.Chapter 33 Super aircraft carrier

Relatively speaking, in recent years, China's military power has grown far less than that of the economy.

After the First Indian Ocean War, Huang Zhibo focused on military construction on strategic projects with decisive significance, especially strategic scientific research projects, such as the "Chinese Project" and detection activities for the sun, according to the strategic report submitted by Mu Haoyang.

Although the Sino-Vietnam War broke out after this, the basic national defense policy was not affected.

More importantly, in recent years, China's military construction has been in a period of transformation, and national defense forces have been affected from the most basic weapons and equipment to the highest-level command structure. With the prospects still not very clear, the speed of military construction has naturally slowed down.

It must be admitted that this is definitely not a bad thing.

There is no difference between military construction and building high-rise buildings. Only by laying a solid foundation can skyscrapers be built. If the foundation is not solid enough, the higher the building is built, the greater the risk of collapse. Obviously, the arms race is to build a "military skyscraper".

Influenced by the technical standards, in this round of arms race, all participants have to start from scratch.

That's why the United States is also strengthening infrastructure and investing huge amounts of money in the field of new military technology, without focusing on expanding the scale of the military.

To put it bluntly, the arrival of technology will eliminate all old-fashioned equipment.

This is just like the cavalry in the age of cold weapons cannot fight against machine guns in the age of hot weapons. Only by seizing the initiative of military technology can we win in future wars.

Of course, military technology is definitely not something that can happen overnight.

More importantly, many military technologies born in recent years have not been tested in actual combat, so no one knows the power of new technologies in war.

China and the United States are the leaders and pioneers.

In the development direction of military equipment, there must be no reference object, and you can only cross the river by feeling the stones.

The result is that with the rise of technology, new and old equipment systems coexist, and will become an important symbol of the development of military forces in the next few decades.

Take the Navy as an example. The impact of new technology has been revealed, but it has not replaced all old-fashioned equipment.

By mid-2032, the Chinese Navy had five aircraft carriers, namely the "Huangdi", the "Yangjiang", the "Yellow River", the "Kunlun Mountain" and the "Tianshan Mountain". In addition, two "Kunlun Mountain"-class aircraft carriers are under construction, namely the "Qinling" and the "Taihang Mountain".

It seems that the strength of the Chinese navy is far superior to that of Japan and second only to the United States.

In fact, this is a significant reduction in the scale of shipbuilding.

Before the adjustment of the naval equipment plan, there were four of the first batch of the Kunlun Mountain class, namely the Qinling Mountain and the Taihang Mountains, which should be built in the first batch and put into service before the end of 2033. There were four of the second batch, which would replace the Huangdi and the Yangtze River class after 2035. According to Teng Yaohui's plan, the C3-class super aircraft carrier will also be built before 2035.

In comparison, the existing fleet is significantly smaller.

Let’s not talk about when the C3-class aircraft carrier will start construction, at least the last four ships of the Kunlun Mountain class have been cancelled. Under the Navy’s existing tactical system, so many aircraft carriers are not needed, and after a large amount of funds are used for strategic projects, there is no money to build so many aircraft carriers.

Of course, this does not mean that the Chinese Navy does not need an aircraft carrier.

In the upcoming full-scale war, the Navy certainly needs more aircraft carriers. The result is that the "Huangdi" did not retire as planned and will be in service until the day the C3 aircraft carrier was born. In addition, the "Yangtze River" and the "Yellow River" returned to the shipyard at the end of 2031 for the first comprehensive improvement after service, replacing major electronic equipment and adding several self-defense defense systems.

According to Mu Haoyang's judgment, Teng Yaohui did not give up on the ideal of building a "big fleet".

In other words, after Teng Yaohui became the Chief of Staff, it is very likely that the C3 project will be advanced to 2034, and at least two of them will be built in the first batch.

To this end, Mu Haoyang specifically consulted documents related to the c3 project.

To Mu Haoyang, the c3 project is no stranger.

When he was also in charge of naval equipment construction in the General Staff, the Navy proposed the C3 project shortly after he entered service on the Yellow River. It can be said that this was a very advanced project, because the C2 project had just been determined at that time, and the Navy's main task was to build the "Kunlun Mountain" class aircraft carrier.

In the initial planning, the c3 project is just a perfect plan for the c2 project.

To be precise, in the first plan of the C3 project, the standard displacement was limited to 90,000 tons, mainly targeting the problems existing in C2 level, with the goal of improving the combat efficiency of carrier-based aviation as much as possible. Subsequently, Dalian Shipyard and Jiangnan Shipyard each submitted their design books.

