Chinese Carrier

[Jamie B]

http://news.yahoo.com/apnewsbreak-satellite-gets-pic-chinese-carrier-180333261.html

The former Soviet Union started building the carrier, which it called the Varyag, but never finished it. When the Soviet Union collapsed, it ended up in the hands of Ukraine, a former Soviet republic.

China bought the ship from Ukraine in 1998 and spent years refurbishing it. It had no engines, weaponry or navigation systems when China acquired it.

Sorry, but Chinese ships will always be junks on the Yantze River....

They are probably coated in lead paint, also. 

[AZRedhawk44]

It's one aircraft carrier, whereas we have 11.

And it's half the size of one of ours.  And it's an old salvage ship with no Russian tech onboard, and the Chinese have to clobber together whatever they can steal from us or invent themselves that fits the ship's form factor.

Not worried.

[Harold Tuttle]

There's most likely orbital rods of god with that boat on the favorite list

[AZRedhawk44]

Interesting thought, though:

Would one of these smaller carriers make a good candidate for a drone carrier?

Keep your pilots belowdecks, launch more ordnance on smaller aircraft, and carry more aircraft.  Also automate landings since pilot comfort/fear/survivability isn't an issue with a drone sea carrier landing.

Dogfighting would be a disadvantage, but if you can launch 5 times the number of drones as a US carrier, and each carries 4 anti-aircraft missiles, that disadvantage is mitigated by lower cost and higher numbers, along with a kamikaze-like pursuit of victory since no lives are at stake when aerial combat involves drones.  It also then means that each US pilot would have to be able to shoot down 5 hostile drones, each sending anti-aircraft missiles at him.

[makattak]

Interesting thought, though:

Would one of these smaller carriers make a good candidate for a drone carrier?

Keep your pilots belowdecks, launch more ordnance on smaller aircraft, and carry more aircraft.  Also automate landings since pilot comfort/fear/survivability isn't an issue with a drone sea carrier landing.

Dogfighting would be a disadvantage, but if you can launch 5 times the number of drones as a US carrier, and each carries 4 anti-aircraft missiles, that disadvantage is mitigated by lower cost and higher numbers, along with a kamikaze-like pursuit of victory since no lives are at stake when aerial combat involves drones.  It also then means that each US pilot would have to be able to shoot down 5 hostile drones, each sending anti-aircraft missiles at him.

That's a rather scary scenario. Good thing the Chinese don't have access to any of our superior drone technology... oh, wait.

[Waitone]

Owning a carrier and successfully operating a carrier are two different issues.  Just because the US makes it look easy does not mean it is easy.

[MicroBalrog]

1. Varyag is a training carrier.

2. There are serious upper limits with how many aircraft you can operate off a carrier. They have to do with air traffic control, not with storage space.

3. Landing a drone plane on a carrier is very difficult and even the United States Navy has only done it in testing.

[TommyGunn]

Owning a carrier and successfully operating a carrier are two different issues.  Just because the US makes it look easy does not mean it is easy.

My father served in the U.S. Navy in a U.D.T. team during the Korean War, when the Navy was just beginning to use jets on their aircraft carriers.  He told me once about sitting on the deck of a nearby destroyer and watching three Navy jets in a row go into the drink.
Every so often they still have a jet crash into the stern, or onto the deck, or some other disaster happens and there's an .... explosion.
Some of these are on the web, somewhere...

[RoadKingLarry]

Problem: 1 Chicom "carrier".
Solution: 1 MK-48 ADCAP.

I'd be really surprised if we didn't have a boat in trail on that thing from the time it cleared the breakwater till it is doubled up back at it's pier.

[never_retreat]

Wasn't there a used brit carrier on ebay a while ago that would have been more seaworthy than that chunk of ex com block junk?

[BobR]

A Defense Department report to Congress this year said the carrier could become operationally available to the Chinese navy by the end of next year but without aircraft.

"From that point, it will take several additional years before the carrier has an operationally viable air group," Hull-Ryde said in an email.

