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FreeloaderUK |
Chinese supercarrier? |
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Posts: 113 (16-Apr-2008 13:27:45) |
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bager1968 |
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Posts: 2893 (16-Apr-2008 20:35:43) |
That was posted a full year ago... and I have heard nothing since.
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FreeloaderUK |
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Posts: 117 (16-Apr-2008 22:29:02) |
so if China aren't building supercarriers, what are they playing at?
If they ever want to be treated seriously as a global superpower- they will need supercarriers |
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taschoene |
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Posts: 4193 (17-Apr-2008 03:19:09) |
The Soviets were taken plenty seriously-they never built supercarriers.
China seems to be doing remarkably well with the soft-power approach based on economic leverage. Switching to the hard-power approach based on long-range power projection would likely be counterproductive for them. |
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Admiral Beez |
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Posts: 4479 (17-Apr-2008 05:19:30) |
What would the Chinese do with carriers? They have no need to project power outside of their own waters. Besides, if they built one carrier, how often could it
be at sea? Isn't half the USN carrier fleet either at port or refit at any one time?
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seasick |
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Posts: 4589 (17-Apr-2008 05:41:23) |
A Chinese CV or CVN would be useful for menacing Taiwan and Japan. They would also be able top use it against Taiwan. A PRC invasion of Taiwan would benifit from a PRC carrier battle group cutting off aid from the east of Taiwan. |
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jim3au |
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Posts: 1449 (17-Apr-2008 06:25:06) |
Taiwan just elected a government whose policies were to go for closer relations with China and to not go for membership of the UN. Trying to invade Taiwan at
this stage is a good way of rescuing defeat from the jaws of victory.
Even planning for that eventuality is counter productive because it could scare Taiwan into spending some of her not inconsiderable reserves of foreign currency on her own defence |
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FreeloaderUK |
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Posts: 121 ( 4-Sep-1954 21:08:41) |
China's aim is bring Taiwan back to within its control, while the Taiwan government may be trying to be more friendly with China the population want to
keep the status quo. Taiwan is de facto an independent country- it may not have worldwide recognition but ultimately thats only because people do not want to
anger China, Taiwan is independent, its unlikely that they will give that up- China may well have to fight for it.
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Obi Wan Russell |
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Posts: 167 (18-Apr-2008 13:38:51) |
In the Taiwan context, a PLAN CVSG is not required directly to attack Taiwan itself but to prevent any outside support reaching the area, cutting off the USN
primarily. This can be done without a shot being fired (at sea) depending on how willing America would be to start a shooting war with China directly. I
don't think China intends to actually invade, but that is not to say they aren't planning to develop the capability as a negotiating tool to bring
taiwan back into the fold. Talk softly, but carry a big stick.
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emc |
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Posts: 3684 ( 4-Sep-1978 21:08:52) |
They just have to wait until Northrop-Grumman decides that labor costs in Newport News are too high, and moves production of supercarriers to China. I give it
15 years.
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wabpilot |
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Posts: 2020 (18-Apr-2008 15:08:46) |
FreeloaderUK wrote: Some years ago the President of the ROC said that Taiwan and the mainland would reunite someday, when the mainland had reached the same level of democracy as the ROC. |
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bager1968 |
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Posts: 2896 (19-Apr-2008 02:48:07) |
wabpilot wrote: So, when members of the Chinese "politburo" start fist-fighting (sorry, kung-fu-fighting) each other on the floor of their legislative
assembly-hall, then the ROC will re-join China? |
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jim3au |
Robust Debate | ||
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Posts: 1452 (19-Apr-2008 05:30:59) |
That is just democracy in action. I imagine that there have been robust debates since the civil war in the USA, if not in Federal legislatures then in state
ones. I know that there have been in Australia in state parliaments.
The boys who have won the "fight" are the ones who for many years wanted to reunite the two Chinas, the Kuomintang. The Taiwamese are supposed to have limited their investments in the PRC to a hundred bllion [which is simply not true]. The current government had as one of its policies the removal of at least some of the investment limits. Having hundreds of billions invested in the PRC and many of their children working in businesses based in the PRC, I think that Taiwan is well on the way to integration. Taiwan could have afforded twenty billion for the submarines that they supposedly wanted and built them themselves with plans that found their way into their possession. They have a pretty advanced military but their hearts are not in it the way they were thirty years ago. The doctrine is that the invasion by the PRC has to be defeated before it lands on Taiwan or the Taiwanese are defeated. That would seem pretty silly when the more troops that the PRC get ashore the more difficult the logistics become for the PRC. If the PRC get an invasion force ashore and they do not control the air or sea, then the invasion force is lost and you would think that would be somewhat desirable but no. The Taiwanese thinking works exactly the opposite. If the PRC get troops ashore, the Army cannot rely on Taiwanese not surrendering. So if the PRC launch an invasion as a sneak attack, they could find that the Defence forces of Taiwan wipe them out of the sea and air before ordinary citizens know that it is on. The clever ploy that the PRC came up with was to pound the Taiwanese with missiles and they would surrender rather than lose all their business assets and all the PRC has risked is US retaliation, but they have done that before. The risk to this approach is that the Taiwanese far from surrendering will harden their hearts and round two of the civil war will begin. So unless politics demand some general make a name for them self and has a go, the PRC will wait for the inevitable. After all, politicians who are willing to punch it out on the floor of the legislature certainly have some sort of fighting spirit. |
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Joshua Kintner |
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Registered Member
Posts: 399 (20-Apr-2008 03:41:20) |
The Chinese have about half a dozen former Russian carriers sitting in ports being used as casino ships. Most, if not all of those vessels, could probably be
rebuilt and refurbished as aircraft carriers in about half the time or less that it would take to build a new carrier from the ground up. But the PLAN
shouldn't need a carrier even for projecting power east of Taiwan, they should have ample land based assets with enough range to project power beyond the
east coast of Taiwan.
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bager1968 |
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Posts: 2897 (20-Apr-2008 07:28:24) |
Joshua Kintner wrote: Hmmm...
Moskva: scrapped in India 1997
I see only 3... half of a half-dozen.
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Obi Wan Russell |
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Posts: 176 (20-Apr-2008 12:03:59) |
Kiev and Minsk could be rebuilt, but look at how much work is required to return Gorshkov to service (neither Russia or China have any STOVL aircraft in
service so STOBAR is the only realistic proposition, and only Varyag is STOBAR configuration as built). As thing stand, The two Kievs could be returned to
service in their current configuration but they could only operate Helicopters. Their heavy missile batteries and radar systems would need replacing as most of
them are obsolete and/or not in Chinese service. Cost of revival are increasing already, and then there is the question of the engines, which had a bad
reputation in Soviet service for catching fire. It could be done, but don't presume they could be recommissioned after a straightforward two year refit and
a new coat of paint. So much effort, to produce a pair of 40,000ton helicopter carriers with a very limited remaining lifespan? If helo carriers are required
then it would be easier to convert a couple of container ships, which could be done in a fraction of the time. Varyag is worth the effort, as she is already
configured for Stobar and is halfway to being a 'blank sheet' for the Chinese.
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FreeloaderUK |
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Posts: 126 (21-Apr-2008 11:46:41) |
they could buy some F35Bs lol
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