PLAN Aircraft Carrier programme...(Closed)
- Thread starter bd popeye
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Maggern
Junior Member
You're correct, but then the Americans knew exactly what they were doing and pretty much asking for a response as soon as they entered the zone. It's not like they were forced to go through there so why else do it...Of course the Americans were also there to show that the carrier can't operate with impunity in the SCS...which I doubt the PLAN even had hoped.
Neither the Americans nor the Chinese were in the wrong here (alternatively both were) ,but that message has not reached the media
Some people may want to equate this with the b52s in the ADIZ, but really it's apples and oranges. The exclusion zone is not the point here, the carrier is
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We've heard so many stories about the "details," of this incident with respect to the manuevering of the ships themselves, that I am personally pretty much not interested in any more "anonymous person's and official's," versions of the story.
I did not believe the earlier reports that said that the Type 072 "stopped," in front of the Cowpens forcing her to manuever. I also do not believe for a minute that the Cowpens "stopped," in the water to avoid collission.
I believe, with a good deal of confidence, the we can say the following:
1) The Liaoning and her group were in the SCS perfomring exerises in between being docked there.
2) The USS Cowpens sailed into the area to to either simply make its presence known or conduct surveillance...though what they hoped to learn that is not already known is beyond me.
3) The Chinese forces noticed the Cowpens in the area and probably communicated their desire for her to come no closer.
4) The Cowpens, in international waters, did not follow the Chinese instructions and continued to manuever freely (ie. as it chose.)
5) The Chinese determined that the Cowpens was getting too close and a couple of vessels manuevered to try and keep her from getting any closer.
6) In that manuevering, something occurred that was failry obvious and concerned the Cowpens commading officer about manuevering freely in international waters.
7) There may have been communications after the incident between local commanding officers on each side.
8) The US lodged a complaint about the incident.
9) The press got word of it and is now trying to make an issue/story/headline out of it.
I believe each side acted as they had been instructed by their orders/command chain.
I believe that neither side's vessels ever came to a "dead stop," and that although there was manuevering that took place in an approach, block, manuever sceanrio, that the vessels were never in any imminent, major danger. There was concern that they could be, and so the complaint was issued.
As it is, the Liaoning Carrier Group is in the South China Sea. Plain and simple. They too have the right of free passage and manuever in international waters.
All of this is really about each side making their statements about their rights to do that, and about sending a message both ways about the realities of a larger, more capable PLAN force making its presence known in those waters.
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All that stuff brings back memories of the cold war days and much the same actions between US and Soviet ships, I know this because I was there.
Also reminds me of same sort of tactics between non-naval maritime patrol ship from China and Vietnam or other countries
when they 'shouldered' each other, just because they are painted grey doesn't mean that it didn't happen and the escorts didn't force the COWPENS to come to a stop and make other drastic course changes. The Chinese have done that before, whether it was their Navy or one of their various maritime law enforcement agencies. Not taking side on who is right are wrong, just saying it probably did happen the way its has been reported.
Also reminds me of same sort of tactics between non-naval maritime patrol ship from China and Vietnam or other countries
when they 'shouldered' each other, just because they are painted grey doesn't mean that it didn't happen and the escorts didn't force the COWPENS to come to a stop and make other drastic course changes. The Chinese have done that before, whether it was their Navy or one of their various maritime law enforcement agencies. Not taking side on who is right are wrong, just saying it probably did happen the way its has been reported.
Blackstone
Brigadier
True, but venturing into a previously announced navy exercise is calculated to elicit responses, so it's bad form to fain outrage. The bottom line is both sides play reindeer games, so the old saying 'you pays your money, and you takes your chances,' applies.
Problem is, it has been reported several different ways.
All of them can not be true.
Jack, I have no doubts that there are aspects of this that are similar to the Cold War and some of the confrontations that occurred there. I lived through that period as well.
The last time we had something like this with China was when numerous relatively manueverable Chinese vessels impeded a very slow and ponderous USNS Impeccable surveillance ship (Civilian and military manned vessel of the Military Sealift Command, not a US Navy ship) over several days in March 2009. Those several Chinese vessels included PLAN Frigates, one of their own surveillance ships, a Bureau of Fisheris patrol vessel and two PLAN flagged trawlers. In that instance, the USNS Impeccable, which is much smaller than the Cowpens (5,500 tons vs. 10,000 tons) and not nearly as fast or manueverable (12 knots vs 32 knots) was hemmed in and forced to stop.
