It’s always good to know the enemy’s capabilities and equipment so let’s take a quick look at some photos of the Chinese ski ramp aircraft carrier Liaoning and see what it can tell us about Chinese ship design philosophy. As a reminder, the Liaoning is the former Soviet Kuznetsov class ship, Varyag, which was stripped down after the collapse of the Soviet Union, acquired by the Chinese, and completely overhauled and rebuilt. Here’s a photo of the carrier:
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| Liaoning - Stern View |
Let’s look at some aspects of the ship that offer insights into Chinese naval philosophy and ship design.
Copy - The first thing that jumps out is that the Chinese rebuilt the ship as a near carbon copy of US aircraft carrier design to the extent possible for a ski ramp variant. Aside from the obvious direct copies of the angled deck, starboard side midships island, stern sponsons port and starboard, smaller forward sponsons, four arresting cables, and bow and waist ‘catapults’ (take off spots), there are other, smaller duplications. The optical landing system on the port side is a carbon copy of US systems in design, function, and location. The flight deck lighting scheme appears to be a direct copy. There even appears to be a copy of the US standard stern debarkation platform.
China has produced no visually unique design features. There is no evident innovation. This kind of blind copying is illegal (patent and other infringements) and unethical – which China doesn’t care about in the least – but, worse for China, bypasses all the learning that led to the end result. That learning is also called institutional knowledge. Yes, by stealing and copying the designs of others, China has leaped to the desired end point but has done so without the intervening steps which produce underlying knowledge and expertise. This deprives them of actual design understanding and experience and makes future modifications and improvements difficult, if not impossible. Bad for them, good for us.
The Chinese have so committed to matching the US Navy that they’ve adopted literal copying as the path to achieving that match. While this may, indeed, result in matching, or overmatching based on numbers of ships, it precludes them from true naval innovation. They won’t/can’t come up with a truly unique naval design that might give them a decided advantage. In contrast, the US has attempted to develop unique designs and technologies such as the Zumwalt, LCS, unmanned vessels, EMALS, Advanced Arresting Gear, and so forth. Of course, most of those attempts have been dismal failures but the attempts were there. China appears to have limited themselves to outright copying. Again, bad for them, good for us.
Weapons Fit – One noteworthy point of departure from US carrier design is the ship’s weapons fit. The Chinese have a clear philosophical leaning towards a more robust defensive weapons fit. Here’s the defensive weapons fit for the Liaoning (note, photos show the weapons fit varying over time so this is a typical, recent fit):
- 3x HHQ-10, 18-cell short range anti-air missile (3 x 18 cells = 54 missiles)[a]
- 3x Type 1130, 30 mm CIWS
- 2x 12-barrel RBU ASW rocket depth charge launcher
- 4x Decoy/Chaff launcher (24 barrels ea)
- 4x 16-tube ???? (port and starboard midships, function/type unknown)
[a]Reports list 4x HHQ-10 but I’ve only been able to verify 3x in photos
Here's some photos of the various weapons and locations:
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| Weapons Fit - Starboard Stern |
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| Weapons Fit - Starboard Amidships |
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| Weapons Fit - Port Forward |
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| HHQ-10 Launcher |
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| Weapons Fit - Port Amidships |
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| Weapons Fit - Port Stern |
By comparison, a typical US Nimitz class has the following typical defensive weapons fit:
- 3x Sea Sparrow, 8-cell anti-air missile (3 x 8 cells = 24 missiles)
- 3x 20 mm CIWS
- 4x SRBOC (Super Rapid Bloom Offboard Chaff), 6-barrel (4 x 6 barrel = 24 barrels)
Clearly, the Chinese believe combat is inevitable and that more robust fits are the way to emerge victorious. In this, they are correct. US ship designs have become positively anemic regarding weapon fits.
Consider the weapons fit on WWII carriers. They were crammed with weapons of all types. Of course, there is no direct comparison between the weapons of WWII and today but there most certainly is a direct and valid comparison in the density of weapons and, in that, today’s ships and carriers are woefully lacking. The Chinese design, while it pales compared to WWII designs in weapons fit, is still an improvement over our carriers.
