Posted on 11/27/2010 9:00:58 PM PST by ErnstStavroBlofeld
I’d love to watch their first aircraft launch and recovery.
Me too. A You Tube moment
A radial engine motorcycle is a crazy idea. Extremely cool but crazy.
Of course!
Its gonna handle like ****
good for target practice
it had better not get anywhere the USN in a shooting war
Thar’She`Blows!,,,;0),,,
I really think it would have made a better gamblin’ boat
than a carrier...
Every time one of these threads shows up, the usual snarking comments show up as well...
Its a FrankenCarrier...Shi Lang = Target...Shi Lang = POS...It doesnt even have steam catapults for crying out loud!...Bronze Star waiting to happen..." Yada, yada, etc., etc...
Personally, I think the Shi Lang and her follow-on sisters is going to be damn effective. Much more effective at what they are being designed for than anyone on FR (with the possible exception of Jeffhead himself) is willing to believe. Much more effective and combat capable than the Admiral Kutnezsov -- and I think the Shi Lang herself, is going to be operational much faster than people believe possible.
Are the ChiComs going to make some mistakes learning the lessons? Sure! They have probably made more than a few already -- which is probably at least part of the reason it's taking them so long to get this lady out to sea.
But they will get that lady out to sea, and they will master carrier flight operations (again, probably a lot faster than anyone here is willing to bet), and they will build more.
As far as her size and lack of steam catapults are concerned, I just shake my head and sigh. People look at her and look at our big brawny Nimitz class carriers and smirk. That, in my opinion is foolish.
She was never designed or intended to go airwing to airwing against American supercarriers. Chinese anti-carrier doctrine revolves around cruise missiles (both sub and surface launched) and their new anti-carrier ICBMs. The Shi Lang is the perfect size for her mission, which will be power projection in the Southeast Asian, Indian Ocean and African areas, in support of Chinese geopolitical objectives involving developing nations.
To give just one example, how does anyone think Indonesia or Malaysia is going to react, if after one of their orgies of bashing their ethnic Chinese populations, the Shi Lang carrying an airwing of 30 to 50 SU-33s and her battlegroup screen were to show up offshore?
Then there is the PLAN itself and the casual contempt in which too many FReepers seem to hold them. People really need to take a good look at Jeffhead's THE RISING SEA DRAGON page,
http://www.jeffhead.com/redseadragon/
and realize that China is building a modern blue water force that is very capable, professional and has the specific mission of driving the US out of the Western Pacific and Indian Oceans.
December 7, is just around the corner. On December 6, 59 years ago, a lot of people were scoffing into their beer about the "zipperheaded, fishhead-eating, Japanese" and gleefully predicting what the mighty USN would do to them if push ever came to shove. You may want to remember how that worked out.
So without any carrier operating, no experience, no technical know how, no fleet support or experience with a carrier, and no operational airwing this thing is suppose to be a threat?
Together with that wonderfully reliable Russian naval technology (sarc) they included in the equation, this will not be a threat to anyone who is a friend of the US,,, or one single Virginia Class SSN.
Are you sure it’s as 3rd rate as you suspect?
This link is 3 years old:
Touching the throttle in a turn would be interesting. I looked up radial engine motorcycle. Most of them had the engine mounted at 90 degrees from that. I think that would work better. It would be harder to balance and doesn’t look nearly as cool.
I would think the gryoscopic forces would ruin it as a viable bike.
I dont even like choppers. It defeats the geometry of a bikes handling.
However, I only posted it as the chicoms are likely to screw up to. They will just take 2 decades to do it.
Do you know the teething pains the US Navy had with carriers?
We do.
We've also read some of the abuse that Japanese expeditionary soldiers wrote in their (captured) diaries about Americans. Your point being .... ?
Give me a break. Of course I do. I am a former carrier sailor myself and have been fascinated with birdfarms since I was six years old and went aboard the USS Midway with my family at NAS Alameda for the first time.
I am also sure that China is going to go through its own teething pains (which will probably involve a moderate to high amount of blood, guts and feathers) but China, being China will simply shrug that off as the price of doing business.
What everyone seems to be ignoring is that the Chinese do not need to invent anything. All they are doing is adapting and improving what others, including us, have already done. They are quite good at that.
And, because they do not kowtow to public opinion like we do, they will get through the messy stages a lot faster.
You might as well ask if I know the teething pains the Chinese went through with submarine operations — which is every bit as complex, demanding and dangerous as carrier operations — and at which they have also become quite proficient.
Proficient enough to sneak a boat well into missile range of the USS Kitty Hawk undetected.
People really need to stop their sneering, wake up and smell the coffee. These are serious professional people who are working with world class hardware. If we do not get that dialed in now, we are going to get our balls kicked up next to our ears if it ever seriously drops in the pot.
You would seem to have the jump on us, then, on how the PLAN plans to employ this ship.
Aside from the rather pointed naming of the ship -- pointed at Taiwan -- it would appear that PLAN strategy seems to involve elimination of USN carrier battle groups through the use of asymmetrical weapons systems and doctrine, esp. involving IRBM's and large ASM's (including the Tomahawk system stolen/copied from the US), which would open the western Pacific and South China Sea to exploitation by Chinese CBG's built around Shi Lang, her sisters, and possibly smaller carriers and helicopter carriers.
There is nothing I've seen that would suggest any other employment than typical force projection on the Western model.
Exactly. It’s not rocket science — or rather it is, because I expect the ChiComs to use RATO on their birds to get them off the deck with a full bag of gas — but it’s obvious to anyone who follows military trends in this neck of the woods.
Could China build a supercarrier ala Nimitz? Probably, but I don’t think they will. They might instead build another Shi Lang type around a nuclear propulsion plant, but even that is doubtful. They can build three STOBAL carriers for the price of one Nimitz style birdfarm, and that will give them flexibility that even we cannot match — at least not for very long.
China is very heavily invested in Africa and many other parts of the developing world. They want and need to have a way to project force into those areas. Shi Lang and her follow on sisters will give them that capability.
Even Japan is also moving back into carrier aviation via the Hyuga and Ise class helicopters, which can be adapted for STOVL operations very quickly.
They even have a newer, much bigger design on the horizon with the 22DDH class. Why? Because the JMSDF planners can see what the ChiComs are doing and know that they are not going to be able to depend on the US to protect their interests forever, so they are going to have to do it themselves.
So? China is a generation or two away from a competent aircraft carrier fleet.
The big weakness in US NAVAIR the last few years has been the disappearance of the Toms. The Chinese would, I think, be looking to exploit that asymmetry by deploying R-33E/AA-9 "Amos"-equipped Su-33's afloat, which would replicate in some fashion the long reach of the F-14/AIM-54 combination. (Wonder why the Chinese didn't go for the bigger, ASM-ready Su-32 two-seater while they were at it?)
Taiwan and Japan both possess "unsinkable aircraft carriers" and I don't think the Japanese would be as urgently challenged by the appearance of Chinese CBG's as the US would be, not while Japan continues to operate F-15J's.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.