SCI/TECH: Chinese Light Battleship In News

According to a news article from the Christian Science Monitor, the Chinese Navy (PLAN) has a light battleship. No Chinese warship of this size has ever been seen before. Not since the iron-clad navies of the late 1800's. It is unknown at this time whether there is a ship like this, but the US intelligence is said to have been surprised by the appearance.



China has unveiled a new attack submarine and a new light battleship - More than a little surprise!

Most of us knew about a new attack submarine. But I haven't heard anything about a light battleship. I would have been surprised to hear about a light cruiser. I am skeptical about a light battleship.

I did a quick search of the web, and there is nothing on current Chinese battleships. There were, of course, battleships in the late 1800's. Checking the lists of Chinese warships turns up nothing larger than a destroyer or frigate. I'm not counting their two aircraft carriers. If history repeats itself, the battleship would have started out as a large cargo ship in the construction yard.

There are no supporting links. There is nothing else in the news, or the ATS threads about Chinese battleships.


[edit on 17-10-2005 by ZPE StarPilot]

I've observed that some people think the term battleship is interchangable with the term warship, not realizing that a battleship is a specific type of warship. I suspect that's what we're dealing with here. I don't think the Chinese are looking to ressurect the battleship, or the Man o' War, or the Viking Longboat for that matter.

Whats the difference between a light battleship and a destroyer?


This is pretty interesting, why would the chinese go thru the bother of developing any battleship, the modern navy is centered around force projection and aircraft carriers no? Seems that a battleship is an odd choice, but, of course, I suspect that the Chinese Navy knows a little more about naval warfare than me.

Do any of the more savvy members know if this implies any shift in the role they intend to use for their navy? I'd think that it might mean less of a focus on power project and carriers, and that that might make sense since the chinese tend to be rather isolationist.

Battleship: Heavy ship of the line. Used for Surface ship to ship combat....Heavily armed and armoured.

Destroyer: Tends to used as a screen for larger warships. Used to used for AA and ASW, although primarily (in the RN for example) are used for AA nowadays. Frigates have taken up the primary ASW role.

A good example of a light Battleship would be the Scharnhorst, a "Pocket Battleship" built by the Germans.

From reading that article, it only mentions once the "light battleship" and from the context, i doubt the write actually knows the difference between a Warship and a Battleship.

I have seen no evidence of any Battleship being built by China. makes no sense anyway. It'd be sunk unless it had good Air or AA cover.

[edit on 18/10/05 by stumason]

So by stating its a battleship they are saying that its going to be used as a ship-of-the-line, and not escorting aircraft carriers? Very odd no?

it is very strange....see my post above (I edited the double post to contain more)

I honestly don't think it is a "battleship". In my mind, they are too big and expensive for very little gain.

You would need a whole squadron of Destroyers as a screen, unless the BS had it's own extensive AA cover. The only way I could see Battleships coming back is with Rail Guns. Even then, smaller ships are far more cost effective.

Plus, look at the Belgrano. That was a light cruiser, former WW2, that was employed by the Argies in the Falklands. The HMS Challenger sunk it with no problem and a great loss of men for the Argie Navy.

Yeah right, a suprise...China has build up quite a naval force in recent years:

www.globalsecurity.org...

They could have seen this comming, and probably did. What the Bush administration want to do is point out how dangerous China is, because they are "so secretive" (as if The USAF, for example, is open about their projects ). They also want to point out how rapid they Chinese armed forces are growing, and point out they're increasing their defense spending.

The truth of the matter is, that the US still has the biggest budget for defense spending, and spend FAR more on defense per capita than any other country on earth. As you all know, the Chinese economy is booming for years now, and thus they have increased the budget for defense. They have a lot of catching up to do, compared to the US and European countries.

The Bush administration tried to link their budget increases to the problem with Taiwan, but that has nothing to do with it.

Here is a link to Globalsecurity.org about known Chinese Ships and some planned for the future.

No Battleships:

Global Security

A battleship, in the traditional sense, wouldn't be logical.

A. It could be something akin to the DD(X), which would make some sense in the event of war on Taiwan. I don't suspect that it would be large enough or hold enough guns to really qualify as a battleship- that, in technical terms, would be called "putting all of your eggs in one basket".

B. It could be a Guided Missile Cruiser (CG or CGN). Cruisers, historically, are mini-battleships- once considered the smallest ship which could operate independently. The HMS Hood was a certain type of cruiser- a Battle Cruiser- which was gunned like a battleship, but not as heavily armored. This is about as big as you'd want a ship to get these days- big enough to carry missiles, appropriate tracking systems, and possibly a nuclear reactor for its propulsion.

C. It could be that the good people at CSM just don't know the first thing about naval warfare. China is putting out a lot of diesel powered crap which for the time being can't realistically be expected to see action any further away than Taiwan, The Philippines, or Indonesia.
It could just be a new frigate to shore up the air defense and asw capabilities o their fleet.


I really don't think the Chinese would try anything radical, like a big DD(X) clone, until they had sufficient experience from designing their smaller vessels to know how to build the best one possible.

Battleships and destroyers are also sub killers, if your your sub isn't very quiet. Most of the "Super-Powers" have submarines and maybe the Chinese want to be able to combat this.

[edit on 18-10-2005 by Senor_Vicente]

I wouldn't really call a battleship a submarine hunter. A good asw platform in my mind isn't a big, noisy, slow target. It's big enough to carry sonar bouys and maybe a helo, some torpedos and maybe ASROCs, and in a perfect world it can also haul some serious tail.
A Frigate or a Destroyer is not a battleship.

If the Chinese seriously want to get into defending their own waters they're going to need an economical destroyer and a good ASW helo to work with it. Building their own nuc' boats wouldn't be a bad idea either, but i guess one step at a time.
Maybe they could get a few Russian boats at a decent price. The Russians supposedly have an Akula-II which they have suspended construction on, an Akula-I decomissioned, 3 more in reserve, and several dozen Victor-I, II, and IIIs: maybe they'll sell China a couple to use as the basis for a clone. Afterall, they'll just end up sunk if they stay in Russian service much longer.

I think it's more then likely a new destroyer or small cruiser, i can't see even the most ignorant person confusing anything smaller with a "battleship", but as previously stated i can't really see the chinese building an actual battleship.

Digging a little bit deeper on the Global Security Website, they do
have a projected (speculation) new Destroyer at 10,000 tons.
That's a pretty big
destroyer, the new DDG-51 Arleigh Burke US destroyer lists between
8200 and 9200 depending on class. The US had "Battleships" in the 10,000 tons range in the early 1900's before they ballooned to over 35,000 tons. A Destroyer in the 10,000 ton plus size, being bigger than the new US Destroyer might be (perhaps falsely) called a 'Light Battleship'.

As for reasoning:
The following quotes from Global Security (the link that stumason posted
earlier) are interesting.

The PLAN seeks to push its maritime defense perimeter further seaward. This change in operations will require newer, more modern warships and submarines capable of operating out to the Ryukyu Islands and into the South China Sea. At these extended ranges, the platforms will have to be better armed to enable defense from all methods of attack. The Navy has been conducting research and acquiring foreign technology in an effort to improve the broad range of naval warfare capabilities; it also is acquiring new classes of ships that will be better suited for operations out to the limits of the East and South China Seas.

The PLAN continues to have longstanding concerns about its capability to engage enemy aircraft, cruise missiles and precision-guided munitions.

Source: Global Security - China DDG-X

So, perhaps they are not attempting to solve problems with AA or ASW, but simply extend the range of thier current Naval operations.




[edit on 18-10-2005 by NERaptor]

I can't imagine the Chinese building anything larger than a CLG at this stage. They could use more AA capability anyway. Doesn't matter though as there are only two kinds of ships--submarines and targets.