No planes to fly from it, no pilots trained to fly from it, just another target without air cover.

And color me skeptical, but a civilian satellite just snapping pictures of the ocean happens to catch this thing underway, right.

bob

[Zardozimo Oprah Bannedalas]

No planes to fly from it, no pilots trained to fly from it, just another target without air cover.

And color me skeptical, but a civilian satellite just snapping pictures of the ocean happens to catch this thing underway, right.

bob

LOL. Nice catch.

[MechAg94]

Interesting thought, though:

Would one of these smaller carriers make a good candidate for a drone carrier?

Keep your pilots belowdecks, launch more ordnance on smaller aircraft, and carry more aircraft.  Also automate landings since pilot comfort/fear/survivability isn't an issue with a drone sea carrier landing.

Dogfighting would be a disadvantage, but if you can launch 5 times the number of drones as a US carrier, and each carries 4 anti-aircraft missiles, that disadvantage is mitigated by lower cost and higher numbers, along with a kamikaze-like pursuit of victory since no lives are at stake when aerial combat involves drones.  It also then means that each US pilot would have to be able to shoot down 5 hostile drones, each sending anti-aircraft missiles at him.

But as we have found out in the past, just launching hoards of AA missiles doesn't necessarily get the job done.  And it only works if you can see the other planes and have the freedom to fire at a decent distance.  I wonder what sort of radar the Chinese would bring to the table if they tried to send this carrier out into the ocean. 

[AJ Dual]

No planes to fly from it, no pilots trained to fly from it, just another target without air cover.

And color me skeptical, but a civilian satellite just snapping pictures of the ocean happens to catch this thing underway, right.

bob

Plus, the small ramp-end carriers are made for STOL/VTOL fighters, like the Harrier, or YAK-whatever the Russians had almost no success with.

So even if you pull off a successful VTOL naval fighter, they tend to have shorter legs than catapult/wire captured fighters.

I'm aware the U.S. Marines operate the Harrier, and there's a VTOL version of the F-35 JSF, but that's a good compliment to their capabilities, which are presumed to take place in the wider arena of U.S. naval and air superiority.

If short legged VTOL's are all you've got. And lumpy-bumpy-frumpy copies of a mediocre-at-best Soviet design that killed a lot of pilots, you're just boned.

Like the UAV secrets in the other thread, it's not even so much the tech itself that's the "secret" it's all the logistics, operations, and supporting systems and organization that make it all work. And that isn't so much even a secret. It's a culture. Either you have it, or you don't.

[birdman]

Plus, the small ramp-end carriers are made for STOL/VTOL fighters, like the Harrier, or YAK-whatever the Russians had almost no success with.

So even if you pull off a successful VTOL naval fighter, they tend to have shorter legs than catapult/wire captured fighters.

I'm aware the U.S. Marines operate the Harrier, and there's a VTOL version of the F-35 JSF, but that's a good compliment to their capabilities, which are presumed to take place in the wider arena of U.S. naval and air superiority.

If short legged VTOL's are all you've got. And lumpy-bumpy-frumpy copies of a mediocre-at-best Soviet design that killed a lot of pilots, you're just boned.

Like the UAV secrets in the other thread, it's not even so much the tech itself that's the "secret" it's all the logistics, operations, and supporting systems and organization that make it all work. And that isn't so much even a secret. It's a culture. Either you have it, or you don't.

That carrier was designed to operate the navalized variant of the SU-27, not the forger.  Since the Chinese already buy the 27, it is reasonable to assume they want to do the same.
 

[AJ Dual]

Jebus. 

They do non STOL/VTOL off a ramp?

Granted, the planes and all the other junk on the straight half of the deck make a touch-n-go off any carrier hairy. But with that ramp just off to your right?  I mean, if it works for them, great. Although that tells me the Soviets/Russians were just never serious about naval aviation and force projection.

Like that poster that shows all the carriers of the different countries. It's a real smack upside the head about our capabilites vs. everyone else's.

