more info can be found here: "http://www.sinodefence.com/navy/surface/type054jiangkai.asp"

 

From its appearance, the ship can be said as well thought and well designed, although the compartment and capability of its combat system is unknown. The stealth feature is dangerous because PLAN still operates lots of old ships that reflect radio waves like angle reflectors.

 The stealth feature is dangerous because PLAN still operates lots of old ships that reflect radio waves like angle reflectors.

Remember that stealth varies with perspective.  
From a surface ship the 054A may appear a bit stealthy, but from a airborne radar the ship looks like it would  light up like a christmas tree.   

To be fair to mainland China, they are advancing their navy by leaps and bounds.  Compare the semi-modern ships they are geting today to the Luda class etc which they based their fleet round 10 years ago.

Still, they need some coherency.

Every six months, a new boat appears, it is the best in the world, and then nothing.

The naval division of the People's Army is still an handicaped infant.

Nothing fits together!

Since you haven't been in the Navy, you have to be the son of a USN officer (probably O-6 or above)

 

Actually, I would argue this is a wise strategy.

If you aren't in a naval race, and China isn't, the best way to move
your fleet forward is with short runs of ships introducing new
technologies steadily in each new class.


This is the model the US Navy really needs to adopt, short runs of new
ship classes with a steady upgrade program. The advantage of this
strategy is the design base stays at its peek by introducing a new
class every few years.

This is the model for the Japanese submarine programs, and as GF can tell you, it is extreamly successful.

BTW, the reason China isn't in a Naval race is because their focus is
on anti-navy. Their anti-navy strategy is designed to make the US Navy
ineffective, by forcing them to stand off at ranges beyond effective
strike capability.

The problem I have with this is that you need, before such implementation, to have any kind of nature technological base.

That is not the case of China.

 

They go in any direction aimlessly. It is costly and ineffective.

 

Regarding the japanese O-class, they follow one single impletary path, since the first Oyashio (1962), which were an evol of the KD-7 class +lessons learned from the Ming. They kept a straight line of design implementing new techs with any new generation.

 

I can't see anything the like in PLA-N.

 

I guess I see it differently.

 

They are building medium sized runs of frigate sized ships to keep the industrial base strong, and they appear to be running a new 2 ship destroyer class every 2 years with incrimental technological improvements as their technology base catches up to their industrial base.

 

The augment their slow development on the top end by buying from Russia, which provides a basis of comparison for future improvements to both the industrial base and technological base.

 

By additionally refitting older ships for new roles, for example very old patrol class vessels becoming ADP destroyer escort type platforms, and building smaller stealth ships they are additionally able to reuse old platforms for new ideas, removing the need to develop experimental class ships.

 

I don't see the aimless behavior you do, can you describe what about their strategy is aimless?

The Chinese military is so secretive that we all have our own speculative vision of it, I have to consent.

I follow you for the "anti-navy" part, but only partially.

Actually, in my thinking, PLA-N is playing that card against the US, in a Taiwanese scenario, or to gain a permanent access to the Pacific Ocean (for its deterence assets).

In this case, they (we all) know that they can't win with "conventional" forces (navy vs navy).

 

But looking elsewhere (South China Sea), they need a strong navy.

They claim the whole place, and not that ALL their best assets are based in the East Sea Fleet.

They want there an overhelming superiority. And they don't see only the protection of the SLOCs IMHO.

 

I don't understand your analogy with the japanese sub fleet, and I hope you can enlight me.

 

Now, the chinese are trying everything they can try, knowing they have a denied access to superior western designs (embargo).

But why don't they stick to one design, and improve it linearly and constantly?

Why do they design so many hull with so many different systems, and never get to the climax of so needed technology?

If you make one step in every direction, you are prone to walk around and go nowhere, aren't you?

the PLA-N builds what it does, when;

 

a. It has a sea/air denial mission off the eastern coast of China of at least 700 kilometers that it has to meet to prevent the USN from clobberingn it in its bases.

 

b/ It has three geographically isolated seas that it has to dominate to protect Chinese coastal merchant shipping, off shore fisheries, oil tanker SLOCS coming up from the Strait of Malacca etc.

 

c. It has to at least pretend to attempt to penetrate what the Chinese call the first island ring to break into the Western Pacific. That ring stretches from Japan to Taiwan in an arc of islands off China's east coast and I suppose you could  include the Korean peninsula as an Asian piece of that first ring.

 

I don't see them building a navy that makes much sense in light of a. b. or c..

 

I mean it has to be obvious that the PLA-Ns first objective in an anti-naval mission against the United States in supporting a PLA operation to take Taiwan is to hit GUAM and they have made very little logical effort to carry out that mission in any fashion that offers them any credible chance of success.

 

What would they try? Land based IRBMs? Sub-launched cruise missiles?

 

Long-ranged air-refuelled naval bombers?

 

Nothing they have built to date or would try in their current naval inventory makes any sense. It would be suicide to put to sea with what they have and they know it.

 

So, lets look for another explanation for their one off, two off, design and build evolutions.

 

What could they be trying to do?

 

How about a potemkim coast defense fleet? Their one offs and two offs could be nothing more than the current iteration of an evolution of the historic Chinese frigate, destroyer, submarine acquisition process. That is the Chinese steal or buy a piece of technology and they try it out and they bungle copy the execution of the evolution in their current design. Rather than build an entire class of failures, they limit the bungled experiments to one or two examples and then they try again. Meanwhile they purchase foreign (mostly Russian) systems in QUANTITY to give their forces some credible capability and deterrent value, while they build copies of the few mature Western (French) and Russian systems that they have totally reverse-engineered and understand.

 

Herald           

 

  

 

 

 

There are no evidence that chinese has the capability to rev-eng any complex system.

And from my second-hand vision (I am not directly in the field), I see many points witnessing (to not use proving) the opposite.

Again, I would disagree, the EP-3 captured by China in 2001 is a good example of one system they appear to have reversed engineered to some degree.

The massive production of several 1 plane prototypes is decent anicdotal evidence they were able to gather useful information from the plane.

 

Additionally, their new Tomahawk 'type' products also tend to lean on the possibility China has reversed engineer those products as well, probably stuff fired on Iraq in the 90s that didn't detonate.

 

While I would wholely agree this is speculation, I'm not the only one who has speculated, as it is in some part reasonable anicdotal evidence they have made strides on their existing technologies and to some degree, many of the changes are similar to US systems China has had access to.