What this demonstrates is that the Chinese are serious about combat and we are not. They expect their carriers to fight and be exposed in combat and are attempting to provide the weapons to enable their ships to survive. The US, on the other hand, has designed carriers so expensive and so bereft of weapons that it is unlikely that we will even risk our carriers in combat and, if they do engage in combat, they have a reduced likelihood of survival.
Philosophy – The photos show a complete, fully functional carrier, albeit one that has no front line future in the Chinese navy due to its ski ramp and the evident desire of the Chinese to move beyond ski ramp carriers and on to conventional, large, ?nuclear?, carriers. Why would the Chinese spend the money and resources on producing a carrier that they knew would not hold a front line position for very long? Not only that, but they also built a brand new carrier, the Type 002 Shandong, which is a functional carbon copy of the Liaoning. What does this imply?
The implication is that the Chinese are deadly serious about developing carriers that are equivalent (or superior !) to the Nimitz/Ford designs and that they want to do so as quickly as possible. Thus, the Liaoning and Shandong are temporary vessels intended to develop carrier construction techniques and manufacturing infrastructure and to gain operating experience while the succeeding conventional carriers were being built and outfitted. Ponder the immensity of that … the Chinese built/rebuilt two entire, large carriers just to operate them for a few years in order to gain experience! That speaks to a focus, intensity, and drive to achieve military superiority that we utterly lack. Can you imagine the US building an entire carrier just to operate it for a few years to gain experience? It’s outside of our mindset to even contemplate that.
The other telling implication is the mere fact of the carrier’s existence. While we are debating the usefulness of carriers and many US naval observers are calling for further reductions – or outright elimination ! – of carriers, the Chinese are pushing as hard as they can to build a carrier fleet. That tells us that the Chinese see great value in a carrier fleet and that, alone, should serve as a strident warning to us as we steadily reduce our carrier power. We’re debating carriers while the Chinese are building them as fast as they can! That strongly suggests that the Chinese envision an eventual head-to-head carrier battle with the US and are working to ensure that they come out the winners.
Alternatively, they may envision a future where we have reduced our carrier fleet to the point of impotence and, when that happens, the Chinese intend to be right there, dictating naval supremacy with a powerful carrier fleet that will vastly overmatch whatever remnants of a carrier fleet we leave ourselves.
The Chinese have seen the lesson of WWII in which powerful, roving carrier groups were able to control the seas – and thus control the land ! - and they see the obvious application of that lesson to today’s battlefields. We, on the other hand, have bought into the network/data approach which sees no great value in firepower. The Chinese have placed their bet on firepower while we have bet on data. I know which I think is the winning hand.
The Chinese are coming for us and they’re not even pretending otherwise. We need to take heed.
I think beating on the Chinese for "copying" is counter-productive. It made perfect sense to copy as much as possible for their initial vessels while the PLAN develops some institutional expertise on how to successfully operate a carrier.
ReplyDeleteTheir carrier program speaks of a long term, well thought out approach to developing something that will actually work.
The initial three Chinese carriers achieve concept validation through prototyping. Something we in the west seem to be unable to wrap our heads around.
"I think beating on the Chinese for "copying" is counter-productive"
DeleteIt's not counter-productive to state a fact.
Its counter productive if it limits readership to the rest of what turned out to be an excellent post. I was about ready to stop reading as you use "copying" repeatedly in this an other posts. I'm glad I read further as the rest of the post was very good.
DeleteYou might care to remember that the US largely got where it was as an industrial powerhouse because they copied the British relentlessly after the industrial revolution.
Very little in the early days of US industry was original. It was largely copied from the UK. So an argument that includes sticking knives into the Chinese because they copy is largely spurious. Of course they copy. Anyone with half a brain would copy too.
https://www.ushistory.org/us/22a.asp
You might care to have a careful look at both the STEM university grad stats, and also the global stats for Patent and other intellectual property filings. The rise of Chinese tech talent is staggering, particularly when you look at how the west including the US is doing.