But I do not believe the Cowpens was forced to stop. If she got herself into a situation, with all of her sensors and while operating within international waters, where that manuervable and fast warship was forced to stop dead, then I would expect a loss of confidence replacement of the commanding officer.
In this case the types of ships involved were reversed. A US Navy warship, fast and manueverable, against two slow and ponderous PLAN vessels. The two vessels that reportedly came out to dissuade the Cowpens were not FFGs or DDGs...not what you or I would call "escorts," at all. The reports state that they were Type 072 LSTs, and they are slow and ponderous in terms of their speed and manueverability, compared to the Cowpens.
I am just saying that I personally do not believe that those vessels forced the Cowpens to come to a dead stop. There is no doubt that the Cowpens did manuever to avoid them.
As it is, this is all (IMHO) becoming a temperst in a tea pot as a result of the press. The US Navy lodged a complaint about the manuevering of the LSTs in front of the Cowpens and the hazard they posed. Either the US and China will talk that out (as the US and Russia ultimately did) or not. In the mean time, the US Navy will continue to navigate freely in international waters as will the PLAN, and hopefully it will be longer than four and one half years before the next incident occurs.
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Yeah, the media is spinning this incident as if China was "ordering" the cowpens around in international waters and how china is trying assert control in its EEZ etc (not dissimilar to how media was interpreting the ADIZ as a territory grab -- and indeed, trying to compare this to the impeccable incident).
In reality, I see the PLAN simply didn't like the Cowpens being so close to their newest and shiniest toy. The Cowpens was of course legally able to transit through those waters as it saw fit, and the PLAN was legally able to intercept the Cowpens with an LST as it came within what it considered a dangerous distance to their only aircraft carrier and within their clearly defined exercise waters.
There's been nothing to suggest the PLAN tried to invoke claims of "territorial" waters as a pretext for ordering the cowpens to stop or to get out, which I frustratingly see media trying to imply.
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Brumby
Major
I understand that the PLAN wanted to maintain a 35 mile perimeter zone. The word "legal" is being used to justify the action. What I have not seen is anybody mentioning the legal basis or lack of it in international waters. Additionally, what is the practice of the USN if they were faced with a similar situation?
Additionally, how do you justify in international waters intercepting a vessel that may result in a collision as legal. I sure would like to hear the legal basis of such an action. Calling it legal doesn't make it legal.
It seems highly doubtful anyone could "legally" intercept a foreign ship in internaitonal waters, especially by if the interception is done by means more dangerous than the activity the foreign ship was alledgedly engaged in.
So unless the Cowpen crossed, or threaten to cross, the bow of any Chinese ship in the formation at a distance closer than 500 yards, or was doing something else inheriently that dangerous, the Chinese would seem to have no leg to stand on, either de jure, or de facto, in intercepting the Cowpen by crossing her bows at 500 yards.
The Chinese could have positioned several of their ships between the Cowpen and the Liaoning, matched speeds, and then gradually steered towards the Cowpen a few degrees at a time to edge the Cowpen away from Liaoning, if they simply wanted to prevent the Cowpen from getting too close to the carrier.
But it does seem the ships involved intentionally undertook a more aggressive, and dangerous, move to increase the risk to the shadowing ship to discourage further shadowing. I think intentionally increasing someone's risk in doing something perfectly legal is unlikely to be met with sympathy from neutral observer.
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Unfortunately even today we don't have the full picture -- nor will we ever, probably.
I'd like to see the plots of the various ships over the entire encounter, as well as whatever signals or radio transmissions they passed between them. If the Cowpens had already weaved through the exercise zone before hand without much reply, I'd see the LST interception as justified. I doubt the Cowpens was just going about its business and then suddenly a LST burst out of the blue and crossed its bow wearing a troll face.
I'm not sure about the lawfulness of the situation -- and in this incident I don't think either side is being particularly unlawful especially if the PLAN didn't invoke territorial waters as a pretext etc.
Sure, it increased the risk of the USN ship being in the area.
You could also argue the USN ship being in the area increased the risk of a miscalculation during whatever exercise they were conducting.
I'd also like to see how the Cowpens acted after the LST interception and the conversation with the Liaoning commander.
(OT: If we want to talk about sympathy from a neutral observer, we could go higher scale and wonder why the USN intentionally undertakes and prepositions its assets aggressively and dangerously so close to China's waters in such a way that will intentionally increase chance of miscalculation and conflict >__> )
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