Launched just over a year ago, on June 17, 2023, the aircraft carrier "Fujian" (Type 003) of the People's Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) of the People's Republic of China, represents a real before and after in terms of engineering and military possibilities for the Asian giant. Equipped with electromagnetic catapults and a very small island, it will allow China to continue increasing its air-naval dominance over its surrounding seas thanks to its ability not only to operate J-15 (and in the future, J-35) fighter-bombers but also Xian KJ-600 embarked early warning aircraft. Thus, and although it is still far from its American rivals in the Gerald R. Ford class, with its four catapults and three elevators, it marks the path to follow for the future Type 004, about which speculation is already beginning.
The Chinese Navy, that is, the People's Liberation Army Navy, has undergone a meteoric evolution in the last two decades. A time in which it has gone from being just a coastal and river navy, without any projection capacity, to being largely a "blue water" force although, still in 2024, the bulk of its units continue to be boats. fast missile launchers and corvettes; a memory of what was once a "mosquito fleet."
When it comes to understanding the abrupt change suffered by this navy, which has gone from enlisting several hundred smaller vessels to a wide and balanced variety of modern surface ships and submarines, we must consider both its evolution as an industrial power, as well as the particularities of geography. A key element that has been - and will continue - limiting Chinese possibilities in the maritime domain, determining the architecture of its Fleet and, incidentally, the way it relates to a good part of its neighbors, with whom it maintains open conflicts that are fought in the Gray Zone, At least for the moment.
Also the exceptional nature of Taiwan, a state that Beijing considers a "rebellious province" and whose annexation is one of the main objectives of the communist regime, although for the moment it has not dared to take the step of launching military action, for the which has been diligently preparing for decades. Preparation that includes, in addition to a good number of landing ships, the deployment of an impressive missile force or the strengthening of its Air Force, the construction and operation of a growing number of aircraft carriers, each one more capable, as a way of present new dilemmas to Taiwanese defenses.
Aircraft carriers that, in any case, have a role that goes far beyond this island, since they are an element of power projection without which a country that aspires to measure itself face to face with the United States, disputing its role as hegemon naval -and not only-, would have no chance of getting closer to its goals.
Table of Contents
- The changing role of the PLAN
- The evolution of Chinese aircraft carriers
- Type 003 Aircraft Carrier (Fujian Class)
- embarked air wing
- Propulsion, generation and catapults
- The minimal island
- Sensors and self-defense capabilities
- Doubts surrounding the “Fujian” aircraft carrier
- The foreseeable future
The changing role of the PLAN
As said in the brief introduction, the role of the Chinese navy has changed significantly over time. During much of the Cold War, and even despite becoming a nuclear power during the 60s, China hardly thought in terms of self-defense, which did not prevent it from playing a relevant role in conflicts such as that of Korea in the 50s. 1979 or went to war with Vietnam, with a rather mediocre result, in XNUMX.
Applied to the naval level, this implied that most of its units were designed to deny any possible hostile power (including a Soviet Union that they distrusted), control of their waters. To do this, following the Soviet doctrine, they built a huge number of very small units, generally fast missile boats, diesel submarines designed for coastal navigation, river vessels and, in the best of cases, corvettes. All this without prejudice to the fact that, during this time, they had some larger units, although they were exceptions and must be understood that way.
The reasons for this procedure must be sought, on the one hand, in the poor technological and manufacturing capacity of an isolated and underdeveloped China. On the other hand, in the international context, in which everything was marked by a competition between the only two superpowers that extended to the naval level, with the former Red Navy and the US Navy being the only ones with a global presence, which included both the Sea of South China, like the East China Sea. And, of course, in geography. The latter, at a time when the PLAN had no opportunity to exercise positive control over the sea, severely marked the limits of its influence, given the presence of straits such as Malacca, jealously controlled by other powers, as well as Taiwan itself, the Japanese archipelago or the Philippines.
Things would begin to change following the détente with the United States, made official in 1972 with the "Shanghai Communiqué" and, especially, from 1979 when Washington recognized Beijing as the capital of China to the detriment of Taiwan and the regime began to open to foreign capital, as well as to adopt economic measures that are behind the "Chinese miracle", now a bit in the doldrums.
Since then, with growing economic power, but also becoming to a large extent protagonists of a globalization that forced them to defend their interests far beyond their own borders, the People's Republic of China has been investing large sums of money in its navy, also doing so with a holistic conception of naval power. Something that has led them, long before they aspire to be the leading maritime power on the globe (by this we do not mean that they will necessarily become so), to be the first shipbuilder in the world, far surpassing in global terms Europeans or Americans.
That said, Chinese plans, already military-wise, were not limited exclusively to providing themselves with a powerful fleet. The strategists of the People's Republic of China, already at the end of the 90s and after a period of study in which events such as Operation Desert Storm (1991) or the Third Taiwan Strait Crisis (1995-1996) were evaluated. , they understood that in the event that there was a war with the United States, the only rational way to confront North American conventional superiority was to adopt an asymmetric strategy, being of course open in the future to turning towards another one. symmetrical.
