Chinese Aircraft: We know that the Chinese Navy is making progress and growing very quickly. This is true for its attack ships, conventional and nuclear submarines, destroyers, and frigates. This is also true for its group of aircraft carriers.
The first Chinese aircraft carrier went into service a little more than seven years ago. In 2017, the Chinese Navy got a second ship, the first of its design. The Fujian, the third aircraft carrier, was launched in June 2022. It should soon start sea trials, and it will probably go into service in 2025.
The pace doesn’t look like it will slow down any time soon. In actuality, Chinese military and civilian leaders have stated that construction on the fourth aircraft carrier for the Chinese Navy has already started.
There are no technological problems with building the fourth Chinese aircraft carrier.
Chinese parliament meetings happen every year, but People’s Liberation Army officials rarely go. It was during these meetings that Chinese Navy officers revealed that work on the 4th Chinese aircraft carrier had already begun.
It will not be long before the Chinese aircraft carrier CV-18 Fujian goes through sea trials.
Adding to this, PLA political commissar Yuan Huazhi said that the design of the new building went off without a hitch and any tech problems. To add to that, it will soon be known whether the ship will be powered by nuclear or conventional power.
But a lot of experts think that building a nuclear-powered aircraft carrier would be too soon for China’s military industry, just like it is for the aftermarket.
It looks like Beijing doesn’t have any nuclear boiler rooms that can produce enough power to move an aircraft carrier, which needs to be able to keep going at very high speeds while in travel and especially when making maneuvers.
Also, the Chinese Navy will mostly need ships in the second circle of islands around the China Sea in the next ten to fifteen years. For this purpose, a conventionally powered aircraft carrier is more than enough, since it is cheaper and faster to design and build than a nuclear-powered ship.
As time goes on, the Chinese Navy will not only have the tools, but also the operational experience, to support long-term power projection tasks. At that point, the need for nuclear-powered aircraft carriers will become clear.
A more advanced Fujian sister ship for the Chinese navy?
The most likely explanation for this fourth Chinese aircraft carrier is that it will be similar to the Fujian or even better, it will be an evolution of the Fujian, like how the Shandong evolved from the Liaoning but added many improvements to make it more useful.
As a reminder, the French Charles de Gaulle is only 261 meters long and weighs 42 tons when fully loaded. On the other hand, the British Queen Elizabeth class aircraft carriers are 500 meters long and weigh 280.65 tons.
Fujian has more to offer than just its size. It has some very modern features, like electromagnetic catapults, which are the same kind that are on the new American Ford-class aircraft carriers and the French PANG that will be built in the future.
According to meta-defense, a group of 45 to 60 planes, including J-15T fighters that can use catapults, J-35 stealth fighters, and KJ-600 air observation planes, will be sent to the battle area. This GAE will be finished with drones and helicopters, which will make it almost as useful as the American Nimitz and Ford class super aircraft carriers.
We still don’t know what the changes are between the 4th Chinese aircraft carrier and the Fujian. If experts in overhead and special photographic analysis were able to figure out what kind of ship it might be, it looked like most of the time it was the hulls of big commercial ships.
The Fujian Chinese Aircraft Carrier will soon start tests at sea
After a few weeks in the repair basin, the aircraft carrier Fujian was put back into service a few days ago. Most of the work that needed to be done on board the building that was launched in June 2022 was finished.
The Fujian has three EMALS electromagnetic catapults, which are similar to those on American Ford-class aircraft carriers and the ones that will be on French carriers in the future.
The ship’s paint job and the covering that was put on the flight deck are both signs that it will soon start its sea trials. This will likely allow it to go into service before the middle of 2025. It had been just over a year since the tests began before the Chinese Navy announced that the Shandong would be put into service in December 2019.
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This is expected to happen at the same time as the entry into service of the planes in its embarked air group. These include the KJ-600 air surveillance and the J-35 stealth fighter (which is still just a name because it doesn’t have an official name). Fujian will have a GAE that is about the same as American aircraft carriers when they get the F/A-18 E/F Super Hornet, the F-35C Lightning 2, and the E-2D Hawkeye.
A model of the J-35 stealth fighter is on board the Liaoning aircraft carrier as tests begin.
This is why the aircraft carrier Liaoning has been testing and validating things at sea after a major maintenance period that ran more than a year. Within a few months, the ship should be ready to go back into service.
But it might be nice to have a new plane join its on-board air group this time. In fact, a model of the J-35 was seen on the Liaoning Bridge for a few days while it was getting repairs. It looked like this model would have stayed on the deck of the aircraft carrier for its sea trials.
There will be a year of repair on the aircraft carrier Liaoning before the trials begin. A model of the J-15 and a model of the J-35 are on board. So, it’s likely that these two planes will make up its launched air group in the coming months.
The goal of using this model is to make sure that the plane can move correctly on the deck, in the hangars, and during crew changes on board the aircraft carrier. The fact that it was launched during sea trials makes it very likely that the stealth fighter will join the Liaoning air group in the coming months or years.
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If this is true, the Shandong, the Liaoning’s sister ship, will also be able to hold and fly the J-35 once it has been fixed up on the inside so that the plane can be maintained.
Being able to bring J-35s on board the Liaoning and Shandong will make these two aircraft carriers more useful in battle. It will also help train and qualify Chinese navy pilots without having to use Type aircraft carriers-003, which have much more useful combat potential.
As things stand, the Chinese Navy will have put into service four major aircraft carriers, each weighing more than 60 tons, in just ten years. During that time, they will have learned how to plan, build, and use these kinds of ships.
In fact, the way things are going right now, it looks like the Chinese Navy also wants to get a fleet of about 12 aircraft carriers by 2045, just like the US Navy, or maybe even better. That would be the first time since the mid-1930s, when the Japanese aircraft carrier force became more powerful.