"Its counter productive if it limits readership"
DeleteAny reader who would stop reading because of a statement of fact (Chinese copying is a fact) is not a reader worth having. You continued to read so good for you and, as a result, you reaped the reward of an informative and insightful post.
Now, you seem to have had an emotional and unfounded reaction to the factual statement about Chinese copying. You'll note that I never stated that China was wrong - from their illegal and unethical perspective - to engage in copying. I did, however, point out the very real negative consequences associated with copying: the forfeiture of institutional knowledge, expertise, and the bypassing of experience. We've seen exactly this negative consequence play out in their faltering attempts to reverse engineer (copy) jet engines without having gone through the historical learning curve and having slowly and painstakingly developed the supporting capabilities such as metallurgy, machining, etc. Simply having a purloined set of blueprints is often not enough to successfully recreate the stolen product.
One cannot discuss the Chinese military without duly noting the copying that underlies their development and that is what I have done.
"sticking knives into the Chinese because they copy"
Other than noting that what they do is illegal and unethical and noting the negative consequences, nowhere in the post did I attach any particular emotional reaction to their copying. That's something you, alone, have done.
Unfortunately I can see many of the current Navy Managers falling into the mind trap of: they are just copying what we have done before, it will take them years to catch up, they haven't seen our newest stuff, etc.
DeleteI imagine the French said similar things about Germans tanks before May 1940: our tanks are more armored, our guns are bigger, we invented tanks, theirs look like small knock-offs, etc.
A leader won;t fall into this trap but a manager will.
All navies copied destructor from Spain when was build. Submarine was partly copied between Spain, US, Germany and others. Dreadnought battleship from United Kingdom. Carrier copied between United Kingdom, US, Japan and others
DeleteTo copy is the standard and is good.
First you copy from the best, and then innovate from that. Any other options are senseless.
JM
Interesting analysis!!! Ive never looked at these closely, assuming that they were largely left unchanged from their Soviet roots. Clearly I was mistaken, and they are much more capable than I thought, at least as far as ski-jump carriers can be, and their weapons fit is somthing we should be striving for. It's clearly built to fight...
ReplyDeleteA very interesting article.
DeleteIf the PLA navy use there new conventional carrier to carry extra AWACS and tanker aircraft to support there ski jump carriers the ski jump carriers could carry 40-50 long range J15 fighters each,with long range air to air missiles. A Chinese Tomcat equivalent.
MA
"AWACS and tanker aircraft"
DeleteYou correctly note that the key feature of a successful carrier and air wing is the AEW, tankers, and EW support aircraft. Ski jump carriers inherently have a difficult time operating effective support aircraft which limits their combat usefulness. This is the major failing of the British carrier.
I suspect that the Chinese are not going to deal with support aircraft for their two ski jump carriers because they clearly view them as temporary, experience-gathering ships and not worth the effort to establish any permanent solution. Instead, they'll just wait a few years and they'll have several conventional supercarriers in various stages of entering their fleet. It will be interesting to see what support aircraft they develop then.
I agree that the two carriers in service are primarily for gaining experience in carrier operations, I’m certain that if a 2nd hand CATOBAR carrier had been available they would have skipped the ski jump carriers altogether.
DeleteMy point is that even there 2 ski jump carriers will be much more combat capable once they launch there third carrier and figure out how to use all the support aircraft it can carry.
I think they already have an E2 clone flying and as you pointed out they will copy from the US all the other capabilities they need.
As for our UK carriers I’d rather not comment as it just makes me angry!
MA
" ski jump carriers the ski jump carriers could carry 40-50 long range J15 fighters each"
DeleteJust a point of interest, the best sources I've seen put the aircraft capacities for the two ski jump carriers at 24 and 36, respectively. I have no idea how big the hangar space is on the carriers but remember that the ski ramp, itself, eliminates a lot of deck parking. US carriers typically park quite a few aircraft on the bow and mainly use the waist cats for launches.
