> The _real_ story behind the pen tips is building up machines to make advanced munitions at scale, few years later, i.e. now - we have stories of PRC cruise missile gigafactory that can churni out components for 1000 missiles per day.
Woah. Who are they arming themselves up to fight with that many missiles? Trisolarians?!
It's not about fighting, it's about forcing US investing resources in a race they can't win because of economic factors. Similar to how US did that to Soviet Union with Strategic Defense Initiative and arms race, which led to the demise of Soviet economy and Soviet Union itself.
IMO entire US security architecture within 1st island chain, aka japan, south korea, philippines, taiwan, anything within 1500-2000km. The math/economics behind cruise missile gigafactory flex is hinting they can make more commodity cruise missile per 1-2 weeks to bleed entire US inventory of missile defense, aka they can spam so much smart munitions, from purely ground launched platforms on mainland PRC (as in capability independant of airforce/navy), that any fixed targets, where fixed is anything that stays stationary for more than 2-3 hours, in 1IC is simply not defensible.
Broader TLDR is telegraphed/public US strategy last few years for the next decade+ to deter PRC is to preposition more hardware, in distributed manner, make more survivable (agile basing, marine MLRS) etc. PRC retort is saying, they're going to make so much advanced munitions, that they can hit essentially any hardware US+co can possibly preposition in theatre that has to sit still for more than a couple hours, with 100,000s to spare to degrade other strategic targets. It's basically conventional MAD for any US partners in region, who are mostly import dependant islands, significantly more so than PRC who is still a continental sized land power with associated resources land connections. PRC hinting they can degrade their critical/energy infra, lock down their ports from importing energy/calories, basically turn them into cuba/gaza, indefinitely, from purely PRC domestic inputs. So think twice about allowing US to operate from their territory in 1st island chain in TW scenario.
They're probably onto something since this development is almost 6 month old and non of US/western strategic writing is openly discussing it, because there simply isn't a viable counter, short of assuming China can't make 100,000s of a thing, or Made in China things must be duds. As many are relearning, having industrial capacity to make magnitude more commodity fires > wunderwaffles. West loves to mention about US ship building prowess during WW2, and how US simply outproduced adversaries. Now we have stats like PRC having 230x advantage in military ship building. Just military, PRC peacetime shipbuilding just passed 160 million dead weight tons, which is more than ENTIRE US ship building program in WW2. Extrapolate that to cruise missiles. IMO the biggest strategic development in region in a long time.
This contrasts with the American inability to ramp up artillery shell production recently. Not enough money in artillery shells so the defense industry doesn't have capacity, they've been focusing on more profitable weapons.
I was more pointing at the different priorities and cultural biases. The western MBA ideology biases them against wanting to make boring, reliable low-margin goods.
They don't, which is worse, because they may also not care whether they'll sell 100x $1000 weapon that works, vs. 100x $1000 weapon that doesn't, but checks all the contract checkboxes.
Yeah, current asymmetry is US wages/labour costs biases towards expensive defense. Add multiplier for expeditionary model. US has like 1:10 "tooth to tail" logistics ratio operating on opposite side of the globe, it's expensive to operate far from shores so force composition oriented towards spending extra money on expensive platforms to deliver high end weapons with low dud rates since it cost so much just to bring ordnances in theatre. VS PRC fighting in her backyard can value engineer the shit out of their cruise missiles, like they do EVs, as long as they perform adequately, they come out ahead massive in total bandwidth of fires they can deliver in theatre. Even duds that fail, if they fail within missile defense engagement envelope can still bleed expensive interceptors assembled/delivered from some pork barrel jobs program factory in CONUS that could be better automated.
So this just takes out the first Island Chain - using an enormous amount of resources to do so, seems like it would keep them quite busy for quite awhile... to what benefit?
We're it to come to this, a full scale war with China, what actual benefit does leveling SK, Japan, Taiwan, and the Philippines do strategically?
