In this photo released by China’s Xinhua News Agency, a newly-built aircraft carrier is transferred from dry dock into the water during a launch ceremony at a shipyard in Dalian in north-eastern China’s Liaoning Province on April 26, 2017, with the communist giant launching its first aircraft carrier built entirely on its own. | Photo Credit:
AP
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The country's second such carrier and to be in action by 2020, it is likely to be named Shandong and will supplement the Liaoning.
China has launched its second aircraft carrier, marking an incremental rise in its capacity to project power in the West Pacific.
The aircraft carrier, called Type 001-A before it acquires a formal name, was transferred from dry dock into the water at a launch ceremony that started at about 9 a.m. at the Dalian shipyard of the China Shipbuilding Industry Corporation. Fan Changlong, vice-chairman of the powerful Central Military Commission (CMC) chaired the launch ceremony.
President Xi Jinping, the chairman of the CMC, was not present at the launch.
The new carrier, which is likely to christened Shandong, will supplement the Liaoning — China’s first aircraft carrier that was purchased from Ukraine, and commissioned in 2012.
The Type 001-A is expected to enter service of the People’s Liberation Army (Navy) or PLAN by 2020, following other time-consuming preparations such as the debugging of all on-board devises and sea trials.
The launch coincided with the start of the installation of the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system by the United States onto a golf course in Seongju, South Korea, in stated response to the North Korean threat.
The new carrier will have a displacement of 50,000 tonnes, which means that the Type 001-A will be a mid-sized carrier, significantly smaller than the super-carriers operated by the United States, which are above 70,000 tonnes. Like the Liaoning, the new carrier is likely operating home-developed Shenyang J-15 fighter jets.
Opinion among Chinese naval experts regarding the ideal size of China's carrier-based strike groups has varied. The South China Morning Post (SCMP) is quoting Li Jie, a researcher at the Naval Military Studies Research Institute, as saying that
China would require at least three aircraft carriers to defend its maritime interests.
"Among three carrier fighting groups, just one would be able to carry out operational missions because one would be used for training, while the third would have to undergo maintenance," he said.
No 3-carrier navy
Mr. Li also dismissed speculation that China would emerge as a three-carrier navy by 2020, with one ship deployed in the East China Sea and two in the South China Sea.
"It's impossible for China to complete the construction of three carrier fighting groups by 2020 based on current shipbuilding capabilities and other technical reasons," he observed. Mr. Li said that China had a limited capacity to produce aircraft carriers as it had only two yards — one in Dalian and another in Shanghai’s Jiangnan shipyard.
Some Chinese experts propose that China would require five to six aircraft carriers, a capability nowhere in the horizon, to project power simultaneously in the West Pacific, as well as the Indian Ocean-India’s core area of concern.
The Global Times quoted Yin Zhuo, a senior researcher at the PLAN Equipment Research Center as saying that "China needs two carrier strike groups in the West Pacific and two in the Indian Ocean. So we need at least five to six aircraft carriers," to protect the country’s maritime interests.
The daily also paraphrased Xu Guangyu, a senior adviser to the China Arms Control and Disarmament Association, who said that "future" aircraft carrier groups would require access to overseas logistical bases in countries such as Pakistan and Sri Lanka.
Here is the reality
But in a reality-check, Hong Kong-based military analyst Liang Guoliang told the SCMP that with the launch of the Type 001-A, China would still have only two carriers, with the new ship requiring two or three years work before it was put into full service.
On the contrary, he said that the U.S. has 10 carrier strike groups, with at least four deployed in the Asia-Pacific region.
""The US navy has 9.5 million tonnes of shipping, while China has just 400,000 tonnes, or 4 per cent of the US capability. The U.S. also has different kinds of carrier-based fighters, including its advanced carrier variants of the F-35 fighter ... while China just has the J-15," Mr. Liang observed.
He added: “Meanwhile,
the US has more than 200,000 marines, while China is just trying to expand its force to 100,000.”