Of course, your concept still holds true regardless of the exact number of aircraft.
Looking at your rear view picture of the carrier realy shows how difficult it would be to park aircraft on deck during flight operations. It’s just a guess but maybe 40 J15’s are doable, I should of made clear that would only be possible by removing all the large Super Frelon type helicopters( another example of Chinese copying western technology).
DeleteRemoving the AWACS version is no great loss anyway.
Your article has driven home the fact to me that 1 proper aircraft carrier, with an early 1990’s air wing is probably more combat capable than several ski jump carriers.
My hope is that the US & its allies has a massive wake up call now the Chinese have launched there own super carrier.
MA
"how difficult it would be to park aircraft on deck during flight operations."
DeleteFlight ops would require the entire landing area and bow area to be clear. That only leaves the wedge beside the island for parking aircraft. Looking at the photo, there are six aircraft parked in that area and you'd be very hard pressed to fit six more in the area. Twelve is around the limit of flight ops parking and I'm even dubious about that.
Bear in mind that the area of the two elevators (fore and aft of the island) must also be kept clear which further reduces usable parking space.
Without a sized diagram of the hangar, I'm only guessing but I would think around 20 aircraft would be the max that could be stored in the hangar. Remember, you have to leave significant open space in the hangar to move aircraft around and to/from elevators and you need room around each aircraft to work on it and get maintenance equipment to/from it.
20-30 aircraft appears to be the max the ship can carry and operate which fits with the reports of around 24 as the max capacity. I'm sorry but something in the 40 range is not even remotely realistic.
If you do a search for "Liaoning aircraft carrier drawing" you'll see plan drawings that clearly show the parking area marked off and it becomes clear just how little space is available during flight ops.
Alternatively, here's a photo of the Indian ski jump carrier Vikrant which is similar size and layout and it shows a full deck park with flight ops area clear and it has 10 aircraft parked and there is no more room for additional aircraft.
Thanks for the picture & expert information.
DeleteThose Indian aircraft are a lot smaller than there Chinese counterparts too. No chance of 40 aircraft.
Why do nations use ski jump carriers given the aircraft storage problems and the fuel/armament limitations of any combat aircraft launched? I know the Chinese are just using there carriers to bigger & better things.
Thanks for the information, just 1 of the reasons I enjoy this blog.
MA
"Why do nations use ski jump carriers given the ... limitations"
DeleteCost. Pure and simple, cost. If that's all you can afford then that's what you build.
Also, their requirements (meaning mission) are different. The US carriers are tasked with global maritime domination and high end war. The UK, India, and others are tasked only with local waters protection (where they can be supported and supplemented with land based air and firepower) and small, 'colonial' interventions overseas (like the UK/Falklands conflict). A ski jump carrier is appropriate, albeit barely so, for those tasks.
Building, maintaining, and operating a true supercarrier is hideously expensive! Of course, for that cost you get enormous capabilities and firepower.
It is also important to note that supercarriers must be operated in groups of 3-4 to be survivable and effective in high end war. In other words, the MINIMUM number of carriers, if you wish to build supercarriers, is 3-4, not just one, if you want to be combat effective. So, again, hideous costs!
China's second ski jump carrier is reported to be a big bigger in size and, I would guess, has been redesigned for a larger hangar. Hence, the reports of up to 36 aircraft capacity as opposed to the Liaoning's 24 or so.
DeleteTake a look at any photo of a US carrier with embarked aircraft and you'll likely see several to a dozen or so aircraft parked on the bow, lined up along the starboard side with the port cat area left clear. That emphasizes the negative impact that ski ramps have on carrier aircraft capacity.
Alternatively, many photos show the entire bow filled with parked aircraft and only the waist cats clear.
US carriers are constantly re-spotting the decks so all you can talk about is 'typical' parking arrangements. At any given moment, there's no telling where the aircraft will be!
