Three years ago when Yeh Man-sheng, president of China Shipbuilding Corp. (CSC) was answering interpellations in the Legislative Yuan, he admitted that the company was still without the capability to produce a large warship. At this, Legislator Ju Gau-jeng smashed down his cup and groaned: "Good-for-nothing!"
As anyone familiar with the history of shipbuilding in China knows, the importance of sea power has been understood in China since the late Ch'ing dynasty, when skilled personnel were trained and fifty-two warships built. The Republican government also attached great importance to the task, and in 1936 the cruiser Pinghai was built in Shanghai, having a displacement of 2,600 tonnes, close in scale to today's destroyer class.
Unfortunately, shipbuilding was brought to a close by the campaign against the Communists followed by the war with Japan. After the seat of government was moved to Taiwan there were too many other priorities to be seen to, so that there has been no opportunity in the fifty years since to produce a vessel larger than the Pinghai.
In recent years the navy has again begun planning for domestic-built ships, made possible by economic growth and the availability of students of shipbuilding from colleges and the navy. The second generation of warships will be built by China Shipbuilding and the Chung Shan Institute of Science and Technology (CSIST) in cooperation with American companies providing technology transfer.
Capt. Wang Feng-tien, chief of the supervisory office for second-generation warships says: "The weaponry and electronic warfare systems aboard a warship are varied and complicated. Everything has to be more precise than on merchant ships, from pipe-fitting to welding. There are two to three times the amount of welds, cabling and piping on a 4,000 tonne naval ship as on a 14O,000 tonne commercial vessel." Shockproofing, soundproofing and heat insulation also have to be at a much higher standard, and will prove a real test for CSC and the CSIST, never having built a large-scale warship before. "When the current eight secondgeneration warships are completed, we will have the capability for independently designed and produced large-scale warships, which in the future can be sold abroad," explains a high ranking officer from the naval construction development center, indicating confidence in the project scheduling.
The first second-generation warship, the Chengkung, will hit the waves this October and start to see service after two years. Warship construction has been picked up again after a fifty year hiatus and shipbuilders can no longer be accused of being "good-for-nothings."
[Picture Caption]
A model of the Chengkung, the first domestically produced secondgeneration warship.
A model of the Chengkung, the first domestically produced secondgeneration warship.
@List.jpg?w=522&h=410&mode=crop&format=webp&quality=80)
@List.jpg?w=522&h=410&mode=crop&format=webp&quality=80)