Latest pictures out of China of PLANs work on the Carrier Varyag

CHINA.COM Military Pics ^ | 10 Octoner 2005 | Jeff Head

[GOP_1900AD]

Logistics, logistics and more logistics. It's the lesson Hitler and Tojo ignored. Hitler failed to understand that once a few hundred miles into the USSR, his own logistics would literally be mired oh and yeah, old man winter. Tojo was overreliant on sea transport and had no other choice. (Compare that with today - note the utter explosion of new overland routes from the Taiga to the Gulf of Thailand ...). In fact, it is the consideration of logistics that makes me worry about "obsolete" large scale overland war biting us on the behind in Eurasia. We are not equipped for it. Logistics pressures the SCO to look at overland strategies and to look at thrusts in the hundreds of miles outward from the SCO's periphery. The same thing that was a disadvantage to Hitler and Tojo, increasing friction away from their core, becomes the SCO's advantage, to a degree. We'd be forced into a D-Day times 10, at a minimum. But we have told ourselves, never fight a land war in Asia. Therein lies the problem.

[GOP_1900AD]

You're right. Another thing they build is large container cranes. But they also have to build the hulls to move them to delivery locations.

[GOP_1900AD]

Some Tu-95 configs are capable of over 500 MPH, but again, only in level flight at altitude, plus, bad for mileage!

[Jeff Head]

Agreed...and make no mistake, that is what the ultimately intend.

The PLAN has already built the other surface combatants needed for a credible carrier battle group, with decent multi-role DDGs, area air defense DDGs and strong multi-role frigates.

They are also building a new class of nuclear powered attack submarine (SSN) that could serve to bolster the ASW defenses of such a group. Here's a pic of what such a group could look like if this thing is ever made operational.

Take a look at all the massive naval shipbuilding the Chinese communists are doing at the following link:

[meadsjn]

Thanks for the update and the pics.

[sam_paine]

I think they do it to manage their currency security the same way a child holds on to the side of the swimming pool on a cruise ship. The child's safety (China's economy) is all relative to its immediate surroundings and also the greater unseen surrounding environment. If the US sinks, how does that help China expand markets?

Lately, I've been trying out the counter-panic perspective for FR:

1) Perhaps Bush DOES NOT have some grand strategery or insight on Miers? Maybe she's just a dopey choice that flopped (in process).

2) Perhaps Karl Rove DOES NOT have a weather machine, and Kyoto WOULD NOT have stopped Katrina.

3)Perhaps the Joint Chiefs do not really have a viable long term strategy to extend Pax Americana beyond the historical scope of Pax Romana.

4)Perhaps China's purchase of US notes today has no more relation to the future price of tea in the US than Mao's swim in the Yangtze really had anything to do with the rise of State-owned-Enterprise semiconductor fabs in Shanghai.

In Occam's words, maybe Chinese buy US Treasuries for the same reasons that the UK, Japanese, French and Americans buy them?

[JamesP81]

I think you're a little optimistic. The USN war-gamed a war with the PRC and, according to the results, its carriers were forced to retreat. Their carrier makes this equation worse.

When they did the war game, was it solely our naval forces v. their forces? If so, then it's not surprising. 4 carriers can field between 350-400 aircraft. That, against their thousands of planes in their air force. I think the important thing to remember is that not just USN is going to be involved in such a conflict. Significant USAF and USMC assets would be deployed against the threat as well.

With all that being said, a strategic withdrawal out of the Formosa straight would probably be smart on our part. It would expose our carriers to less risk from land based air power and it would force their fleet into open waters, if they wished to engage us, which would be suicidal. It would also leave us within striking distance of their fleets inside of the Formosa strait (the advantage to carriers, after all, is their very long range).

[Little Ray]

The USMC can operate from carriers just fine, but where would the USAF operate from? Taiwan? Japan? Diego Garcia?