The original purpose built ski jump carriers( the uk’s Invincible class) were built as anti submarine warfare carriers for use in the North Atlantic/Artic Ocean. The Sea Harriers were mainly to be used for shooting down maritime patrol aircraft, the main peer warfare assets were the large anti submarine Sea King helicopters.
DeleteI really don’t know what the present uk carriers are for. Like you said there are only two of them and they have very limited air wings. Kind of wanting a champagne lifestyle on beer money!!
MA
Should we perhaps be ‘copying’ anything from China’s Type 055 destroyer, which on the face of it seems to be a considerable advance in terms of design on the Burkes?
ReplyDelete"seems to be a considerable advance in terms of design on the Burkes"
DeleteWhat design features strike you as considerably advanced?
What we need to copy isn't the design, but the design process. China didn't try building the Type 055 as a counterpart to the Ticonderoga class cruiser, with technology she didn't have; she started by building two Type 052 destroyers in the 1990s, sailed them for a few years to find and then fix any design and construction flaws, and then built two Type 052B destroyers incorporating newer technology, sailed them a few years, and then built six Type 052C destroyers...
ReplyDeleteThe Type 055 is built upon lessons learned from building, testing, and sailing the Type 052 and its subclasses. Any new technology is thoroughly tested, before a design incorporating them is put into mass production- a sharp contrast to what the USN did with the Littoral Combat Ships and the Zumwalt. If the Type 052 design was fatally flawed, China would've wasted its money and industrial resources on two ships instead of the DOZENS the USN wasted on the Littoral Combat Ships.
"What we need to copy isn't the design, but the design process."
DeleteBingo!
It seems to me the US used to do that back in the day, when we had numerous companies vying for the contract. Think of the military plane manufacturers in:
Delete1960: General Dynamics, Lockheed, McDonald Douglas, Northrup Grumman, Fairchild, Bell, Cessna, North American, Convair.
Now? 2022: Northrup Grumman, Lockheed Martin, Boeing, General Dynamics
Manufactuers used to draw up new designs to compete. Consolidations and buy outs have dried up competition and the vast craziness of logistics chains have compounded the issue.
"Manufactuers used to draw up new designs to compete."
DeleteYes, they did and they did so at their own expense. They would often build prototypes at their own cost, as well.
"Consolidations and buy outs have dried up competition"
No, not really. You need to be careful to distinguish between cause and effect. The effect is, as you noted, consolidations and buyouts but they are the effect not the cause. The cause is the scarcity of production contracts. During pre-WWII, WWII, and the 1960's and '70's, we produced many dozens of different aircraft. There were production contracts available for any semi-competent aircraft company and all the companies prospered. In the 1980's and beyond, we moved to fewer and fewer production programs for larger and larger stakes. We (the military) killed the opportunities by insisting on mega-programs instead of many smaller programs. The F-35, for example, was a single program to supply the AF, Navy, and Marines and was intended to replace dozens of aircraft with just one. THAT'S WHAT KILLED THE COMPETITION. When there's only one production contract issued ever two or three decades, every aircraft company except one is a mega-loser and the losing companies can't survive except by consolidation and buy outs. We brought this on ourselves. Don't confuse cause and effect !
If we look forward many decades, we can see that China will easily end up with a navy double the size of the US.
ReplyDeleteTo me, this means China will have the sheer numbers to hold off Japan and the US off it's mainland, while being able to project power worldwide.
For example, at 10 new vessels per year, by 2040, China might have about 500 vessels, compared to the USN 270-350 (LCS doesn't count).
For example, 300 vessels stay at home, while 3 carrier task forces surround Australia west, north west, north north east.
Australia's main defence of the mainland is the air force. It is not large, and it will have to be divided into thirds.
The US aid, even by AUKUS and ANZUS , will not be large, even though air power can be delivered within 24 hours.
Could you imagine this? Australia might have to secede , at first, a few hundred square kilometres of land, like a larger version of Hong Kong and Macau.
