Yawn but I am not impressed with what China is doing. Maybe you are but with the Liaoning spending most of its time dockside I still say that they are moving at a very leisurely pace towards carrier operations. China actually began its carrier program in earnest in 1987 so this fiction of achieving fantastic results in just three years is a popular but misleading myth.

Way to go oversimplifying a vastly more complex story! It is not a simple case of stating China started on date X so they should be at Y now. There have been significant political struggles within the PLAN and geopolitical events that have led to this point. China has actually expressed an interest in carriers since the 1970’s and in the early 80’s the UK made a significant push to sell the Sea Harrier to operate off some form of Invincible type carrier. In the mid 80’s China got its hands on the HMAS Melbourne which they had torn to pieces to examine and it is widely rumoured that the Catapult and Arrestor gear were ripped out for examination. It is known that they had a land test facility to test either that catapult and arrestor gear or a close copy from the early 90’s. That is what we know but you also need to take account of the politics within the PLA.

In the 80’s the PLAN was a subsidiary organisation of the PLA many officers were in effect Army officers who were directed to operating in the fleet, the PLAN itself was a coastal defence focussed force with an obsolete fleet that was also trying to integrate a random range of Western equipment. When you enter into the 90’s you start to see a generation of officers who see themselves as Navy first not Army. There was an argument developing within this new navy focussed hierarchy about what direction they should take. Should they develop a blue water fleet with carriers forming a component or a blue water fleet centered around missile cruisers. There was also a faction most likely heavily PLA influenced that wanted to stick as a Brown water force albeit with investment in ballistic missile submarines. Arguably most of the 90’s were taken up with those different factions fighting it out amongst themselves and it wasn’t until the early 00’s that a serious move was made towards carriers most likely driven by the embarrassment of the USN being able to sail a carrier up the Taiwan strait with impunity.

In the meantime the procurement of ex Soviet carriers continued with the Varyag eventually being purchased and towed to China in 98. They didn’t start serious work beyond remedial preservation for a number of years with serious refit starting in 2007. That delay was primarily down to internal PLA/PLAN turf wars and then research being conducted. They took about four to five years doing the refit plus reverse engineering the Su-33 whilst in the meantime training crew based upon what they could glean from various sources including a paid for visit to the Sao Paulo to see her flight operations. Liaoning finished refit in 2011 went through acceptance trials and then about a year later conducted the first landings and takeoffs of the prototype J-15. The next three years they have worked up to flight trials of a small squadron of production variants.

Your strange obsession over “The Dance on the deck” whatever that actually means and colour of shirts doesn’t remove the fact they went from first landing to exercises with a squadron in three years. Just saying “They started in 1987 so why are they not better?” is a gross oversimplification of a significant amount of history. I don’t think they are anywhere close to being the USN when it comes to carrier operations but their progress so far is pretty impressive.

Your own picture shows the PLAN stepping away from the system the US Navy and other navies from around the world use and moving to a deck system more like the Russian navy.See picture below.

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The Russian navy has never adopted a color coded deck crew system. This could be the reason why Russia has not fielded a better aircraft at sea program

One Picture Rooivalk One Picture! Come on! That is not enough to form ANY conclusion!

The Russian navy has never adopted a color coded deck crew system. This could be the reason why Russia has not fielded a better aircraft at sea program

The reasons why Russia has not had a larger carrier program is myriad, but the fall of the Soviet Union and lack of money is a major reason. What colour shirts the crew wore is well down the list of reasons and citing it as a major factor is borderline insane!

Maybe the Chinese are developing their own ‘mix’ of carrier systems in an attempt to achieve competency in the shortest time. The ‘dance on the deck’ is hard to master and maybe the PLAN is using their own ideas based upon the limited experience they have gathered to date. After all they do claim that the Liaong is a training ship.

One will you STOP banging on about the “Dance on the deck” and two YES the Chinese are trying to develop their own ‘mix’ of carrier systems which is why it is so pointless drawing any serious conclusions on such scant knowledge!

