On Tuesday, the People's Republic of China launched its first-ever aircraft carrier, a ship they purchased from Ukraine and then refurbished. The ceremony was attended by two of the highest-ranking Chinese officials and was hailed as a symbol of the growth of Chinese power and military might, especially within the region. However, the aircraft carrier is essentially devoid of any operational ability but instead exists solely as a symbol of Chinese power and intentions.
For the United States, aircraft carriers are seen as an extension of America's military power and diplomatic influence. Whenever there is a crisis situation around the world in which the United States wishes to display force and resolve, it sends in a carrier task force. For the United States, these carriers provide the ability to extend American airpower far beyond the carrier's horizon and into whatever inhospitable theater the carrier may be stationed. However, for the Chinese, the carrier lacks any kind of projection capabilities because it can't launch any aircraft.
Developing the technological sophistication and completing the training necessary for carrier landings among the most difficult maneuvers that a Navy pilot will ever undertake requires decades. However, as of now, the Chinese do not possess the requisite aircraft to even attempt a training landing on their new carrier, but instead China's naval pilots are relegated to practice strips on the ground. Therefore, the carrier lacks the very characteristic that makes it a useful piece of military hardware its ability to launch and recapture aircraft.
Furthermore, the launch of a carrier that cannot field planes is emblematic of the rise of Chinese power, in that it is significant but incomplete and lacking in certain areas. China's economic growth over the past few decades is, by all measures, remarkable. Growing at just below 10 percent per year, the Chinese economy continues to show signs of strong development and prosperity. However, this growth in economic power is far ahead of the development of many other factors that determine a nation's power. Although China does possess a strong ability to project its power internationally, it is still significantly lacking in its domestic development, with a significant portion of its population living in rural poverty and under the heavy yoke of censorship and political oppression.
What this carrier does symbolize, however, is the undeniably clear ascendency of China as a world military power. Although the current Chinese focus in terms of military spending and development is on its army and air force, the launch of the aircraft carrier does present the impression that Chinese leaders have begun to understand the primacy of naval power. China has traditionally focused on its land forces, given the fact that it was continually threatened on its northern, western and southern borders by groups wanting separation, by states with growing power or by competing empires. Thus, the understanding that naval power is crucial for the extension of national power into the global world is both a troubling and progressive realization.
With Chinese influence already growing in the Third World, as evidenced by the role China has played and is playing in many of the Middle East rebellions, a further growth of China's projection capabilities will continue to pose direct threats to American interests. Though the PRC's newest military tool is solely a symbolic possession, it still carries a significant symbolic meaning, especially with its presence in a region that is currently undergoing a territorial dispute between two ancient territorial competitors.
Though the symbolism may be a wash, China's aircraft carrier must still be viewed by both American and Western officials as a clear sign of China's intention to increase its presence on the world stage. For what the carrier lacks in functional ability and what it possesses in strategic vulnerability and thus operational impotence, it still represents the growth of Chinese power and the ranking of not only China's economy but also its military among the most formidable in the world.