Once the strategy was established, they began to materialize it by giving a great boost to their ballistic and cruise missile capabilities, reinforcing what was the Second Artillery Corps of the People's Liberation Army while improving the capabilities of their Air Force, which It participates in this strategy through its strategic bombers, armed with both anti-ship and land attack cruise missiles. What China sought was to establish a strong deterrence mechanism – based on a dense A2/AD defense – capable of imposing an unacceptable cost on any possible retaliation by the US and its allies.
Only in this way would China be free to advance its plans, which involve turning its surrounding seas into authentic "Chinese lakes" and improving the mechanisms of coercion over its neighbors, both objectives for which it needed to achieve negative dominance of the sea in a first phase, yes, but also militarize three specific points: The Spratly and Paracel Islands in the South China Sea and the Senkaku, in the East China Sea. Only from there would it be possible to pursue positive domination of the sea, something on which it is now concentrating, hence the need not only for a large number of cruisers, destroyers and frigates, but also for aircraft carriers, both super aircraft carrier such as the Type 003 “Fujian”, as a light aircraft carrier, topic that we addressed at the time and landing ships, as well as logistics of all types.
The evolution of Chinese aircraft carriers
If Chinese planners are showing off something, it is patience, in every sense. What is perhaps the most ambitious shipbuilding plan of the last half century –surpassing in many ways the Soviet one of Gorshkov's time– has been characterized by three elements: 1) seeking a balanced navy; 2) a navy that is part of a greater whole, for which they have developed the naval sector in the broadest sense and; 3) gradualness.
This last characteristic is extremely interesting, because far from seeking revolutionary changes or taking temporary "jumps" trying to burn through stages (this being said taking into account the very high pace of construction), each new model is usually a relatively unambitious development of a previous one. That is to say, there are hardly any disruptions between series of ships, let's talk about corvettes, frigates, destroyers or, as in this case, aircraft carriers. This is even though for obvious reasons, the series in this case are much shorter.
That said, the People's Republic of China took its first steps towards acquiring aircraft carriers several decades ago, acquiring the technology and knowledge abroad that it lacked. First of all, in the mid-80s, with the purchase of the light aircraft carrier HMAS «Melbourne» (R21) from the Royal Australian Navy, which although it was deprived of all electronic systems before being delivered to the Chinese company (CUSC) that was to scrap it, did keep on board both the steam catapult and the equipment related to the landing of the aircraft, both cables and systems. to help with orientation by mirrors.
Subsequently, they took over the "Minsk", actually a cruiser with the capacity to operate both fixed wing (Yak-38 Forger) and rotary wing (Kamov Ka-25/27/29) aircraft, which after sleeping the sleep of the righteous for years in Nicolaiev (Ukraine), ended being sold in 1995 to a South Korean company and, from there, to another Chinese company that turned it into a themed attraction in Shenzhen: the "Minsk World", although his fate has been quite sad since then. They did the same with the first ship of the series of four, the "kyiv", sold a year later to another Chinese company and also converted into a theme park, this time in Tianjin.
Now, let no one be fooled. It is one thing that both ships were converted into attractions at the time or that the "Melbourne" was scrapped as had been agreed and quite another that the Chinese technicians did not dedicate enough time to inspecting all these hulls at will, analyzing their design and architecture. , its distribution and many other elements.
What's more, they did not stop there, but rather came to negotiate with the former Empresa Nacional Bazán (predecessor of the current Navantia), the purchase of plans for two designs: SAC-200 and SAC-220, in both cases escort aircraft carriers of 23.000. and 25.000 tons, although the idea did not fully bear fruit, although there are suspicions that some documents could finally reach the communist regime. And in the same way, it was said that France had offered China the Clemenceau, in exchange for contracts to modernize the Asian country's radar network, although it seems that the proposal did not prosper either.
The most important acquisition, in any case, was that of the "Varyag", the second unit of the Kuznetsov class, which was also docked in the river port of Nicolaiev, and which was purchased through companies based in Hong Kong. After this, it was taken to China, arriving in the country only after a long and controversial journey in which it faced the blockade of the Turkish Government for months, and even a force 10 gale that ended with the ship adrift in Greek waters. . The total cost, according to some sources, had been 120 million dollars for Chinese companies after the operation (who hardly acted without political direction). However, they had acquired not only the hull of a true fleet aircraft carrier, but more importantly, the four engines that allowed both propulsion and electrical generation, which made it possible to advance once again in terms of engineering in one of the perhaps most complex aspects.
Furthermore, the arrival of the "Varyag" had another added value: unlike the "Minsk" and the "kyiv", which were not true aircraft carriers, or the "Melbourne", which was a light and very old aircraft carrier, in this case it would be It is easier to study aspects that the fan may not take into account very much, but that are key, such as the layout of the aircraft on the deck and in the hangars, the distribution of the internal spaces - including storage rooms - or the "choreographies" that personnel and devices must be carried out so that the pace of operations is adequate.