The design of Dalian Shipyard is relatively conservative and still adopts traditional ship types. It mainly improves the dispatch rate of ship-based aviation by adjusting the internal cabin layout and redesigning the flight deck. Although the overly conservative design has many disadvantages compared with the requirements put forward by the Navy, such as limited space for later improvement, it is widely used to adopt mature technologies and can use existing construction equipment to minimize construction risks.

Relatively speaking, the design of Jiangnan Shipyard is more forward-looking. The biggest feature is that it adopts a trimaran model that was first used on LCCS. While reducing the displacement as much as possible, it can maximize the available area of ​​the hangar and flight deck, and obtain two landing runways without affecting the normal takeoff of the carrier-based fighter, solving the problem of carrier-based fighter recycling.

However, the Jiangnan Shipyard design plan adopts a large number of new technologies, and the construction risk is very high.

Because the construction of C2 is progressing smoothly and the construction of the first four ships has been approved, Mu Haoyang put aside the C3 project before leaving the General Staff. According to his plan, the design bidding for C3 must be started after the second batch of C2 starts construction.

The problem is that Teng Yaohui does not intend to keep C3 on paper.

Shortly after Mu Haoyang left the General Staff, Teng Yaohui started the bidding for the C3 project, allowing Dalian Shipyard and Jiangnan Shipyard to resubmit the design book. This time, Dalian Shipyard also adopted a trimaran model and took the lead in proposing to adopt a more powerful controlled fusion power system.

That's why the C3 project was delayed until the end of 2031.

According to the situation at that time, the key was the power system.

Although Jiangnan Shipyard proposed a backup power plan, namely, four nuclear reactors are used to meet the basic requirements of installing new weapons systems, the cost of installing four nuclear reactors is very high, and it will occupy more internal space, which puts forward higher requirements for the cabin layout of the aircraft carrier. From the perspective of improving the comprehensive combat efficiency of carrier-based aviation, it is obviously impossible to meet the requirements put forward by the Navy.

Only by adopting a new power system can all problems be solved.

In this way, a controlled fusion reactor becomes the only option.

Of course, it is also possible to develop fission reactors with greater power, but the investment cost is too high and it will cause considerable trouble for later improvements. It is better to spend funds on new power systems.

By 2032, the technology of controllable fusion reactors has made decisive breakthroughs.

Although in everyone's opinion, controllable fusion technology will be first applied in the commercial field, and the investment and development of related technologies is also private capital, as a top energy technology, the progress of military application development of controllable fusion nuclear reactors is far greater than that of commercial use.

If everything goes well, the military controlled fusion reactor will be available at the latest in 2035.

It is precisely because of this that Teng Yaohui officially started the C3 project, and it was clearly required in the tender that a controllable fusion reactor must be used.

After the power system is guaranteed, other tactical indicators of the C3 project will also be improved accordingly.

For example, in terms of displacement, the Navy has relaxed the standard displacement to 100,000 tons. If other tactical indicators can be increased accordingly, another 5,000 tons can be added. As the displacement increases, the number of carrier-based fighter jets has also increased to 90, and must be all placed in the hangar, and thirty tie points are retained on the flight deck, and the maximum load capacity should be up to 135.

Just taking the number of carrier-based aircraft, it far exceeds that of the C2-class aircraft carrier.

Improved tactical standards means increasing the difficulty of design and construction.

In terms of the number of carrier-based fighter jets, according to the requirements of the Navy, when carrying 120 fighter jets, the dispatch rate should not be affected, and the recovery efficiency must reach 80% of the maximum; when carrying 135 fighter jets, the dispatch rate must reach 80% of the maximum, and the recovery efficiency should not be less than 70%; at least 72 fighter jets can be guaranteed to be dispatched in one wave.

Such a high standard directly excludes all traditional design solutions.

According to the information obtained by Mu Haoyang, the C3 class will definitely adopt a trimaran type, with at least four catapults, and have two landing runways. As for the specific design plans of the two major shipyards, it is still being determined, mainly to resolve the contradiction between technology and tactics. For example, in terms of ship island layout, Dalian shipyard tends to cancel ship islands, while Jiangnan shipyard tends to set up a small ship island in front of the main hull.

If everything goes well, the C3 level will only start construction in 2033.

From a time perspective, it cannot catch up with the war in 2035 anyway, so this epoch-making aircraft carrier is not within Mu Haoyang's consideration.

What can be really used and can play a key role are four "Kunlun Mountain" class aircraft carriers.

If the C3 level is an epoch-making work, then the "Kunlun Mountain" level is the step for the Chinese Navy to catch up with its opponents and surpass its opponents.

It can be said that from the perspective of combat capabilities alone, the "Kunlun Mountain" class is no worse than the "Ford" class. It can be said that it is the only super aircraft carrier except the United States. After the "Kunlun Mountain" was completed and put into service, it became a symbol of the Chinese navy and even China's national strength...
Chapter completed!