Japan has a top 10 military these days, it's not like they will be able to occupy these areas real easily.
So we park our aircraft carriers a little further away - or use any number of military bases we already have in Asia in other regions.
We have declassified planes from the cold war era that can take off in Kansas, bomb anywhere in the world and land back in Kansas. Planes that fly so high that by the time the bombs hit the ground the planes are hundreds of miles away.
Until China can control the skies, this is all just kinda moot
> Planes that fly so high that by the time the bombs hit the ground the planes are hundreds of miles away.
That's a moot point if anti-air missiles shot down the plane before it even got to its target zone. We're not in the 80s anymore, radars are networked and missiles are much more capable.
I don't think it's enormous, I think it's probably a trivial amount relative to PRC productive capabilities / acquisition effectiveness. Benefit is PRC can potentially kick US out of East Asia, outside hedgemans don't abdicate unless their presence is demonstrated to be untenable. Rationale = PRC dragging US art5 tier partners in the region into broader war and showing everyone the US incapable of fulfilling security commitments in the PRC backyard even if the US wanted to. Incapable is key, only way to deter others in region from hedging with US secuirty if TW off the table is to demonstrate US simply cannot. Incidental benefits are also huge. PRC competes with SK/JP/TW on many fronts, especially in region, breaking their knees if they are actively involved in TW scenario = PRC has an opportunity to fill holes. Samsung phones can be replaced by Huawei around the world. JP infra investments can turn into PRC contracts. Killing 90% of high end semi that overwhelming benefits west = PRC close semi gap. Least of which = resolving ongoing maritime disputes. No occupation needed, they're islands, they can be turned into Cuba from the PRC mainland. There's only top2 mil and everyone else, JP doesn't have enough offense to really matter, realistically no one in the theatre is projected to except PRC. Meanwhile PRC is multiple times bigger = they have more targets/more resilient, and more labour/construction overcapacity to recover. Doesn't mean this is what PRC wants, but they're positioning MIC in a manner that they can / won't say no to escalation.
>park our aircraft carriers a little further away
Carriers are already parked much further away due to intermediate range PRC missiles, around 2IC in conflict. Spamming cruise missiles is about breaking the strategy of other US branches who has to operate in 1IC (airforce agile basing / marine mlrs / army missiles). Carriers were already being squeezed far enough that carrier aviation approaches irrelevance, ranges where they can't sortie to meaningfully deliver stand off weapons even with tanking. There's no other bases in the region that PRC can't reach, i.e. carrier aviation/escorts still need replenishment every few days, USN replenishment fleet anywhere in the region goes boom if they stay docked for more than 30m. Even further, other regions, we're really talking about Hawaii/3IC and beyond, and at that point the ability for USN to generate fires/sorties becomes negligible due to logistic constraints. For reference 5 carriers + regional air basing, operating unobstructed took 3 weeks to break Iraq, scale to PRC size, that’s 5 years of impossibly high tempo operation, assuming PRC can’t hit back at all.
>take off in Kansas
Everyone already knows what US long range strike options are, can extrapolate from B21 procurement what it will be. PRC answer to that is more missiles - conventional prompt global strike, which has entered their military strategy writing a few years ago, i.e. any carrier, sub, bomber that docks anywhere in the world, including CONUS goes boom in 60m. Also oil refineries, LNG plants, semi fabs, server farms, B21 plants etc etc.
"The US has long range strike options" argument misses the point. It's not about what the US always had/has/will have - ability to hit targets anywhere in the world - it's about how dynamic changes when US adversaries have what US has, when PRC can do to CONUS what US could always do to PRC mainland. And at what scale, JP still tried to fugu ballon CONUS during WW2 =/= PRC likely built an arsenal to hit every piece of strategic CONUS infra.
