Replying to everyone above.
@Viktor Jav @Bltizo @AndrewS
Currently I think any talk of China protecting its SLOCs or anything else
beyond the 1st island chain is beyond its capability against a near peer, peer, or superior, opponent. Indeed it spills over into international relations and a lot depends on how other countries align and exactly what triggers a conflict.
No disagreement there.
The most likely flashpoint for China continues to be a Taiwan scenario, potentially with the US, Japan, and even South Korea intervening against China. In this context China needs sufficient expeditionary forces to flank primarily Japan to more effectively hold their east at risk while taking the fight away from China's mainland, here South Korea's naval and air forces need to be kept at bay as well, in order to deter their involvement in the first place. Even for Taiwan itself China will be more effective at recovering Taiwan militarily if it has the expeditionary forces to flank it and approach from the east early on enough.
If we want to talk about rationalizing PLA and PLAN procurement, and especially in terms of carrier procurement, I have an overall "theory of everything" that I use to make sense of. I'll crosspost it from a post I made elsewhere:
==
I've personally long conceptualized the PLAN and PLA's two main strategic directions as "
westpac oriented" and "
non-westpac oriented".
In the short term to
medium term future (5-15 years, let's say), the "
westpac oriented" direction will involve seeking the ability to fight a high intensity air-naval-missile conflict in the western pacific limited to the first and possibly second island chains. However, in this same period, the "
non-westpac oriented" direction is one where China faces risks in the Indian Ocean by nation states and non-nation state actors that have the ability to threaten Chinese SLOCs, Chinese investments, and Chinese nationals, all of which exist in the Subsaharan Africa region, the MENA region, as well as the Indian Ocean -- for this "non-westpac oriented" direction, it can be basically described as needing an ability to fight a low to medium intensity conflict in blue water, where power projection will be necessary. It would be a strategic disaster if Chinese SLOCs or Chinese investments were threatened and China lacked the ability to defend them. It is important to note that the "non-westpac" direction is one where the PLA's adversary is NOT the US or a major US ally.
Therefore, in the short term to medium term future, there is a need to reconcile the force structure that is most optimal for a "westpac oriented" mission (which would not involve big blue water power projection ships like carriers and may include more SSKs and land based missiles among others), vs a force structure that can also fulfill the "non-westpac oriented" mission (which would require big blue water power projection capabilities that can operate in a low-medium intensity conflict against opposing nation states or non-nation state actors).
In the
medium to long term future (15-30 years, let's say), the "
westpac oriented" direction will likely build on the short-medium term goal of fighting a high intensity air-naval-missile conflict in the 1st and 2nd island chains, but I believe by this point Chinese capabilities would have advanced to a point where the goal would be to
dominate the 1st and 2nd island chains through air-naval-missile forces, while also having the capability to push out and fight US pacific forces beyond the 2nd island chain -- essentially a high intensity warfare scenario in blue water where China will not have as big as the home base advantage that they would have when fighting in the 1st and 2nd island chains -- both sides would be fighting in "even" territory, so to speak. For the high intensity warfare at blue water scenario, it will of course require a high end combined task force that includes but is not limited to large aircraft carriers which will likely remain relevant for providing organic CAP, airborne strike and airborne AEW&C capabilities to the task force. The "
non-westpac oriented" direction for the medium to long term would likely similarly build on the capabilities of the short to medium term described above, where PLA expeditionary and power projection capacity will increase overall, as well as having the ability to wage high intensity war against more capable nation states (not dissimilar to US capabilities today), and to defend their SLOCs in the IOR against medium to high intensity nation states as well if it came to that.
Essentially, in
the short/medium term China has the dual goal of having to fight in the westpac against a high intensity adversary, while also having to develop a power projection capability for blue water against low to medium intensity adversaries. That necessitates at least an elementary level of power projection that China's current trajectory of carrier procurement and amphibious assault ship procurement can be seen to remedy. While power projection ships are not optimal for a westpac high intensity conflict, they are fortunately able to provide some additional flexibility and capability in such a conflict even if they don't offer the best opportunity-cost... However that is certainly the "less worse" choice compared to if the PLA were called upon to conduct an expeditionary power projection mission (non-westpac) and lacked a credible power projection capability at all by virtue of investing the majority of their funds into weapons and platforms whose reach and relevance was limited to the westpac.
In the
medium/long term, China will want to have the ability to dominate the westpac, and to push the fight out beyond the westpac into the central pacific if not more against the US if necessary -- which will also require large naval task forces that will have to include a high end, mature carrier force for their one of a kind organic aviation capabilities -- while also having the ability to deploy larger scale, complex power projection missions in blue water to defend their global interests and SLOCs in blue water against more capable nation state actors. Both of these medium/long term westpac and non-westpac strategic directions require a mature, capable carrier force -- which of course requires the PLAN to start to operate carriers sooner rather than later so they can build up the expertise and experience to fulfill those high end missions in the medium and long term.
