A shortcoming that the PLA has not been able to resolve for a long time has once again been exposed in the current change in the situation in the Middle East: the PLA's ability to intervene overseas is insufficient.
Although in accordance with China's consistent diplomatic principles and political philosophy, we will not interfere in the internal affairs of other countries, especially by military force.
But as our overseas interests grow, so does the need for our military operations overseas. We do not act to interfere in other countries, but to protect our own interests.
For example, in the current situation in the Red Sea, the escort formations we have deployed nearby can only be said to be sufficient, far from being useful. If the situation on the ground becomes more conflicted, our forces will be even more stretched.
Obviously, our army needs to further increase its ability to carry out military missions overseas. Considering the rapid development of amphibious ships of our Navy, the formation of an expeditionary strike group is an option worth considering.
1
What is an expeditionary strike group?
An "expeditionary strike group" is a tactical group proposed by the U.S. Navy, in which an expeditionary strike group includes seven to eight main combat ships.
The initial version of the expeditionary strike group consisted of 1 amphibious assault ship, 2 dock transport/landing ships, 1 cruiser, 1 destroyer and 1 frigate, as well as 1 or 2 attack nuclear submarines underwater.
With the change in the equipment of the US Navy, all the surface combat ships in the current expeditionary strike group have been turned into Burke-class destroyers.
The core concept of this organization is actually to deploy a surface fleet and submarines capable of anti-ship, air defense, anti-submarine, and land strikes for a landing fleet capable of large-scale landing operations.
Such a formation allows the expeditionary strike group to respond to a wide range of situations faced in overseas military operations.
If you want to carry out ocean-going escort missions, you will need mainly surface combat forces and marines who can board the ship, and the marines on destroyers and amphibious ships can accomplish these tasks.
If it is to be fought on land, the land forces on the amphibious ships can be deployed. Of course, limited by the transport capacity of amphibious ships, the scale of land forces that can be deployed will not be very large.
However, for tasks such as protecting important overseas interests and rapid response, a strengthened battalion-level combat force is sufficient to accomplish most of the tasks.
At this time, destroyers and nuclear submarines with land-fighting capabilities in the formation can provide support to ground forces, including air defense support and land-attack support.
If it is to carry out tasks such as evacuating overseas Chinese, amphibious warships with strong loading capacity are also capable of evacuating thousands of people at a time, and can quickly complete the evacuation task.
It can be seen from this that although an expeditionary strike group does not possess much of a strong combat effectiveness, it is superior in its comprehensive functions, can cope with various tasks, and is more suitable for carrying out military missions overseas.
So does the Chinese Navy have the ability to form an expeditionary strike group or a similar ocean-going fleet? What are the difficulties if we want to deploy such a fleet?
2
We already have the foundation
From the point of view of equipment composition, our navy already has the conditions for forming one or more expeditionary strike groups.
As the core amphibious assault ship, we have already commissioned three Type 075 double attack ships, and recently launched the fourth Type 075 double attack ship.
The Type 075 has a comprehensive and powerful loading capacity and can carry 20 to 30 helicopters, 4 air-cushion landing craft and dozens of armored vehicles.
We can also equip the expeditionary strike group with the Type 071 Integrated Landing Ship, which can transport four air-cushion landing craft and dozens of armored vehicles, in addition to four helicopters.
If the Type 071 integrated landing ship uses the dock to carry our Type 05 amphibious assault vehicles, then the number of armored vehicles carried can be increased to more than 100 units.
As for the surface combat forces that the strike group needs to be attached to, our 052D destroyers, 054A frigates, and 903 and 901 integrated supply ships can all serve them, and the underwater can be handed over to the Type 093 nuclear submarines.
Obviously, we have no problems in the Navy in terms of hardware, but what about in terms of software, that is, training and experience?
Thanks to more than a decade of escort operations in the Gulf of Aden by our Navy, we have accumulated long-term experience in deploying a small fleet in waters far from our homeland.
At the same time, we have also organized large-scale formations to enter the Pacific Ocean for ocean-going training on many occasions, and we have also accumulated a certain amount of experience for large-scale fleet deployments.
Since the Type 075 two-attack lead ship was put into service, the use of amphibious formations with amphibious assault ships as the core and Type 071 landing ships as auxiliary forces has also begun to explore and accumulated a lot of experience.
Therefore, as far as the ocean-going deployment of expeditionary strike groups is concerned, our navy has not yet had the experience of directly deploying such a fleet, but there are not many relevant experiences that can be used as indirect references.
As long as we do thorough research and start the actual deployment, we will be able to refine the experience and fill in the software gaps in no time.
3
What is the reason for not yet being formed?
But we often say that it's one thing to have the ability or not, it's another thing to do it or not. Does China now have the conditions to deploy nearly 10 warships overseas and maintain a regular presence? I don't think it has yet.
We do not have enough amphibious ships, and at present three amphibious assault ships and eight integrated landing ships are not very sufficient to deal with Taiwan Island, and there is no surplus force to deploy in the open ocean.
Moreover, for a fleet of this size to be deployed overseas, it is not enough to rely on the supply ships in the fleet to provide material supplies, we need to have a large military base in the relevant area to support the fleet's operations.
Moreover, the cost of deploying thousands of warfighters and nearly 10 capital warships far from home is not to be underestimated. Are our interests overseas so large that we need to deploy military forces at such a cost?
After all, for us, our diplomatic and political strength is the main force, and our military power is only a supplement, and the scale of military force required for overseas operations is much smaller than that of the United States and Russia.
However, as our overseas interests further expand in the future, and after we resolve the Taiwan issue and amphibious ships are abundant, we will increase our overseas military bases in the future.
Perhaps in the near future, we will have a sizable, full-fledged expeditionary strike group sailing across the ocean to safeguard our overseas interests.