They had been studying carriers, and they can afford it, considering the pittance that is spent. How much for the Varyag? 20 million? That’s less than a jet fighter.

Is that the ammount they have spended untill now (prior the system fittings) or the overall cost or your own conclusion made by using the highly effective RAHI method (RAHI= ravistettu hihasta, means threw out of your sleeve 😉 )

The Varyag languished for years in Dalian, getting new paint, but otherwise its been sitting there. If there has been a firm commitment to carriers, you would see PLANAF pilots being trained on the Kuznetsov under contract since 1999, and Su-33s would have been bought before, then assigned and lent to the Kuznetsov to train these pilots.

In ideal situation yeas, perhaps …but like in TV series as you mentioned it, things may go wrong, delays, and all sort of little things that can seriously affect to the schedule. It may well be that the chinese decicion to buy Su-33 was after long arm-wrestling between those who wanted some other aircraft (J-10 or domestic naval version from j-11 just for example) The STOBAR with Su-33 has lots of limitations (tough with Varyag, the only solution since there haven’t been any changes to the Ski-jump) so i’m not suprised if chinese would have choosed it after they seeked all other possople alternatives and came to the same conclusion.

It works well observing most militaries because they tend to be transparent with their roadmaps. Not with the PLA. They don’t say anything about their plans, it’s only when they’re already right on the water can we say, okay they just built a new destroyer, okay they just built a new sub. Since we don’t know what they’re really up to, we only have what in our minds what we think they’re up to. But the problem of this is that it makes it vulnerable to new developments that don’t quite fit to what we expected.

But I’ve been trying to say that in my obinion the carrier and the new statement of Su-33 purchase fits quite well to my obvesvation of PLAN and it’s direction. The naval expansion of china is clearly going to the road which will end up some sort of bluewater navy with operative carrier(s) as centre of it. We could discuss more of these wider view things, but perhaps in another thread? I’m not just focusing on the events happening just now, but trying to see it in a longer timespan and into the frames of other developments happening in china.

Things can happen very unexpectedly. What you would have thought they are firmly moving in one direction, they would suddenly stop and moved into another. I can cite many cases of this happening. The halt of Su-30 purchases is an example of massive policy turnaround that no one in the outside world expected, not even the Russians. It was completely out of pattern. I can almost swear that the one constancy in PLA observing is the lack of constancy.

I agree, there’s always some level of uncertancy…life usually is…But in wider scale, in all three major branch of chinese military, PLA, PLAN and PLAAF the overall idea of the modernisation havne’t been changed or shifted it’s priorities much since it started. With naval issues it’s haven’t been as upfront and straightforward that it could in in threory, but still if you take all the factors that may inflict the development in to opservation, you’ll notice that it still follows the path that was laid upon it.

So I like to keep these new events under watch. It is certainly most interesting development, it reflects fundamental changes in PLAN doctrine and how they see themselves fitting into the future. But it’s still not set in stone and still open to the sudden “frack it”, and project abandoned.

It most certainly is and it propaply wont be easy road (tough none never did say it would be) but it’s a road that they have choosen. There maybe some sudden changes, but I hardly think they will effect on the Varyag…it’s just too big to be abandoned. The aircraft carrier will be part of PLAN future someway or another, I can bet anything on it. What is interesting is the decisions and lessons learned after the Varyag is in use. Will the PLAN continue the STOBAR use that have sneaked in the carrier world via backdoor? Or will they see things differently than the sometimes odd russian way of looking the wolrd?

We just have to wait and see…but what else we are supposed to do :confused: like we have anything better to do :rolleyes: 😉 :diablo:

Check the link I put in post 13, it should give you some insight!

sorry, it made me even more confused?? Guess they didn’t teach us the english nutrital dictionary that well afterall… 😀

then for Francois5,
did some chinese kid steal your lunch in school or what is this all about?? :confused: 😉 :confused: If you so much hate chinese and their way of seeing the world, could you step aside and rant somewhere else and leave this thread to those who actually wants to discuss about the topic??? Please, as a humble reguest???

I don’t really think there is a big pro-carrier faction in China. Many think its still a waste of money and that opinion may be shared by factions within the PLAN, the CMC and the CCP leadership. This is a country that remains traditionally bound to the concepts of a continental power.

PLAN has been in an internal battle between the squids and the seagull factions. The seagulls had control of the PLAN in the 90s but in this decade, the squids have been dominating. There appears only enough support to do a serious trial and tryout of a carrier, but not enough to commit to 3 or 4. Frankly for the seagulls to go this far is a pleasant surprise.

Getting the Varyag to run and operate as a trial carrier, then put some planes on it, to demonstrate the feasibility and advantages of carrier operation, this is more of a demonstration to the PLA and the main party leadership than to the outside world that the concept is viable. Once that obstacle is past, then maybe you can see a second or a third carrier, but that’s way down the line.

I have to disagree with you on this little bit. I think even china now see it’s navy as a whole and the expansion of it clearly indicates to moving towards more complex and mature naval power that it previously has been. The carrier is just normal step ahead. Although china seems to have quite alot money preserved to the naval expansion, i doupt they could afoard to give huge ammount of funds to “some admirals” being able to proof their ideas to be right. Aircraft carriers are normally (only exception was our dear neighbours, soviets) the centre of the fleets and all the organisations are going to be build around it. China is clearly showing indications that it will follow this path. So I’m pretty sure the chinese are full hearted with this carrier aqustion and it’s being the top priority.

What is marmite :confused: :confused: ….seccond cousin to marmelade?? 😎 :confused: