Future PLAN orbat discussion

manqiangrexue · Monday at 12:56 PM

AndrewS said:
I should have been clearer that there would need to be multiple Chinese aircraft carriers.

If you need to invest more than 3 carriers to this mission, it's already cooked. What's the plan? Keep making $20B carrier packages with 4K sailors on them that can be killed by a single ASBM to try to stop shipping from the US to Japan??

AndrewS said:
IRBMs are expensive and in short supply. But the Chinese military does have a lot more munitions options given that all of the Japanese Home Islands are within 1500km of mainland China.

Carriers are more expensive and not expendable. When the option exists to blast all of Japan's ports with missiles, why would you consider doing something so risky and out of our element?

AndrewS said:
Seaborne shipping is only part of it. If the US can operate bombers and tankers from Alaska, and have a clear route from Alaska to Japan, US bombers can use the Japanese Home Islands as a shield, and launch missiles from there, as the Chinese Air Force wouldn't be operating over hostile landmasses in force.

You can either detect these aircraft in which case you can shoot them down in Asia and over Japan or you can't detect them in which case, even if your carriers aren't all taken out, you still couldn't try to blockade stealth aircraft over the vast expanses of the open sea.

Once again, missiles to take out all air bases in Japan is how to do it. If you want to block shipping from the US to Japan with aircraft carriers, you are talking about dealing with far inferior nations. When China has the power to talk down to the US like some junior country acting out, then we can block them with a carrier and it will be the threat of what happens to them if that carrier is attacked or sanctions violated more than the power of the actual carrier that produces the effect.

AndrewS said:
We're talking about a hypothetical US-China conflict where the US decides to declare war on China, as China can achieve its objectives without going to war with the USA.

In order to end such a war, there won't be any alternative but for the Chinese Navy to neutralise the 3rd Island Chain.

With missiles. You wanna neutralize Alaska and Hawaii with carriers??? The US would have to have been beaten to pre-surrender WWII Japan state before you can do that to them.

AndrewS said:
You can look at it as staged objectives:

1st Island Chain
2nd Island Chain
3rd Island Chain (Alaska/Hawaii/Australia/etc)

About 2030, I reckon it should be obvious that China would "win" in the First Island Chain.
About 2035, I reckon it should be obvious for the Second Island Chain.
Then there is the 3rd Island Chain afterwards.

---
From a resourcing perspective, China's economy today is around twice the size of the USA, if you look at the latest price surveys and account for differences in measurement methodology.

So given time, China should be able to build a Navy twice the size, with say 22 aircraft carriers.
And with that increased scale, they should obtain 5-10% better availability along with a 10-20% cost reduction, because they are buying and operating twice as many carriers.

Bu they won't do that, because those resources are far better-used on other equipment. Eventually, to put the final nail in American global power, China will build a significant aircraft carrier fleet. But because their use is very limited and they are considered glass jaws in high intensity peer conflict, China will focus more on technologies that risk less to do more damage at least until the US is definitively supplanted.

America is very badly overextended and overinvested economically in a navy that is structurally incorrect to fight a modern high intensity peer level war. China is not going to take their numbers and just multiply them by true PPP to see what we can should build. We don't copy other people's homework and accept all their flaws with it.

sndef888 · Tuesday at 1:53 AM

Is there any news at all of a 052D replacement?

had been hoping for a long time to see a 8000ish ton 052F with 80 vls but seems all is quiet for the past year or so

AndrewS · Tuesday at 4:21 PM

manqiangrexue said:
If you need to invest more than 3 carriers to this mission, it's already cooked. What's the plan? Keep making $20B carrier packages with 4K sailors on them that can be killed by a single ASBM to try to stop shipping from the US to Japan??

As I already said before, seaborne shipping is only part of the reason.
The objective is to stop bombers and tankers (operating from Alaska) from being able to reach launch points over Japan, and launch missiles at mainland China.

And as I've pointed out, the US only has hypersonic missiles with a 13kg warhead, so a single hit won't sink a carrier.

And it is beneficial (from a cost perspective) for China to launch SM-6s to shoot down all incoming hypersonic missiles.

manqiangrexue said:
Carriers are more expensive and not expendable. When the option exists to blast all of Japan's ports with missiles, why would you consider doing something so risky and out of our element?

Again, seaborne shipping is only part of the reason

manqiangrexue said:
You can either detect these aircraft in which case you can shoot them down in Asia and over Japan or you can't detect them in which case, even if your carriers aren't all taken out, you still couldn't try to blockade stealth aircraft over the vast expanses of the open sea.

You can go after the tanker aircraft which are refueling the stealth bombers transiting from Alaska to Japan.

manqiangrexue said:
Once again, missiles to take out all air bases in Japan is how to do it. If you want to block shipping from the US to Japan with aircraft carriers, you are talking about dealing with far inferior nations. When China has the power to talk down to the US like some junior country acting out, then we can block them with a carrier and it will be the threat of what happens to them if that carrier is attacked or sanctions violated more than the power of the actual carrier that produces the effect.

Again, shipping is only part of the reason. For targets on the Japanese Home Islands, it is more efficient to use land-based aircraft and missiles.

manqiangrexue said:
With missiles. You wanna neutralize Alaska and Hawaii with carriers??? The US would have to have been beaten to pre-surrender WWII Japan state before you can do that to them.

That is the logical next step after the Second Island Chain has been secured.

manqiangrexue said:
Bu they won't do that, because those resources are far better-used on other equipment. Eventually, to put the final nail in American global power, China will build a significant aircraft carrier fleet. But because their use is very limited and they are considered glass jaws in high intensity peer conflict, China will focus more on technologies that risk less to do more damage at least until the US is definitively supplanted.

America is very badly overextended and overinvested economically in a navy that is structurally incorrect to fight a modern high intensity peer level war. China is not going to take their numbers and just multiply them by true PPP to see what we can should build. We don't copy other people's homework and accept all their flaws with it.

Air power is fundamental to power projection. I simply don't see any alternative to aircraft carriers, albeit operating long-range aircraft to mitigate risk.

manqiangrexue · Tuesday at 5:23 PM

AndrewS said:
As I already said before, seaborne shipping is only part of the reason.
The objective is to stop bombers and tankers (operating from Alaska) from being able to reach launch points over Japan, and launch missiles at mainland China.

And as I already said before, you can either detect them and shoot them down in Asia or you can't and you can't intercept them over the ocean either. Except the latter requires you send ships and thousands of men to wait and potentially get killed.

AndrewS said:
And as I've pointed out, the US only has hypersonic missiles with a 13kg warhead, so a single hit won't sink a carrier.

And as I've pointed out, America is so badly behind on large ship killers because it hasn't needed to build them. If China develops a large carrier fleet, America's ship-killing missiles with take off. It's a lot cheaper and easier to build bigger ship-killing missiles than it is to build 22 carriers and their complements and to train their sailors.

AndrewS said:
And it is beneficial (from a cost perspective) for China to launch SM-6s to shoot down all incoming hypersonic missiles.

It's not beneficial from a people's lives perspective to put a ship out thousands of miles from home to see if they can intercept all the missiles coming down on them. I'm rather happy that American carriers have to play this game in Asia with China.

AndrewS said:
Again, seaborne shipping is only part of the reason

Again, I addressed everything else too.

AndrewS said:
You can go after the tanker aircraft which are refueling the stealth bombers transiting from Alaska to Japan.

1. If your carriers haven't already been torpedo'd missile struck to death, you can try.
2. B-1, B-2, B-21 range doesn't require a refuel between Alaska and Japan, even round trip is possible. Conformal fuel tanks are also relatively easy to develop to extend range. Give the US the reason to develop them and they will be added.

AndrewS said:
Again, shipping is only part of the reason.

Again, I addressed everything else too.

AndrewS said:
For targets on the Japanese Home Islands, it is more efficient to use land-based aircraft and missiles.

Yes, not aircraft carriers; they are not very useful except against very weak foe.

AndrewS said:
That is the logical next step after the Second Island Chain has been secured.

The next step is achieved with missiles.

AndrewS said:
Air power is fundamental to power projection. I simply don't see any alternative to aircraft carriers, albeit operating long-range aircraft to mitigate risk.

We're going in circles. I agree that aircraft carriers are needed for power projection, but I'm arguing against your assertion that they are needed to fight defensively against Japan/USA attacking China.

AndrewS · 2026-06-20T12:39:42-0400

manqiangrexue said:
And as I already said before, you can either detect them and shoot them down in Asia or you can't and you can't intercept them over the ocean either. Except the latter requires you send ships and thousands of men to wait and potentially get killed.

And as I've pointed out, America is so badly behind on large ship killers because it hasn't needed to build them. If China develops a large carrier fleet, America's ship-killing missiles with take off. It's a lot cheaper and easier to build bigger ship-killing missiles than it is to build 22 carriers and their complements and to train their sailors.

