In this first in a series on the region’s navies, The Diplomat looks at how to measure naval power—including the US and China’s.
It's a sobering thought that even analysts steeped in naval affairs disagree about how to tally up who exactly has the strongest fleet. Writing in the Washington Post last month, Robert Kaplan declared in passing that China had constructed ‘the world's second-largest naval service, after only the United States.’
In contrast, though, other reputable commentators maintain that the Chinese People's Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) in fact now boasts the world's largest fleet. For example, in August, The Economist published a story titled ‘Naval Gazing’, noting that the London-based International Institute of Strategic Studies said China now has more warships than the United States. And sure enough, accompanying the story was a graphic showing that the PLAN has edged ahead of the US Navy in terms of ‘major combatants.’
Surely seasoned defence officials have a reliable formula for comparing navies? Not necessarily. Speaking in front of the Navy Leaguein May, US Secretary of Defence Robert Gates questioned the need to keep investing in a mammoth fleet and rattled off statistics intended to convey the US Navy's overwhelming size and strength.
For example, he noted that the US Navy ‘operates 11 large carriers…In terms of size and striking power, no other country has even one comparable ship.’ It ‘has 57 nuclear-powered attack and cruise missile submarine—again, more than the rest of the world combined.’ And ‘the displacement of the US battle fleet—a proxy for overall fleet capabilities—exceeds, by one recent estimate, at least the next 13 navies combined.’
According to US Chief of Naval Operations Gary Roughead, who spoke in Canberra recently, it will take years for the PLAN to master tactics and procedures for handling aircraft-carrier task forces at sea, even after a Chinese carrier does eventually take to the water. If carrier operations represent the gold standard for naval power, naval mastery remains a long way off for Beijing.
Top US defence officials are clearly trying to send foreign and domestic audiences a message: that the United States’ overwhelming material superiority, coupled with China's technological backwardness, will keep the peace in Asian waters. By implication, the United States and its allies can rest easy.
But faulty assumptions can in turn lead to faulty strategy.
Photo Credit: US Navy
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ozivan
Hi..James Holmes/Yoshihara. It would be interesting to know why Japan has to get herself involved with the US against China. I believe China has no plans for war with Japan over the Senkaku islands. But probably she might in the case of Taiwan but why should Japan get involved? There are no big territorial issues between China/Japan unlike the Kuriles.
Could it be that the US forced a treaty upon Japan to serve US interest after their defeat in WW2 ? Or is it ideology that beckons them ? Or is it something else ?
Wouldn’t China be just as keen as Japan and the US to want to keep the sealanes in East China and South China seas free?
You’re both Associate Professors of Strategy,it would be interesting to hear from you if you would oblige us.
Ivan, Australia
BRUTAS
I WONDER THE WRITER DO NOT MENTION INDIAN NAVY,AS IT HAS TAKEN MASSIVE MODERNISATION & EXPANTION PROGGAME,I THINK IT WLL BE A MAJOR POWER IN INDIAN OCEAN IN FUTURE.
Dan Kemp
I’m agreeing with John regarding the issue of an Iowa-class battleship’s survivability. It would not be a duel of 16″ guns versus missiles. Remember, these ships were upgraded in the 1980′s with surface to surface missiles of their own, plus the Phalanx CIWS. Before they put to sea again (and I in my gun-loving heart maintain hopes for Wisconsin and Iowa), those systems would be refitted.
The example also fails to take into account the incredible armor and damage-control capabilities of a full-size capital ship. This is something that few people remember because it has been so long since such a ship was gainfully employed.
Yes, the Chinese can make it unpleasant for foreign navies to enter what it sees as its territorial waters. This was also true of the Japanese Empire, and look how that worked out.
I disagree that US naval upgrades must come at the expense of our land forces. The ability to sustainably place ground forces on disputed territory is the mark of a superpower. Sailing off a hostile coast or bombing an enemy capital is only part of a balanced-force solution.