And unlike the UK, they'll militarise the s**t out of it, and, using China/India border dispute as a guide, they'll build towns all along the borders, and then start pushing to see what they can get away with, by patrolling a few km beyond the border, and then when there's no response, they'll build towns, roads, rail there, like SCS islands, and rinse and repeat.
Or, they could send the carrier task forces off the coast of Africa, and bypass Australia as a source of raw materials all together. Just go invade Africa, set up the rail and roads for mining coal etc, set up corridors for mining straight in and out. No need for slavery this time, as China has plenty of poor people to exploit, and as can be seen from Europe's example, administering territory is time consuming, and costly.
Or....... 4-5 (make up a number) carriers to surround Taiwan to spread Taiwan military thin, while another 5 stay off shore Okinawa to defend against Japan and the US?
Bloody hell, more war is coming.
Andrew
You're making the incorrect assumption China's ambitions are exaactly the same as the British Empire, and she'll take the exact same actions to fulfill them.
DeleteFirst off, who's stupid enough to waste time, manpower, and other resources trying to conquer Australia? Can't control be done more effectively and efficiently via trade and cultural influence, i.e., what the US has done for over a century?
"You're making the incorrect assumption ... Can't control be done more effectively and efficiently via trade and cultural influence"
DeleteIt's possible that you're also making an incorrect assumption that China thinks and acts as a Western country would. China does not view the rest of the world as potential economic partners (with varying degrees of friendship to go along with it). Instead, because of China's history of being continually attacked and conquered, China views the rest of the world as an existential threat. China's philosophy is conquer or be conquered. Anyone you don't conquer will, eventually, attempt to conquer you. Understanding that philosophy, it's apparent that Australia, and every other country in the world, is on China's conquering 'to do' list. It's just a matter of when.
China's history, culture, cultural psyche, public statements of exorbitant territorial claims (second island chain and beyond), and actions (militaristic expansionism) all support this position. China is not looking to peacefully co-exist with the world; it is looking to conquer the world.
For example, China is embarked on a campaign of debt-trap acquisition of foreign bases and territorial acquisition. This is not the action that a country would take if it was looking to establish friendly, mutually beneficial trade relations as a member in good standing of the international community. Instead, this is an example of non-kinetic conquering.
Aim9snake, just look at how the coal issue backfired on China.
DeleteConquer western Australia, a piece at a time, and the coal, LNG, who knows what other commodities , issues are solved.
Andrew
Since we're on the subject of China stealing then copying US weapons, I want to share a conversation I had with a rather high-ranking Air Force guy fairly recently, at least the part I can actually share.
ReplyDeleteIs China really doing that, I asked, and are you okay with it?
Pretty much, he said, and for three reasons.
First, it is far from clear that we could stop them even if we wanted to do so.
Second, if they get used to stealing and copying they won't puch much effort into actual innovation.
And lastly, as long as they keep copying our stuff, we can be sure that their planes will only ever be number two in the world, at best.
"as long as they keep copying our stuff, we can be sure that their planes will only ever be number two in the world, at best."
DeleteSetting aside the dubious nature of that comment, your friend is ignoring the , 'quantity has a quality all its own' truism.
The unidentified launchers amidships could be a variation of the CS/AR1 anti saboteur launchers which are being deployed on a growing number of chinese ships. These could be more effective against shallow water UUV at short range than the RBU launchers which are optimized for longer range and greather depth.
ReplyDeleteHmm, interesting thought although the launchers look far too big to be the CS/AR1 which are pretty small, petite, and have only 5 narrow diameter tubes on each side. I suppose it could be a new variant although it seems far to big for the anti-frogman function. Let's keep investigating. My best guess is that they're some kind of decoy system although there are other, readily identifiable decoy systems on the carrier.
Deletei get the comparison to Nimitz rather than Ford, but in terms of the on board anti air gear, Ford has 3 CIWS, 2 RAM, and 2 ESSM.
