India, which likes to "benchmark" with China in everything, has recently compared itself with China in the field of navy.
According to the Observer Network, recently, Indian Defense Minister Manmohan Singh announced in an interview with Indian media that India will "soon start building a third aircraft carrier, and will build a fifth and six more in the future." Later, the Indian media mentioned in the exaggerated tone of "naval competition" that "China already has two active aircraft carriers - Liaoning and Shandong", and "the next-generation aircraft carrier Fujian is also undergoing sea trials", focusing on exaggerating the atmosphere that India needs to build a third aircraft carrier in order to "compare with China". What should we think of India's move?
First of all, a country equips several aircraft carriers according to its own defense needs, not just to flex its muscles.
On the one hand, China has a long coastline with a total length of more than 32,600 kilometers, and from north to south there are the Bohai, Yellow, East and South China Seas.
Among the naval sequences, several aircraft carrier battle groups have the strongest comprehensive combat effectiveness, so equipping aircraft carriers has also become a necessary choice for China.
On the other hand, China not only has a long coastline, but also constantly suffers from provocations from external forces. In those years, the Anglo-French alliance and the Eight-Nation alliance invaded China from the sea, and the Opium War and the Japanese invasion of China also took place on the sea route, so China must have its own maritime weapons to stop foreign aggression.
Today, the United States and its NATO forces are constantly flexing force against China in the Taiwan Strait and the South China Sea, and are trying to use this to exert pressure on China, interfere in China's internal affairs in the Taiwan Strait, and force China to cede its interests in the South China Sea. Against this background, China also needs aircraft carriers for self-defense.
Compared with China, India is also a maritime country, the terrain is a peninsula, except for the north connected to the mainland, the other three directions are bordered by the sea, but because the land area is not as large as China, the coastline is only 7,700 kilometers. Objectively speaking, although there is also a need to equip aircraft carriers, "five or six" is probably a bit exaggerated. First, India's coastline is only so long, and having more aircraft carriers will reduce its effectiveness; Second, the maintenance of aircraft carriers also requires the support of strong national strength, and India may do what it can.
Most crucially, India's security environment is not as complex as China's. From the outside, the United States and the West want to win it over to "counter China", regard it as a partner, and will not provoke India; Speaking from within South Asia, India is the "first brother", and no one will be uncomfortable with it. Therefore, if India really equips five to six aircraft carriers, I am afraid it will really be a "face-saving project."
Second, it is not the first time that India likes to "benchmark" with China in everything.
Just two days ago, India signed a 10-year agreement with Iran to invest $120 million and raise $250 million to take over the development and operation of Iran's Chabahar port. Supposedly, this is a major event of India-Iran cooperation, and such a large investment is of course for its own national interests, but the Indian media wants to involve China, saying that this is an "important geopolitical contact" between India and Iran, which will help India counter the Gwadar port project of China-Pakistan cooperation.
Meaning, didn't China build a Gwadar port in Pakistan and open the "China-Pakistan Economic Corridor", then India is also building a port in Iran to strengthen trade ties with Central Asia, and also build a "corridor".
Since 2008, China has dispatched 45 convoys to serve as escort missions between the South China Sea and the Gulf of Aden, making important contributions to maintaining regional peace and stability. In this regard, India, which has always regarded the Indian Ocean as an "Indian lake", is very unhappy and has always wanted to compare itself with China. At the end of last year, in order to crack down on piracy, in addition to sending two warships to track the pirate ship, India also dispatched American-made C-17s from the mainland, flew 2,600 kilometers with special forces, and parachuted in front of the pirate ship, and finally successfully captured 35 pirates and rescued 17 hostages.
Although it is a bit of a feeling of "fighting mosquitoes with cannons", after all, it is still a righteous action worthy of affirmation, but the Indian media has "benchmarked" against China, saying that "we want China to know who is the boss of the Indian Ocean". Earlier, Indian Foreign Minister S Jaishankar also said that while China is rising, India is actually developing rapidly, but "China has robbed China of the limelight".
Finally, China and India are neighbors and representatives of developing countries, so cooperation can be win-win.
As long as we can afford it, we will not intervene in a "pure aircraft carrier formation" to play along the Indian Ocean, but please do not "benchmark" against China, because China has no time to compare with India. On the one hand, China is worried about its maritime security and needs more aircraft carriers to fulfill the important task of protecting the country. On the other hand, China, as a member of the P5, has to use its own strength to maintain world peace. China and India are neighbors, one is the world's second largest economy and the other is the fifth largest economy.