Posted on 04/30/2022 10:54:18 PM PDT by Zhang Fei
Developments in Ukraine reverberate far beyond its borders. The ChineseAll nations are now reviewing the possibility that their navy’s operations will be more vulnerable to Taiwanese anti-shipping measures than previously thought.
FIFY
Not sure I believe this. Wasn’t China building a whole strategy of making the aircraft carriers of the U.S. worthless?
it’s only 90mi from mainland china to taiwan.
i’d be amazed if the chinese don’t roll out 100,000+ drones (10x10 or bigger) to swarm the island and take it over
Why would Xi have needed the example of the Moskova to understand the vulnerability of ships in general? Many on FR have been calling ships “targets” for years.
A good article but strikes me as myopic to decide aircraft carriers are going to be destroyed because one destroyer got sunk by missiles.
In a major conflict, many ships are going to be disabled or sunk. China needs to land troops to win so the ability to move those troops and their equipment, under air and naval cover, is paramount.
I think the bigger similarities are that China will risk a lot of losses, possible defeat, and possible engagement of other major powers.
Of course, all this risk is unnecessary. Taiwan and Ukraine are bothering no one and this whole risk of a major war is strictly because Russia and China are totalitarian SOB’s. If they were democracies their people would never green light these wars.
Taiwan is a “dead stone”. Removing it from the board is unnecessary.
Aircraft carriers are for gunboat diplomacy. You sail them only where you have air superiority. Then you bomb some small country.
Carriers are just large, slow targets, aren’t they?
They won’t become obsolete, but will change beyond recognition.
Aircraft carriers, in particular, need to be replaced with a group of smaller boats where the loss of one is at a lower cost. vTOL or other tech to replace a big landing strip needs to be perfected.
Human fighters will become drone directing platforms.
Looks like the article is behind a paywall, anyone have a different link?
Does the naval future belong to submarines, drones, and hypersonics? Seems like it to me at this point.
I would think in a world of satellites,drones and communications tracking large concentrations of of material or large craft are facing a rapid demise. Aircraft carriers provide a lot of support fighting an enemy that doesn’t have the ability to target them. The next large war will be hell on earth.
Clubs and thrown rocks made humans in warfare obsolete long ago by the logic shown here.
If Xi is looking at anything, he’s looking at the performance of Russia’s conscript soldiers vs his own troops with zero combat experience.
At this point you do have to wonder if Aircraft Carriers aren’t the battleships of the 21st century - ie hugely expensive show ponies that will prove to be outdated in any major power conflict.
I know this, the last warships will be submarines. Anything on the surface will be hugely vulnerable. Are we there yet? Is the answer more smaller ships like frigates and destroyers? (and a willingness to lose a lot of them to accomplish your objectives). That’s what China is betting on.
Or is the answer fewer but much more sophisticated ships with better defenses? That’s what the US Navy is betting on.
“The next large war will be hell on earth.”
They all are. We have not had a war on our shores since the Civil War. It was Hell on earth for hundreds of thousands of Americans. Parts of the South did not fully recover for 100 years.
.
I hope we are also.
We should have stopped making Aircraft Carriers 20 years ago but our politicians are addicted to these mega ship naming game.
Carriers require a group of ships and subs for protection and support. Drones and missiles are the new technology.
Wrong.
Our military is built, and has been for a while, to conduct WW II operations against Grenada, counterinsurgency against low-peer states to show we are serious and get our best and bravest killed, and to rely on the silos in the Dakotas and the Ohio-class boats to make sure we don't have to fight anybody else.
The worst development of 60 years of this policy is that young men (and women) now consider full-on nuclear war as a policy option, and maybe one to be preferred.
Damn them all to hell.
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