With mass production, the US *hopes* to reduce the cost of a hypersonic missile from $40 Mn to $15Mn
But it is still *cheaper* for the Chinese Navy to launch two SM-6 to shoot down.

However, I doubt the US military-industrial complex can actually get the cost down, produce these missiles in volume, nor field the platforms to launch enough of them. In comparison, we have a situation where China already has about 250 DF-26 Launchers

---

In addition, the US missile only has a 13kg warhead, which doesn't qualify as a ship-killer.
So a true US hypersonic ship-killer missile would be a lot bigger and more expensive.

To sink an aircraft carrier, I think it would take at least 10 heavy warheads.
But having said that, a mission-kill on a carrier is a lot easier.

manqiangrexue said:
Again, I addressed everything else too.

1. If your carriers haven't already been torpedo'd missile struck to death, you can try.
2. B-1, B-2, B-21 range doesn't require a refuel between Alaska and Japan, even round trip is possible. Conformal fuel tanks are also relatively easy to develop to extend range. Give the US the reason to develop them and they will be added.

It's a 10,000km roundtrip from Elmendorf to Hokkaido, leaving barely any buffer for emergencies for a B-2/B-21. But from Hokkaido, 1000km cruise missiles can't actually hit anything.
So these bombers would need tankers.

---

Fighter jets can use conformal fuel tanks because they are already designed to carry heavy external payloads.

But stealth bombers aren't designed for this, so developing conformal fuel tanks for a large flying wing bomber is going to require a structural redesign of the bomber. That is not an easy task.

manqiangrexue said:
The next step is achieved with missiles.

Look at the distances from China:

Alaska: 5000km (overflying Russia)
Hawaii: 8000km

Missiles with that range are going to be very expensive and in short-supply.

Even today, China has only fielded about 250 DF-26 launchers with 500 missiles, with a 3000-4000km range.
That is not enough for a sustained missile campaign

manqiangrexue said:
We're going in circles. I agree that aircraft carriers are needed for power projection, but I'm arguing against your assertion that they are needed to fight defensively against Japan/USA attacking China.

China staying on the defensive is a losing proposition, as eventually the enemy will concentrate enough forces to break through to critical targets. That is what will happen if China allows bases in the Third Island Chain to act as secure staging points.

But to neutralise those bases on a continuous basis, you need to be able to use lower-cost (and therefore shorter-range) munitions. That requires the launch platforms (ships/carriers/aircraft) to get pretty close.

Chinese long-range stealth bombers will be a part of this, but for sustained power projection against the Third Island Chain, I don't see any alternative to a large fleet of Chinese aircraft carriers.

---

Let's take a notional Chinese Navy which is twice the size of the US Navy.
So call it 22 fleet carriers, with 22 Type-076 drone carriers, 120+ SSNs, etc etc

It would be feasible to form a fleet comprising 8 fleet carriers, 8 drone carriers, 60 SSNs, etc
But where could the US launch enough long-range hypersonic missiles from?

This fleet could reach Hawaii or Alaska, and destroy the bomber threat at those airbases.

wuguanhui · 2026-06-20T14:06:49-0400

Lol. If we have neutralised all threats at the 2IC, I honestly don't care about the 3IC. I certainly have no interest in building 44 carriers just to bomb Hawaii.

AndrewS · 2026-06-20T14:14:55-0400

wuguanhui said:
Lol. If we have neutralised all threats at the 2IC, I honestly don't care about the 3IC. I certainly have no interest in building 44 carriers just to bomb Hawaii.

The alternative is sit behind the 2IC, and then allow Hawaii to be used to attack China.

manqiangrexue · 2026-06-21T01:53:34-0400

AndrewS said:
With mass production, the US *hopes* to reduce the cost of a hypersonic missile from $40 Mn to $15Mn
But it is still *cheaper* for the Chinese Navy to launch two SM-6 to shoot down.

It is incredibly difficult to intercept a hypersonic missile, if it is even possible to do reliably. You need multiple, way more than 2 interceptors to even attempt to catch one, and they may launch well more than one. If you fail, they hit a target that is billions of dollars in value, and the lives on those assets are lost. That's why I like China's odds against America's carriers to much.

AndrewS said:
However, I doubt the US military-industrial complex can actually get the cost down, produce these missiles in volume, nor field the platforms to launch enough of them. In comparison, we have a situation where China already has about 250 DF-26 Launchers

You doubt? LOL I wouldn't bet making 22 carriers on it.

