Blind leading the Retarded...
-
Please take a moment and update your account profile. If you have an updated account profile with basic information on why you are on Air Warriors it will help other people respond to your posts. How do you update your profile you ask?
Go here:
Edit Account Details and Profile
Chinese Carrier
- Thread starter tomcatfan
- Start date
Blind leading the Retarded...
Dont get me wrong, they are gonna learn. But when looking to a nation willing to sell off a strategic advantage to another world power for cash, why go to Russia who barely has anything resembling Carrier Aviation when France is out there.
It's hard to know what to think about all this. Does a single Chinese carrier keep anyone in the US awake at night? No probably not. There's no way that carrier is going to be anything near effective for the short term. Then again I don't think the Chinese are looking to put together a bunch of carrier battle groups to take on the American Navy out near Midway or Guam. But one or two of them could come in handy in their neck of the woods when they want to show the flag off of someones coast. Give them ten to twenty years along with the national will to build a blue water navy and we may be humming a different tune. For now, we sit back and watch Chinese jet pilots figure out how to land on a ship.
Because France knows where it's bread is buttered. Selling radars to Iraq is one thing, selling a top of the line CVN to China is another matter entirely. Believe it or not, France and the US see eye to eye on most things defense related. On the other hand, Ukraine (not Russia) had no hopes or ambitions of ever using that kind of hardware, so selling it makes perfect sense.
Brett
I'm not saying they'd suddenly be selling off the de Gaulle. But I wouldn't see it as out of the question at all to start running Chinese pilots through their pipeline of training. As cash strapped as things are getting in Europe with the euro and being they are the only country outside ours that has maintained a conventional carrier aviation wing over the last few decades, starts making sense.
CV NATOPS isn't exactly a state secret. We could train up an entire Chinese CVW ourselves, it wouldn't make a damn bit of difference unless they kept at it. The reason we've got good at fixed-wing carrier flight ops is we practice. Proficiency, standards and experience are the keys to success, and that takes lots of time, lots of flying and lots of money.
When the Chinese first started looking at buying this boat in the '90's, Jay Johnson was CNO. He said something to the effect of, it took us 50 years to learn how to do this without killing ourselves; if the Chinese want to go down that road, they're welcome to it. I think he was right, and I think the Chinese know it too, which is why they're pushing this "training and research" dodge.
Even the most half-assed carriers are great as flagships and status symbols, and I think that's all this boat will amount to in the immediate future. Worthless for power projection, great for making port calls and awing tinpot despots, especially ones the Chinese are leaning on for one reason or another.
When the Chinese first started looking at buying this boat in the '90's, Jay Johnson was CNO. He said something to the effect of, it took us 50 years to learn how to do this without killing ourselves; if the Chinese want to go down that road, they're welcome to it. I think he was right, and I think the Chinese know it too, which is why they're pushing this "training and research" dodge.
Even the most half-assed carriers are great as flagships and status symbols, and I think that's all this boat will amount to in the immediate future. Worthless for power projection, great for making port calls and awing tinpot despots, especially ones the Chinese are leaning on for one reason or another.
Oh, like the Viet Cong or Al Qaeda? Technical parity is hardly a prerequisite for inflicting significant harm to an adversary or for defeating them. This speaks to my original point about underestimating one's foes. Assymetric warfare for limited means has had a pretty good track record in the last 250 or so years.
What do you think our current administration's response would be if China sank one or two of our CVNs with aircraft from their CV? Do you think they'd be willing to wage all out war against China considering the war-weariness of our electorate?
Brett
While the French are willing to sell a lot for money I seriously doubt they would train the Chinese for several reasons starting with the fact that most, if not all, of their carrier pilots now learn how to land on the boat in the US now. Their catapults and AEW planes are US-made and the only place they can test their carrier birds for carrier suitability on land (catapults, arresting gear, etc) is here too. So all in all they have a lot of irreplaceable things to lose if they train the Chinese how to land on the boat, no matter how much they would get paid. And surprisingly enough the French aren't the biggest fans of the Chinese either though they have a lot less geopolitical interests than us with respect to them, they are minor players in the Pacific.
And to echo what Brett said, our militaries actually get along pretty well at the 'middle-management' level and to a slightly lesser extent at the leadership level.
FIFY.
"History does not repeat itself, but it does rhyme." -Mark Twain
In an institutional sense it may have taken us 50 years to get carrier aviation down to a fine act, but we were pretty effective after only about the first 15-20 years. So was Japan. China's new boat isn't something that should raise our blood pressure and keep
(Or if we are going to laugh at it, then we should laugh about things like ship's laundry coming back not actually clean, drinking water that tastes like fuel, brown stuff growing on the lettuce, toilets that don't flush...)
lots of folks around here speaking very definitively on a perceived lack of technical ability and how that will prevent PRC from doing much with their new toy. many would do well to not underestimate or speak with chests puffed out too far....
to the many comments about how it took us XX years to figure it out and will therefore take them something close to XX year to do it... It took us that long because we were essentially inventing it as we went. Yes, the Brits had been in the business for some time, however it was the US that really took some UK inventions (fresnel lens) and moved them forward. The Chinese aren't starting from scratch and it would not take them nearly as long to figure it out.
http://www.carrierlandingconsultants.com/ <---- obviously not going to sign a contract with PRC, but you might be surprised who these guys are in comms with.
to the many comments about how it took us XX years to figure it out and will therefore take them something close to XX year to do it... It took us that long because we were essentially inventing it as we went. Yes, the Brits had been in the business for some time, however it was the US that really took some UK inventions (fresnel lens) and moved them forward. The Chinese aren't starting from scratch and it would not take them nearly as long to figure it out.
http://www.carrierlandingconsultants.com/ <---- obviously not going to sign a contract with PRC, but you might be surprised who these guys are in comms with.
Sounds like someone's pipe dream. Exactly who are these guys expecting to consult for?
Brett
I'm reminded this everytime I roll into the groove when I've not had more than a full-stop in several weeks.
Also, has anyone here read Kissinger's On China? Thoughts? I was considering picking it up to fill in what little spare time I do have while I'm in the RAG.
Not anymore man - my paddles are permanently hung up. I didn't even go up for "old timers" day this past cruise
I'll send you a PM with some more info on CLC - pretty interesting.