055 Large Destroyer Thread II
- Thread starter Blitzo
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Do you guys think China will produce type 055 in large numbers like 30+? Or do they move to a successor that is even bigger?
China is producing bigger ships than the previous generation. Type 054B is bigger than 054A. I think the next successor to 052D will be bigger in displacement, most likely in the 10K range, just like the burke class.
But if that happens, type 055 as the flagship, commanding premium cruiser will seem small. It might make sense for China to come up with a bigger ship as a successor to 055. A 20K ton ship could be useful as a massive carrier of large anti-ship missiles and bigger radar for fleet air defense.
China is producing bigger ships than the previous generation. Type 054B is bigger than 054A. I think the next successor to 052D will be bigger in displacement, most likely in the 10K range, just like the burke class.
But if that happens, type 055 as the flagship, commanding premium cruiser will seem small. It might make sense for China to come up with a bigger ship as a successor to 055. A 20K ton ship could be useful as a massive carrier of large anti-ship missiles and bigger radar for fleet air defense.
We can't really speculate right now, we are at a stage of Chinese naval procurement where we don't have a good projection as to what their procurement will look like outside of the immediate 1-2 years from the future, let alone 5-10 or 10-15 years.
In the long term, all of the options you described (and more beyond that) could be within the realm of possibility and cannot be ruled out, so it's kind of pointless for us to try and speculate what they'll end up going for.
I wouldn't be surprised if the PLAN themselves are still deliberating aspects of how they will progress.
It might happen. The current naval gas turbine engines available in the West are higher power than the ones used in the Type 055. I would expect them to boost performance of the engines eventually or make a new generation engine. When that happens they can make a larger ship with a similar engine configuration.
The Type 054B is supposed to use a new kind of diesel engine as well.
The Type 054B is supposed to use a new kind of diesel engine as well.
During the initial developing stages, the 055 DDG was indeed designed to displace around/at least 20000 tons at full load.
However, that proved to be more than what China's military shipbuilding capability is capable of handling at the time, alongside the heavy cost, material and operational requirements which the PLAN just isn't ready to shoulder. The PLAN eventually demanded the ship designers to squeeze that full displacement down to 13000 tons, i.e. what we're seeing today with the 055 DDGs.
Of course, with the 071 LPDs, 075 LHDs, 002 CV and 003 CV being the obvious testaments, China's military shipbuilding industry can certainly build 20000-ton surface combatants for the PLAN (whether those be classified as DDGs or CGs).
However, ability is one thing; requirement is another. TBH, I don't really think that China really needs a surface combatant that large. Even Japan has decided to be realistic by scaling down their ASEV from the original plan of a Kirov-counterpart to a larger-055.
Also, what China is really looking for is the ability to field highly-capable surface combatants at-scale and with bang-for-the-buck. Building just a few Kirov-size DDGs/CGs like the Soviets isn't the correct way to go for - Their respective fates are the best cautionary tales for the PLAN WRT warship procurement and sustainment.
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One of the more significant reasons why they were able to squeeze the ship from 20,000t to 13,000t is because of miniaturization of subsystems as technology progressed.
That past experience doesn't necessarily have the same reasoning as to whether it would make sense for the PLAN to procure a class of larger surface combatant as heavy as 20,000 tons in the future.
As I wrote above, everything is likely being considered, and we shouldn't rule in anything in or out.
I think the main purpose could be large anti-ship ballistic missiles, similar in size to what the kirov class carries, the Granit shipwreck missiles. Or like the DF-21D or 36. With such large likely hypersonic missiles, China could put US carriers at risk long way into the Pacific. I could also carry a very large Radar array for long range detection. Anti-stealth requires low frequency radars, which are very large in size. Countering stealth with large radars could be important.
If Hypersonic missiles become prevalent, then Carriers could slowly become obsolete for both US and China, then this kind of large warships with powerful missiles could become again the primary capital ship that fleets are based on, kind of modern day battleships.