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.
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 .... ?
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.