DeleteWe have 10 functional Nimitz class carriers. We have 0 functional Ford class carriers. The rationale for using the Nimitz as a comparison should be rather obvious.
DeleteYou have to give the Chinese some credit for taking an abandoned, partially-built, Russian-designed aircraft carrier, that laid dormant for about 10 years before they got their hands on it, and turn it into a functional warship.
ReplyDeleteAs for copying "the angled deck, starboard side midships island, stern sponsons port and starboard, smaller forward sponsons, four arresting cables, and bow and waist ‘catapults’ (take off spots)," these are features that have been on British and American carriers for decades and form follows function. And, the angled flight deck is a British innovation.
Did someone say they shouldn't have copied Western carrier design?
DeleteThen why all the angst about copying our designs and lack of unique design features?
DeleteThe Liaoning is their version of our Langley. Which they then improved upon with their Type 002 carrier Shandong.
But, it's their Type 003 carrier, Fujian, that they just launched, that should be our focus. Reportedly, it has their version of EMALS. And, if it is a successful design and China could build 4 or 5 more, that could be a real challenge, especially when it comes to defending Taiwan.
"Then why all the angst"
DeleteWhat angst? Other than you, who's worked up about it?
I guess we're not taking China to court for patent infringement just yet.
DeleteWell, we could always file a claim with the Patent Cooperation Treaty which China is a signatory to but given their blatant disregard for the rulings of the UNCLOS tribunal which they are also a signatory to, I don't see much of a likelihood of success.
DeleteChina's word, or signature on a treaty, is absolutely worthless. They have no honor or integrity.
I have seen many comments about Chinese aircraft carriers saying something like "they built a carrier, now let's see them actually use it" implying that since in world War 2 the United states built carriers and won battles with carriers that the modern navy's carriers would be much more successful then Chinese carriers. These comments sometimes use the phrase 'institutional knowledge' which has been used in this post. It seems just as likely that the us might forget the purpose of these designs or doctrines as for China to never realize. Is there any truth to institutional knowledge as a substantial advantage?
ReplyDelete" Is there any truth to institutional knowledge as a substantial advantage?"
DeleteThe answer is blindingly obvious. I won't bother addressing it further.
"seems just as likely that the us might forget"
Absolutely ! The US Navy has clearly lost a great deal of institutional design knowledge. While the Navy retains institutional knowledge of day to day carrier ops - which the Chinese lack - we have clearly forgotten our combat ops institutional knowledge.
Whether you lack institutional knowledge because you forgot what you once had (the US Navy) or because you never had it (the Chinese), the end result is the same. However, while the US has forgotten some of what it once knew, it is easier to recapture knowledge you once had than to develop it from scratch. In that, the US has an inherent leg up on the Chinese although we seem determined to squander that advantage.
"I have seen many comments about Chinese aircraft carriers saying something like "they built a carrier, now let's see them actually use it"
Wherever you're going to see that, you need to stop going there. While the Chinese currently lack operational and combat experience with their carriers, they are acquiring it quickly and it's only a matter of time until they equal our experience. As far as I can recall, no one on this blog has ever made a statement along the lines of what you cite. You're apparently hanging around the wrong blogs!
I am going to point out a few fallacies here :
ReplyDelete1) That the Liaoning was rehauled completely and rebuilt from the bottom up :
No, the ship was never subjected to such a complete reconstruction, the entire hull was towed from Ukraine to China and sat in a dry dock. At no point was the ship "deconstructed" , so what you see is how the Soviets originally conceive their carriers as.
2) That the Shandong is a carbon copy of the liaoning, again that's not the case. The Shandong features are designed tower that is more streamlined, it deletes the 16 vls anti-ship missile tubes that Liaoning has, these 2 facts free up space for munitions, fuel and planes. Plus the ski-jump is redesigned compared to the Liaoning in terms of the angle.
This shows they aren't just blindly copying, but rather they take what they can get first and then work it out to see what fits.
That's how they get the 055, a design which uptill now the USN have not achieve in reality. They took the first step to build a ship that while pieces of it's tech exist on existing ships, have not been combined before.
