006
University, with a dissertation on Chinese aerospace development. He has worked for Science Applications International Corporation (as a Chinese translator), as well as at the U.S. embassy in Beijing and the American consulate in Hong Kong. His publications include contributions to Comparative Strategy and to (for the Naval War College Press
China's advances in submarines and aircraft carriers
2016
This article was compiled wholly from public domain sources, including the Xinhua and other Chinese websites, past Defence Today articles, the APA website and Wikipedia. The J-15 Flanker D is a reverse engineered Russian Su-27K/Su-33, likely using Chinese systems developed for the J-11B Flanker.
Role of the Aircraft Carrier in a Twenty-First Century Navy
Despite the current significance of aircraft carriers, I believe that in the near future they will be pushed into a marginal role because of new military innovations that jeopardize their safety defensively or obsolete their capabilities offensively. There are three main areas of inadequacy that make the aircraft carrier defensively obsolete: missile defense, submarine attacks, and protection against new offensive military technologies. Similarly, there are three major reasons why the carrier is offensively obsolete: the development of new military technologies that obsolete the carrier’s air wing, the possibility of moving command, control and communications (C3) capabilities to other naval vessels, and the development of other military systems that can replace the modern carrier group’s role as a quickly mobilized first response force. In this paper, I will analyze the effects of each innovation listed and also examine the reasons why countries continue to build new aircraft carriers despite their modern military shortcomings.
Passing the Baton: The Asian Theater of World War II and the Coming of Age of the Aircraft Carrier
Education About Asia 19 (2), 68-73, 2014
World War II marks the eclipse of the battleship as a symbol of naval dominance and the rise of the aircraft carrier in its stead. The medium for this shift was the Asian theater of war, namely the Pacific and the Indian Oceans, where the two major belligerents—Japan and the United States—employed a large number of carriers. It was only here that carriers were used as capital ships from the outbreak of the conflict, engaged each other in fierce duels, and ended up becoming a crucial weapon for victory. In contrast, carriers played a limited role in the European theater, partially due to the fact that Germany and Italy did not commission even a single carrier before or during the war. The naval warfare in the Asian theater demonstrates that the bilateral use of a new weapon system is likely to push its development forward rapidly. This article explores the reasons that made the Asian theater rather than the European theater become the arena in which the carrier reached maturity, and the impact this prominence has exerted on the naval arena ever since.
Aircraft Carriers—Missions, Survivability, Size, Cost, Numbers
2022
A new, twenty-first-century design of the size of USS Midway with an air wing up to sixty-five aircraft, whether conventionally or nuclear powered, could complement larger nuclear flattops while still incorporating rugged survivability and being capable of independent operations—and could be built quicker and cheaper and in more shipyards
In the Asia Pacific region, currently there are only two regional powers which can operate aircraft carriers, namely India and Thailand. The Chinese Aircraft carrier ex Varyag has not yet commenced operations. A few words about a Carrier strike group (CSG) would be in order at this stage. An aircraft carrier is akin to a mobile naval air station along with 70 to 80 fighters, bombers and support aircraft, which can sail to any place on the earth within a span of about two weeks travelling 650 to 700 nm per day. An aircraft carrier is however vulnerable to attacks from air, sea and underwater and therefore it normally travels with a protective consort ...