AndrewS said:
In addition, the US missile only has a 13kg warhead, which doesn't qualify as a ship-killer.

It takes you like a week between each reply so you forgot what you already said. We've done this like 3 times already.
You: US missile has only a 13kg warhead.
Me: It's because they were not prepared to fight enemy carriers; if that need comes, they will prepare and they can put way more than 13kg on it.

AndrewS said:
So a true US hypersonic ship-killer missile would be a lot bigger and more expensive.

It will be more expensive but it's not linear to the warhead size so it's not really going to be that much.

AndrewS said:
To sink an aircraft carrier, I think it would take at least 10 heavy warheads.
But having said that, a mission-kill on a carrier is a lot easier.

DF-26 are 1 hit kill or mission kill depending on how accurate. I would not gamble that the US can't make a missile as powerful with far less range if you are looking to run up on Alaska or Hawaii. You want China to invest in very expensive, very vulnerable assets.

AndrewS said:
It's a 10,000km roundtrip from Elmendorf to Hokkaido, leaving barely any buffer for emergencies for a B-2/B-21.

What emergencies would stealth bombers expect to face in flight?

AndrewS said:
But from Hokkaido, 1000km cruise missiles can't actually hit anything.

If they have nowhere to land in Japan because everything's been obliterated, then we've won already.

AndrewS said:
So these bombers would need tankers.

So no, actually.

AndrewS said:
Fighter jets can use conformal fuel tanks because they are already designed to carry heavy external payloads.

But stealth bombers aren't designed for this, so developing conformal fuel tanks for a large flying wing bomber is going to require a structural redesign of the bomber. That is not an easy task.

I don't know if this is true; I think it could be much easier than you think engineering some bumps on them to carry fuel, but they can also reduce internal payload to add internal fuel tanks.

AndrewS said:
Look at the distances from China:

Alaska: 5000km (overflying Russia)

Covered

AndrewS said:
Hawaii: 8000km

So why do you insist we need to counter Hawaii?

AndrewS said:
Missiles with that range are going to be very expensive and in short-supply.

A missile from the US to hit China? Why would they need that? Are we at nuclear war? Have all the US subs been sunk?

AndrewS said:
Even today, China has only fielded about 250 DF-26 launchers with 500 missiles, with a 3000-4000km range.
That is not enough for a sustained missile campaign

How did you get the missile numbers? I would very much support buying many many more missiles, but we would need to be absolutely out of things to spend money on before investing in 22 carriers.

AndrewS said:
China staying on the defensive is a losing proposition, as eventually the enemy will concentrate enough forces to break through to critical targets. That is what will happen if China allows bases in the Third Island Chain to act as secure staging points.

One minute you complain they're too far, the other you say they're too dangerous. Like I said, pushing the US back to the 3rd island chain is cooking them. If they were beaten in the first and second chains, the third one's bullshit.

AndrewS said:
But to neutralise those bases on a continuous basis, you need to be able to use lower-cost (and therefore shorter-range) munitions. That requires the launch platforms (ships/carriers/aircraft) to get pretty close.

Like a submarine

AndrewS said:
Chinese long-range stealth bombers will be a part of this, but for sustained power projection against the Third Island Chain, I don't see any alternative to a large fleet of Chinese aircraft carriers.

1. Submarine
2. Stealth bombers
3. They can't do much from there anyway cus it's too far

AndrewS said:
Let's take a notional Chinese Navy which is twice the size of the US Navy.
So call it 22 fleet carriers, with 22 Type-076 drone carriers, 120+ SSNs, etc etc

It would be feasible to form a fleet comprising 8 fleet carriers, 8 drone carriers, 60 SSNs, etc

You want to mimic and scale up the military of the country that is known for spending an unsustainable amount on its military and you want to copy the breakdown that is known to be unprepared to fight peer battles?

AndrewS said:
But where could the US launch enough long-range hypersonic missiles from?

1. Submarines
2. Aircraft from their carriers (which are better protected due to their proximity to their shores) and land bases if you get close enough

AndrewS said:
This fleet could reach Hawaii or Alaska, and destroy the bomber threat at those airbases.

They'll blow up all your carriers that get into range first. Don't ever doubt that a country with the firepower of the US can be supressed by what you can put on a boat.

Chinese carriers can challenge American carriers on other arenas so we can power-project in the Middle East, Africa, Europe, Southeast Asia, etc... but challenging America directly with your carriers won't work for precisely the reason we here are so confident that the US can no longer suppress China with their carriers.