And since you pointed out all these other navies who use the colored vest system you should be aware that it was the US Navy who actually pioneered the color coded deck system that is in use today. The pictures below from WW2 tell the tale

Firstly a number of carrier nations came up with similar ideas at about the same time and secondly SO FLIPPIN WHAT! China is just adopting good practice drawing conclusions beyond that is silly!

Finally you should be questioning the PLAN and their sluggish snail like pace regarding carrier operations rather than my observations of this pace. Even the US Navy is aware that proficiency at carrier operations takes practice, practice, practice at sea. The PLAN seems to believe that having a carrier tied up dock side will some how result in mastering carrier operations. But to each his own.

Not this old nugget again! In what sense is it sluggish? They went from ZERO carrier experience to deck landings and as these most recent pictures show a full deployment of production standard aircraft in THREE YEARS! That is STAGGERING! Just because they don’t have ten CATOBAR carriers with huge airgroups should not diminish their amazing progress. They are actually working quicker than the United Kingdoms planned work up schedule for the F-35B and QE class carriers.

Chill guys! Watch this nice video of Swiss Mirage III to calm down 😉

Er – no.

Firstly, & most importantly, this is NOT about the threat of invasion. As has been said, over & over again, there is no real threat of invasion.

Secondly, mass paratroop drops into enemy-held territory just aren’t done any longer.

I vaguely remember that the Parachute Regiment were keen on deploying to Afghanistan via mass parachute drop, I believe the reply from the army brass was:

Quaint and No!

Going back to subject matter somebody mentioned FA-50, to be honest in this case it isn’t that bad an idea if we are talking about a Tiger replacement. It even has the same (with small differences) engine and a cannon that shares ammunition with their Hornets.

Its unlikely China will ever get back its loan for sub purchase given a bankrupt Pakistan and its failed economy.

still though, its additional employment for chinese workers, so not a terrible loss.

Whilst it is fair to observe that the Pakistani economy has its problems exacerbated by the chaotic nature of their political system when it comes to defence procurement Pakistan has a reputation for pragmatism and careful spending.

They buy what they can afford, if they can’t afford it they save up or transfer budget from one arm of the military to help get the capability if it is for the greater benefit. A good example of that is when they recently purchased the surplus F-16 from Jordan with the Army transferring funds to the Airforce to enable the procurement to go through. You rarely see vanity projects with Pakistani defence procurement, whilst they do look to advance their indigenous defence industry they don’t over stretch gaining foreign help in areas of weakness but with an eye to tech transfer. They upgrade and overhaul equipment to keep it relevant and have become canny at getting spares for their fleet of aging French jets.

Pakistans navy knows it can’t go toe to toe with the Indian navy so instead looks to invest in force multipliers, Submarines are just that. Even with India’s significant upgrades in the area of ASW Pakistans submarines are still a potent threat. Going on other procurements of Chinese equipment like the ZDK-03 they will be very clear what they expect out of any Chinese submarine procured and no doubt look towards a number of changes and upgrades.

Outburst is rather pejorative. I and others here took the time to underline specific points with arguments.

And by the way, close to home is quite short for an argumentation.

And remember, there is not known action AFTER the plane was set in a dive. Nothing in the 8 min long descent. I am sorry, but it does not fit (Ok, I give up with the capital letters)

It got your attention.

You were speculating not making an argument.

Saying it is close to home was not an argument. It was a statement, I have flown that route making this incident uncomfortably close to home for ME!

Let the air accident investigation team do their job.

TomcatViP, to be polite your written outburst helps nothing.

This is a very recent event and the press really have had no chance to spin anything. They are only reporting what the official prosecutor are telling them. Whilst it is right to be sceptical and I think it is right to keep an open mind I think it is best to let the air accident investigators to do their job before we start declaring “it does not fit”!

This is a very unpleasant accident that hits close to home, I myself have flown that route and I feel slightly squeamish that such an incident could happen.

Please I am not taking a pop at you but let’s see what the investigation brings up if anything else for the families sake.