And that also how they got the 003 carrier, if they are so committed to copy the US, why did they not just slap on 4 catapults like all USN carries instead of 3 ? It may be they realize the limitation of their current tech, or that they figure out a different way of launching planes compared to the USN, either which shows that they capable of independent thinking.
@ correction, the liaoning does not have the anti-ship missile tubes but a complete reconstruction of the ship was not possible so it was impossible to maximize the benefits of it compared to the Shandong.
DeleteIt also must be noted that the Admiral Kuznetsov, the Liaoning's sister ship also sports a 4 arresting wire configuration, 4 similar take-off positions and the same island placement, amongst other things.
DeleteI am going to point out a few fallacies with your comment:
DeleteLiaoning was never a complete Soviet ship. It was abandoned, only partially complete, when the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991. The partial vessel was stripped for parts and left to rot until the Chinese eventually acquired it and restored the ship from the keel up and completed the build. During the course of the rebuild, the Chinese removed the missile structures, enlarged and restructured the hangar spaces, reworked the superstructure, sandblasted and reworked the hull surfaces, installed a completely new sensor/radar suite, installed new weapons, rebuilt the sponsons, modified the stern structure, and so forth. That's a pretty complete rebuild by any standard.
"That the Shandong is a carbon copy of the liaoning"
Since you appear to have missed it, here is the sentence in the post that mentions the Shandong:
"Shandong, which is a functional carbon copy of the Liaoning."
You'll note the phrase, 'functional carbon copy' which does not mean a rivet for rivet duplication but, rather, a duplication of the essential function which is that of a ski jump carrier.
" they take what they can get first and then work it out to see what fits."
Again, did someone say they aren't?
All in all, you've offered a very poor comment with no content that furthers the discussion. Would you like to try again and this time offer something of substance that would be informative and helpful?
So you are either going to delete my posts to pretend that they do not exist so you get the last post in ? Wow, just wow.
DeleteI deleted your posts because they offer nothing of interest and do not further the discussion. If you have something other than debating how many bulkheads were rebuilt or what the nuances of the phrase 'functional carbon copy' are then you're welcome to share it and I'll enjoy and appreciate it. Otherwise, I'm not going to waste my time or my reader's. You might want to review the Comment Policy page.
DeleteI'm looking for quality, substantive comments not lawyer-ish trivialities.
I don't see how decrying China emulating western tech as "illegal" or "unethical" proves anything, the US to copied the V2 rockets wholesale, heck it even imported nazi scientists to work on the tech.
ReplyDelete"I don't see how decrying China emulating western tech as "illegal" or "unethical" proves anything"
DeleteI must have missed this. Who said it proved anything and what did they say it proved?
"but, worse for China, bypasses all the learning that led to the end result. That learning is also called institutional knowledge. Yes, by stealing and copying the designs of others, China has leaped to the desired end point but has done so without the intervening steps which produce underlying knowledge and expertise. This deprives them of actual design understanding and experience and makes future modifications and improvements difficult, if not impossible."
ReplyDeleteOld post but I'd say attempting to reinvent the foundations of carrier warfare and design would've served a very dubious value proposition to the PLAN for the most part. I don't think the end results or conclusions they would've came to have been much different. When we consider that the Chinese didn't have any fixed wing VTOL capable aircraft designs nor anything remotely similar to an F-35B competitor in their development pipeline, it became immediately clear that the Chinese naval aviation wasn't going to evolve into STOVL carrier designs in the future as we currently see with the HMS QE class. Going from STOBAR carriers to CATOBAR carriers was by far the obvious next step for them since they were already developing an F-35C equivalent (J-35) and expressed grievances with air wing limitations on their own STOBAR designs.
What you call "copying" is simply just a case of where "form follows function" because the Chinese aim to employ very similar sets of technology as the USN does. It's not hard to track where carrier design will go in the future between a total of only 3 viable directions (STOVL/STOBAR/CATOBAR).