By steadily improving its ability to produce increasingly sophisticated commercial and naval ships, China is positioning itself to become a leading commercial shipbuilding nation within the next two decades. In 2000, China's Commission of Science, Technology, and Industry for National Defense declared shipbuilding a "strategic industry," and the government continues to enact legislation to increase funding for and lower legal barriers to shipyard consolidation. The Tenth Five-Year Plan (2001-2005) emphasizes continued support for shipbuilding, one of the "Top Five" military industries. China is investing large sums of capital, restructuring construction facilities, promoting research and development (R&D), and acquiring advanced foreign shipbuilding technology.
Between 1990 and 2000, China's market share of international commercial shipbuilding increased from 2.5% to between 5% and 7%. During 1999 and 2000, it captured nearly 20% of worldwide export orders for new ships. Between 2005 and 2010, China will almost triple ship production—from the current capacity of 3.5 tons to a predicted 10 million tons, thus doubling its shipbuilding market share to 15% of the world total. Admission to the World Trade Organization could help the shipbuilding industry by reducing tariffs on imports of advanced technology.
In a move reminiscent of Japanese and South Korean entries to the world shipbuilding market, the majority of Chinese ships built for export are based on low-cost designs with small profit margins. However, to gain higher profit margins over the past three years, China has simultaneously been lowering sales prices, subsidizing production costs, and building more technologically advanced ships.
China continues to restructure the industry by consolidating shipyards, streamlining management, and expanding shipyard production and dockyard facilities. The restructuring is being implemented by the leading shipbuilding parent companies: China State Shipbuilding Corporation (CSSC) and China Shipbuilding Industry Corporation (CSIC). As an example, in August 2000, Shanghai's Jiangnan and Qiuxin shipyards merged; in April 2001, the Hudong and Zhonghua shipyards merged. In addition, expansion of CSSC's newest and most modem facility, Waigaoqiao Shipyard, continues near Shanghai. These initiatives are designed to increase profits, production efficiency, and absorption of technology. At the same time, China is establishing shipbuilding "centers of excellence" that concentrate capital, management, technology, and expertise in the ports cities of Dalian, Shanghai, and Guangzhou.
Advances in Ship Design, Architecture, and Construction
China is steadily expanding and improving ship design, engineering, and manufacturing using imported foreign computer-aided design and computer-aided manufacturing (CAD/CAM) hardware and software. Shipyards are gradually replacing older manual template copy techniques with CAD/CAM, which shortens the ship design process considerably. Since 1990, more than ten yards have acquired the "TRIBON" CAD/CAM system to design and produce ships.
China's naval architects are becoming more proficient in designing ships with energy efficient hull forms based on more accurate calculations of ship motion, propeller, and rudder actions. Engineers are designing better compartment layouts as well as superior structural and ship engine room arrangements. Improved hull and bow designs increase ship stability and performance in high sea states, and upgraded propeller blades and propeller-rudder combination designs increase the efficiency of ship propulsion systems during maneuvering.
There is extensive cooperation between China's commercial and naval shipbuilding facilities, many of which are collocated. This cooperation entails sharing advanced ship engineering methodologies, construction techniques, reverse-engineering of marine equipment, and R&D. Improvements in facilities—such as assembling workshops, dockyards, and steel production factories—have produced higher quality ships. China currently is completing construction of three new drydocks large enough to accommodate 300,000-ton crude-oil tankers in Dalian, Shanghai, and Guangzhou.
In the past five years, China has increased production of commercial ships that are large, fast, and sophisticated technologically. Examples include bulk carriers, cargo and container ships, chemical product carriers, and roll-on and roll-off vessels. Many of the recently built commercial ships show improvements that range from habitability and damage control to engines and electronics. China's shipyards also are using high-strength low-alloy shipbuilding steel that has more strength and malleability and higher resistance to seawater corrosion.
China imports advanced shipyard production technologies, such as specialized steel welding, modular construction, and panel production assembly lines. Several Japanese shipyards have invested in Chinese shipbuilding and shipboard equipment manufacturing facilities; their companies conduct training in Japan for hundreds of Chinese shipyard workers. Chinese shipyards are increasing production rates and improving ship hull forms, frame assemblies, structure tolerance control, and pre-outfitting efficiency. These efforts enable them to design and build larger, more complex engine rooms on large commercial and naval ships. It is reported that China has reduced the average building period for vessels over 10,000 tons to 16 to 18 months—three months less than previously required.
China imports high-technology ship components and equipment for electricity generation and distribution, navigation, communications, and auxiliary services. Imports of propulsion systems include marine diesel and gas turbine engines, controllable-pitch propellers, and thrusters. Other ship component imports include switchboard control panels, hydraulic lifts, electrohydraulic steering gears, and fresh water generators. Through joint production arrangements with German, Japanese, French, Swiss, and Danish companies, China is acquiring technology to design and manufacture various types of large, medium- to high-speed marine diesel engines and gas turbine engines. These engines are reliable, powerful, and fuel-efficient, and they require less maintenance than older models. They will increase the propulsion output of the newly built large commercial ships, naval combatants, and auxiliaries that require high power ratios on their propeller shafts. Shipbuilders are incorporating improved marine engines with foreign-designed machinery plant and control room layouts—again, for the purpose of optimizing fuel consumption and reducing maintenance.