>control the skies
Controlling skies is a proxy for delivering effective fires. PRC betting advanced rocketry can skip the air control/supremacy layer with long range missiles designed to penetrate anywhere on earth via performance and volume. The thing with aviations/airframes is they can't be "classified" anymore, anything US is observable via space, because bombers still need wheels spin in the wild for testing. Versus PRC focusing on missiles, which can be manufactured/stored/launched from hardened facilities (look up PRC third front where they moved MIC into mountains), which IMO long term is much more resilient than bombers assembled/maintained in huge structures.
The reasoning here is that the US had 70 years to develop global logistics for carrier/bomber basing, because that was only technically feasible expeditionary hardware of the time. PRC couldn’t replicate that if she tried to (too much depends on uncertain geopolitics / alliances / access). But why bother if they can just skip all that and go straight for missiles that can hit broadside of a barn on the opposite side of earth. Arguably it would be cheaper/better, a lot of US force composition is arguably trapped in legacy inertia, i.e. Navy is not going to not carrier/sub, the air force is not going to not fighter/bomber - too much identity tied into platforms and money tied into procurement, and obligations tied into security commitments/alliances where US has to flex/visibly show presence with expensive hardware. Not to mention internal US defense drama killed earlier US efforts at prompt global strike, because why potentially cannibalize duties / undermine branch fiefdom. Meanwhile PRC/PLA modernization still new, not much sunk cost, is free to focus on rockets to break all those platforms at less cost. They don't need to FONAP, sail expensive platforms, fly bombers halfway around the world. That's a premium US maintaining hegemony has to pay for. Controlling skies in modern warfare = at the end of day is about delivering munitions to cripple war making capabilities. PLA started writing about PromptGlobalStrike in 2020 Science of Military Strategy, and acknowledged by the 2022 DoD report on PRC military. IMO we're looking at 2030 timeline where they get them in quantities western analysis would be forced to acknowledge implications. Incidentally at same time PRC also building up nuke program.
Would not discount prestige and desire to dick measure when every other large power has them. Technically on paper, carrier still good for projecting against non peer powers.
But looking at numbers, I would say relative to PRC ship building capabilities, they're not really investing in carriers. Adoption very slow: 2.5 carriers (with 60 J15s) in 15+ years with PRC's ship building is unserious. 2.5 (not 3) because Liaoning hull was rebuilt Varyag from UKR/USSR. For reference US was launching a carrier every year/other year post WW2, with comparable/larger displacement. Even considering PLAN starting from 0 for carrier ops, they're not waterhosing resources/bodies at problem, i.e. they were spamming submarines/subsurface fleet despite tech gap being even larger. IMO overall carrier investment pretty minimal/conservative, enough to build up institutions, training etc to test waters. Still slowly prototyping fc31/j35 and kj600 when already churning out 100+ J20s per year. Not saying they're not aiming for many more carriers groups eventually, but so far not urgently expanding when they could be laying down 2 per year. Nor are they zerg rushing big replenishment fleet to sustain operation outside theatre.
IMO, apart from glamour shots and training platform, I don't think anyone in PLAN seriously expects their carriers to survive vs US in full spectrum war. Or much of the surface fleet, but need grey hulls to navy stuff during peacetime, hence have many of them. I think gamble is making sure PLA has ability to ensure no USN surface ships survives either, which breaks US expeditionary model, meanwhile PRC likely will retain stupendous industrial capacity to rebuild fleet after war. And if they can sink USN with land based long range strikes, whose going to mess with PRC shipping in the interim.
> All that effort just for showing 'W(h)e(e) too!' ?
Maybe having a few carriers gives them useful capability? Cruise missiles are pretty binary - you can't exactly fly the flag with them, and even shooting one past some target as a warning would be read as declaration of war. Having a mobile airfield you can park near someone else's water gives more flexibility in applying pressure without shooting.
One could paint them accordingly, also advertising some funny messages via ADS-B, and going for pulverizing self-destruct in the air instead of impacting somewhere. Maybe even with colored smoke in national colors like they do in air-shows.
Woah. Who are they arming themselves up to fight with that many missiles? Trisolarians?!