I don't think the PLA would let us set up on Taiwan, and Japan would throw a fit if we compromised their neutrality. Diego Garcia is too far away for USAF ops in support of the fleet. I think that the USN might be on its own.

[Triple]

Its all part of the casino motif. Like Ceasar's palace, right?

[F.J. Mitchell]

I'll take that as a "No".

[JamesP81]

I don't know. Japan has a vested interest in keeping the region stable, and Chinese aggression would definitely be a destabalizer. They might allow us to fly from Japan. If not, we at least don't have to fly from Diego Garcia. We can fly from Guam. It's a long way off, probably too far for fighters, but we can still deploy long range strategic bombers there. B-52s shooting anti-ship cruise missiles (and each bomber can carry 8 harpoon anti ship missiles or 20 air-launched cruise missiles, so do that math for a flight of six bombers) from afar and B-2s striking their command and control onshore would be an extremely potent force to augment the USN against Chinese naval and air forces.

[Jeff Head]

If we are fighting China over Taiwan, then we will operate off Taiwan and will not care what the PRC thinks at that point.

Japan could very well join the fray, or at least allow us to operate from there, in the event of PRC aggression against the ROC.

Korea would be an interesting situation and I am almost willing to bet that the North would take advantage of such a situation to try and go south while we were distracted. In fact, a more likely scenario IMHO, would be the N. Koreans going south first, getting us involved over that...and then China making its play for Taiwan.

In either event there is Guam for long rang missions, tanker assisted fighter cover, or long range B1 or B2 missions.

[Jeff Head]

I believe the PRC will ultimately construct their own indigenous carriers...in fact I would not be surprised to learn they had already cut first metal.

But the actual construction would almost certainly be found out because it is just too big, and there are only so many sipyards where such construction could even take place...which we are most certainly monitoring.

So, the answer is no...I do not believe the Varyag is a decoy while they are building others. We will know it when they do...unless they have constructed some huge covered facility that we do not know about...in which case the construction of such a facility itself would be very hard to conceal and would get us poking around...IOW, same result.

I do believe the PLAN may make this Varyag operational as an intial vessle to garner experience while they go about building and commissioning their own at a later date. Either way...it is too valuable and potentially dangerous a target for us to ignore and it would complicate issues in the Taiwan Straits area if it attempted to support any Chinese attack there.

[Jeff Head]

FYI.

[Tolerance Sucks Rocks]

Look, Jeff. I'm sure Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold are fine kids. So one of them did a project about shooting up the school? So somebody saw them buying guns? So what? Just normal teenage hijinks. Relax.

Is it April 20 already???

[Jeff Head]

Hey...I am relaxing!

[Little Ray]

My point is that the PLA is not led by idiots like the Iraqis. They would not let us set up on Taiwan - our bases would be attacked instantly by missiles and bombers, long before they became operational.

It keeps coming back to political will - If it were up to me, my FIRST strike would be against the Three Gorges Dam, with a nuke if necessary. But I'm pretty bloodthirsty. Need to ask yourself "What would Hillary do?" since, given Republican idiocy, she's likely to be President. I doubt there is the political will to do what is necessary.
Given the political will, we could win a naval war and stop an invasion. But that is a pretty big if...

If the North goes South in Korea, given the current state of the North Korea, it is going to be VERY roughly handled by ROK forces. The commies don't train enough on their equipment, don't have enough to eat, enough fuel, etc. Again, it would come down to political will. A appeasement minded South Korean government might hamstring ROK forces.

[Jeff Head]

Agreed...I believe the Varyag is more of a political tool than anything else at this point...followed by a training tool. The ChiComms hope to be able to use such tools to influence a future US administration and get them to do what they could otherwise not accomplish militarily.

Same holds for the ROK.

...and, if the elections go bad here in 2008, they may well succeed.

[Jeff Head]

FYI.

[F.J. Mitchell]

So far then, unless the PRC has rediscovered and megatized the secret that Lamont Cranston learned in the orient, everything concerning this carrier is controllable.