Implications for China's Naval Modernization
China clearly is leveraging cooperative exchanges between its civilian and military shipbuilding sectors. Naval combatant designers and engineers have been moderately successful in producing ships with increased speed, navigability, and reliability. Shipbuilders are cooperating to improve advanced hull forms and ship performance in high sea states, and to develop new materials and technical processes. Concurrently, they are likely to be adapting foreign design and building techniques to achieve greater stability in new ships to accommodate the use of advanced missile systems when operating in high sea states. As the size and numbers of designs of naval combatants grow, they will require increasingly complex and powerful steam turbines, main boilers, and auxiliary engines.
Since the mid-1990s, production of larger and more sophisticated naval combatants has increased moderately. Examples include destroyers (DDs), submarines, and auxiliary ships. The new 6,600-ton Luhai-class DD, built in Dalian and commissioned in 1998, represents a major step for China's indigenous naval shipbuilding capability. While the Luhai is slightly smaller in size to Russia's 8,000-ton Soveremennyy-class DDG, it is 2,000 tons heavier than China's last new class of DD, the Luhu. The Luhai's increased width, length, and space allow installation of advanced weapon systems and sensors. However, China has built only two ships of each of the Luhu and Luhai classes during the past ten years.
China's acquisition of advanced technology is directed primarily to improving destroyers, naval special-purpose craft, and auxiliary ships such as supply and command-and-control ships. To date, China has not built significant numbers of the larger DDs. It continues to experiment and build limited numbers of advanced amphibious landing craft through acquisition of commercial hydrofoil ship designs, components, and engine technology from Russia.
Over the past decade, China has produced modern naval combatants with a focus on gradually improving diesel-fueled power systems. A key goal is to incorporate diesel-fueled combined power systems to achieve faster start-up times and thereby shorten preparations needed for rapid deployments. China has successfully used foreign technology to build combatants with greater mobility and more reliable tactical and logistical support systems. Observers speculate that its shipbuilders are likely to adapt foreign marine technology, such as submarine diesel engines and battery storage units, to improve the quality of the submarine force. China seems able—at least on a basic level—to assimilate many advanced foreign design and component concepts to improve its naval combatants. Design characteristic changes seen on a few recently built naval combatants include wider hulls to enhance stability, increased armament carrying capacity, and crew living-space accommodations for longer voyages.
Can China Build an Aircraft Carrier?
It appears that China is capable of building a medium-size aircraft carrier for operating helicopters or fixed-wing aircraft. Such a ship could be built from a relatively simple design, based loosely on LHA- and LHD-sized amphibious aircraft carriers similar to those used by the United Kingdom, Russia, France, Spain, and India. Debates on this issue center on funding and the most suitable design. Press reports have speculated that China intends to build an aircraft carrier by 2006. While some Chinese authors suggest that China does not need a carrier, others believe it should build three medium-sized carriers to meet future naval strategy requirements. At present, details of China's future naval strategy and its effect on requirements for specific types and numbers of combatants are unclear to the West.
Acquisition of foreign technology enhances China's ability to build at least a medium-size aircraft carrier. And recent expansion of shipbuilding infrastructure provides space for carrier construction. The likeliest shipyards would be those capable of handling very large crude carriers in Dalian, Shanghai, or Guangzhou. In spite of progress toward building small numbers of large, sophisticated commercial ships, building a complex warship similar in size and sophistication of a U.S. aircraft carrier is probably beyond reach for at least ten years. Specifically: China has no capability to build large-capacity aircraft elevators and steam or electromagnetic catapults for moving and launching aircraft. However, China is acquiring commercial ship ramps and elevators and large-power marine engine technology that it could adapt to aircraft carrier construction.
While China is capable of building an aircraft carrier hull, equipping it with components necessary to make it a platform capable of self-defense and power-projection is another story. If China decides to build an aircraft carrier in the near term, it would most likely outfit the flight deck with a forward ski-jump ramp for launching fixed-wing aircraft.
Conclusions
Expansion and restructuring of China's shipbuilding industry are rapidly accelerating its capacity for producing commercial and naval ships. Imports of advanced foreign design methods, ship construction techniques, and marine equipment technology enable China to build large, fast, and sophisticated ships. No doubt, the commercial and naval shipbuilding sectors are cooperating and adapting foreign technologies to the naval sector. And the Chinese are improving the performance characteristics of naval combatants and auxiliaries. However, based on the overall quantity and quality of its newest naval combatants, China's naval shipbuilders seem to have taken a "big step"—rather than a "great leap"—forward.
Lieutenant Commander Hugar is a foreign area officer (East Asia-Pacific) and Mandarin Chinese linguist. He is the intelligence officer on the staff of Amphibious Squadron Seven.