If it weren't the whole "God made man, Sam Colt made them equal" factor that nukes have, even during the Cold War we were sort of the world's only superpower.

[kgbsquirrel]

But as we have found out in the past, just launching hoards of AA missiles doesn't necessarily get the job done.  And it only works if you can see the other planes and have the freedom to fire at a decent distance.  I wonder what sort of radar the Chinese would bring to the table if they tried to send this carrier out into the ocean.  

Since this class of carrier was originally outfitted with a phased array radar, I'm guessing some sort of variant of the AN/SPY-1 Aegis that they stole from us.

That carrier was designed to operate the navalized variant of the SU-27, not the forger.  Since the Chinese already buy the 27, it is reasonable to assume they want to do the same.

Yup, the Sukhoi Su-33 and now introducing the MiG-29K developed off the MiG-29M.

[makattak]

Jebus.  

They do non STOL/VTOL off a ramp?

Granted, the planes and all the other junk on the straight half of the deck make a touch-n-go off any carrier hairy. But with that ramp just off to your right?  I mean, if it works for them, great. Although that tells me the Soviets/Russians were just never serious about naval aviation and force projection.

Like that poster that shows all the carriers of the different countries. It's a real smack upside the head about our capabilites vs. everyone else's.

If it weren't the whole "God made man, Sam Colt made them equal" factor that nukes have, even during the Cold War we were sort of the world's only superpower.

This one?




(Obviously this is dated)

[kgbsquirrel]

I used to drive that one on the bottom left! 

[BobR]

They do non STOL/VTOL off a ramp?

Seems to work OK for them. I just wonder what kind of a payload, if any they can load up and still not dribble off of the pointy end when they run out of deck?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D3AMB7ZFF3Q


And the SU-33.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wj3o3gNgxg4&feature=related


And this just because it will make you pucker even if it is just a video.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8mmcSF9AuL8

bob

[longeyes]

Carriers make sense only when a big power is fighting a lesser power and "projecting power" unchallenged by major rivals, otherwise they are extremely vulnerable targets that would not last long in a serious dust-up.  If the Chinese want to spend huge sums on carriers to make themselves feel first-rank I say go for it.  Too bad, though, we are subsidizing them with our debt.

[freakazoid]

Since this class of carrier was originally outfitted with a phased array radar, I'm guessing some sort of variant of the AN/SPY-1 Aegis that they stole from us.

Gah! I come here to get away from working for a while and SPY still gets talked about. 

[MicroBalrog]

Granted, the planes and all the other junk on the straight half of the deck make a touch-n-go off any carrier hairy. But with that ramp just off to your right?  I mean, if it works for them, great. Although that tells me the Soviets/Russians were just never serious about naval aviation and force projection.

AFAIK, in Soviet doctrine the primary goal of aircraft carriers is not force projection, but helping to fend off a supposed US mass-landing.

[Scout26]

It's a Navy Cross that's just waiting to happen.

[dogmush]

Carriers make sense only when a big power is fighting a lesser power and "projecting power" unchallenged by major rivals, otherwise they are extremely vulnerable targets that would not last long in a serious dust-up. If the Chinese want to spend huge sums on carriers to make themselves feel first-rank I say go for it.  Too bad, though, we are subsidizing them with our debt.

Naval tactics fail.  Carrier Battle Groups are designed and trained to control large areas of ocean to keep sea lanes open.  Apparently in the last "serious dust-up"  there were some Bavarian dudes in little bitty sinking ships that caused trouble all out of proportion to their size.

The whole force projection thing is something they do because no one is actually trying to close sea lanes.

As to a carrier's vulnerability, they are both very tough ships and very hard to get ordinance to.  Even the Soviets, who spent a lot of time and money to figure out how to, were unsure of their ability to sink more Carriers wholesale.  The folks that talk about "big easy targets" tend to have been no closer to a navy ship then reading a Tom Clancy novel.