In the end, the advantage of this acquisition was so great that after determining that the hull was in condition to be returned to service, renovation and updating work began in 2005 in Dalian, which included changes in the internal distribution, the inclusion of new self-defense equipment and sensors, including CIWA, anti-aircraft missiles and an AESA radar. A little more than five years later, the current "Liaoning" It began its sea trials in the summer of 2011, which would be repeated in the autumn of that year, as well as during the following year until completing a total of eight tests, not without problems, including power losses.
Needless to say, since its entry into service in September 2012, the "Liaoning" or Type 001 has allowed the PLAN to accumulate enormous operational experience, with thousands of flights from its deck that have served to perfect the development of future aircraft, to polish the design of the next aircraft carriers, to develop an employment doctrine and, ultimately, to gain valuable "know how" without having to start from scratch. In fact, if you think about it, China achieved in the space of a few years something that took the Soviet Union several decades, going from the Moskva class to the kyiv and from there to the Kuznetsov. That is to say, that China has burned the first two stages in record time and has even surpassed this stage with the Type 002, the "Shandong", aircraft carrier that includes numerous improvements and modifications with respect to the base design from which it is based, which is none other than that of the Type 001 and, by extension, that of the Russian "Kuznetsov".
Regarding the "Shandong", it should be said that although at first glance it appears very similar to the "Liaoning" and is, as in that case, a STOBAR (Short Take-Off But Arrested Recovery) aircraft carrier, there are notable differences. Despite very similar exterior dimensions, the displacement is substantially greater, becoming around 70.000 tons fully loaded compared to the 54.500 tons of the Type 001. In addition, there are other significant changes, both in the installed equipment and in the shape of the island or in the layout of the elevators, which indicated that, indeed, the experience acquired with the "Liaoning" had been used. In passing, China passed on the right and without looking in the rearview mirror at the Russian Federation, which has been unable to return its only aircraft carrier, the "Kuznetsov", to service since it was put into dry dock in 2018; nor to advance plans to build a hypothetical relief, who have never gone beyond the multiple mockups presented at various fairs.
The most curious thing about the case is that China has followed at all times and in many ways the type of approach envisioned by Admiral Gorshkov. In fact, the "Shandong" could be considered in some respects a hybrid or a design halfway between the Russian "Kuznetsov" and the unborn "Ulyanovsk", a design whose keel was laid in 1992, but which ended up being canceled with the fall of the Soviet Union and finally scrapped. In that case, it was a super aircraft carrier with a fully loaded displacement of 75.000 tons (depending on the source, 80.000), a length of 321,5 meters and a maximum beam of 83,9 meters in the case of the deck, which, although it placed them behind the American Nimitz, would have been an enormous step forward for the Red Navy. Especially since for its propulsion and the power of its steam catapults it would have relied on four KN-3 nuclear reactors, providing the former USSR of its first aircraft carrier CATOBAR (Catapult Assisted Take-Off Barrier Arrested Recovery).
That is precisely the step that the People's Republic of China seeks to take through Type 003 or "Fujian", which we will talk about calmly in the following section: build its first aircraft carrier equipped with catapults -also, electromagnetic-, although with conventional propulsion, as a preliminary step to a Type 004 that is expected - this one - to be comparable in everything to the US supercarriers, including nuclear propulsion. A platform that will have to equip new combat aircraft beyond the everlasting J-15, which will do so in large numbers and will allow us to improve the knowledge related to the operation of a ship of these characteristics and its embarked air wing. To this end, it is foreseeable that they will continue to carry out the same type of maneuvers that have been observed in recent years with the "Liaoning" and that have included on several occasions deployments to the west of both Taiwan and Okinawa, allowing sailors and Chinese aviators try, among others, its ability to deploy and fly over 700 nautical miles of the country's coast.
That said, it must be taken into account that in parallel with this effort, the People's Republic of China has been expanding and improving its facilities both to continue building ships –military and civil– large enough to provide the required maintenance. It must be taken into account, in relation to this, that they currently have a certain advantage over the United States, at least in the sense of not having to operate at enormous distances from their starting bases. That is to say, they do not foresee that in the coming years, although aircraft carriers can increasingly play a role in defending Chinese interests - for example, through defense diplomacy - in areas such as the Indian Ocean, that these ships can carry out operations projection of the type carried out by the US Navy. Thus, operating mainly in the Yellow, East China and South China Seas, could be maintained in any of the main shipyards in the country, all of them at safe distances, making complex solutions such as floating bases unnecessary.
The aircraft carrier “Fujian” (Type 003)
In the first quarter of 2015, possibly in march, construction of the aircraft carrier "Fujian" (Type 003) for the Chinese navy began at the Jiangnan shipyard (31.36373505614139, 121.72369813825624), in the Chansxing Island (Dalian). It was originally called by the media as Type 002, since its predecessor, the "Shandong", being an evolution of the "Liaoning", was thought to be the Type 001A. However, it soon came to be considered a class of its own, thus adopting the classification we now know.
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