AndrewS said:
The alternative is sit behind the 2IC, and then allow Hawaii to be used to attack China.

If the US has fallen back to using Hawaii, they are cooked as shit. Japan, Philippines, Guam all dead, and they're gonna use Hawaii?? Hawaii can be hit by missiles too.

sndef888 · 2026-06-21T02:19:47-0400

Australia is much more important than Hawaii. It is a piece of Asia that remains colonised today and China should help decolonise it.

Michael90 · 2026-06-21T11:12:49-0400

mack8 said:
I'll just make the point i've made in the past, that extra money could be used to reach parity in the areas China is still critically behind, namely carriers, nuclear subs and ICBMs/nuclear warheads.

As far as PLAN, the recent SSN developments are encouraging, but as production is conditioned by money for the infrastructure/shipyards and the ships/weapons themselves, that extra money not only could guarantee building SSN/SSBNs at a high rate (they launched 3 SSN this half year so far, would there be more launched by the end of 2026? reference has been made of US launching up to 7 nuclear subs a year in the 1980s), but also build up the carrier fleet just as the US claims/expect anyway (9 by 2035, which given current observed PLAN construction rate just doesn't seem possible, they need at least 2 being built simultaneously and occasionally 3, they do have the shipyards/drydocks for that).

And a quick comment on the issue of China avoiding conflict, how long can they can keep doing that? They can't just keep avoiding the US forever, which is not even hiding it's intentions to destroy China, at one point they have to turn around and face them head on, and China would be much more confident in facing them if they'd have parity or even superiority in the major combat/strategic systems. This makes it that more likely US will back down, which is the best outcome China wants, avoiding open conflict, and doing so in it's own terms.

So more money for defence means less likelihood for open conflict, and less likelihood of China's rise being hindered.

Your last point is exactly what I mentioned on this forum a few weeks ago. I admire Chinese leaders restrain and their desire to grow peacefully. To be honest the CCP might be an authoritarian party but since maos death and Deng Xiaopings pragmatic policies of “it doesn’t matter whether the cat is black and white as long as it catches mice and keeping your head down and bidding your time “ Chinese leaders have followed his ideology very successfully. However, I believe the gloves have come off since 2014/2016. The US is now focused on stopping China (which makes sense, it’s nothing personal, since even china was replaced by India or Japan, they will be treated the same way) from challenging her number 1 position and standing in the world. china might not have that intention but the mere fact they are growing too big for the US is in itself a crime already since the is automatically seen a threat to US supremacy. So make no mistake the US will do everything she can to slow or ideally stop this growth trajectory. A conflict is not out of the question actually.

I do believe the CCP is not spending enough militarily to be honest. China should have almost twice what they have/are spending today. The mere fact that many US leaders and military officials even talk of possible war and how to fight and win it against China says a lot. It means they still see the PLA/PLAN as nowhere near the US firepower and capabilities and think on the event of a war they can win if the USA focuses all its mind/resources in that war. This is very very dangerous, since as I said weeks ago, China has failed to established a quasi deterrence and equilibrium militarily against the US. This is unlike the Soviet Union which for all her ills had established a quasi potent deterrence against the US and entire West(and her allies) who back then were even far stronger /powerful than today. So you hardly ever saw any US/western leader talk about a war with the Soviet Union , it was basically unthinkable in their minds since they knew it was a MAD no question about that .
So they avoided a direct confrontation at all cost. It’s not something they even wanted to imagine or entertain for a minute . Reason they had mutual talks and agreements in stabilizing their relationships and being careful in not crossing the Soviet unions core interests/red lines.

However this is not the case with China to be honest. china is still seen as a major power but one who is not powerful enough militarily to be peer of the US and so their red lines can often be crossed even by smaller countries much less bigger powers. China has failed to established that deterrence to be honest, which makes the likelihood of a war and miscalculation in future actually more likely which will cost the country far more than what she is trying to save today(which is rational since they want to focus on economy which I admire, but situation has changed a lot this past years/decade).

So prevention is always better than cure as they say.So I will say that’s one aspect the party could do better, even though they have building up at a decent pace this past years. But it’s still nowhere near enough to be honest, especially looking at the threat and hostile powers they face at their doorsteps (not even far away).

Future PLAN orbat discussion

manqiangrexue

Brigadier

sndef888

Captain

AndrewS

Brigadier

manqiangrexue

Brigadier

AndrewS

Brigadier

wuguanhui

Junior Member

AndrewS

Brigadier

manqiangrexue

Brigadier

sndef888

Captain

Michael90

Senior Member