According to the "South China Sea Situational Awareness" think tank, the US aircraft carrier strike group recently entered the South China Sea again. After the USS Ronald Reagan aircraft carrier strike group entered the South China Sea, its subordinate warship USS Benford guided

According to the "South China Sea Situational Awareness" think tank, the U.S. aircraft carrier strike group once again entered the South China Sea waters. After the U.S. aircraft carrier strike group entered the South China Sea, its strike group's subordinate warship the US "Benford" guided missile destroyer Without the approval of the Chinese government, they illegally entered China's Xisha territorial waters. In response to the malicious provocation of the US military, the Southern Theater Command organized naval and air forces to directly drive them away.

Currently, the Reagan aircraft carrier is still cruising near the South China Sea, and its captain, Colonel Goldhammer, even boldly stated that the U.S. Navy's arrival in the South China Sea means "free navigation." This is the usual excuse of the U.S. Navy. The USS Reagan can also be regarded as our "old acquaintance". It is the No. 9 ship of the US Nimitz-class nuclear-powered aircraft carrier. It is currently affiliated with the Seventh Fleet of the US Navy's Pacific Fleet. It began to regularly cruise in the Pacific a few years ago. It has repeatedly intruded into the South China Sea and provoked. Last year, the aircraft carrier USS Ronald Reagan was transferred to the Middle East to assist in the evacuation of the US military due to the sudden change in the situation in Afghanistan. At that time, the aircraft carrier USS Carl Vinson was responsible for taking over the USS Reagan for military exercises in the Pacific region, but it did not expect to jump to the South China Sea. Come, make a fool of yourself at the door of China's house and disgrace me. The F-35C fighter on the ship had an accident when it landed, and a "sliding shovel" fell directly into the South China Sea. Later, the US Navy used its old nose to successfully salvage the scrapped F-35C.

But this time the USS Reagan aircraft carrier came to the South China Sea again, but it did not bring a single F35 on board. From another perspective, it can also be said that the US Navy is strictly preventing the F35 incident from falling into the South China Sea from happening again. After all, if an F-35 happens this time The accident of crashing into the sea will severely damage the reputation of the US Navy and F-35. Judging from the current situation of the USS Ronald Reagan aircraft carrier, it does not have the ability to carry F-35s, and even if it carries F-35 fighter jets, the possibility of an F-35 crash into the sea like the USS Carl Vinson aircraft carrier is small . After all, when the Carl Vinson arrived in the South China Sea for a training mission, it was already deployed overdue, more than 6 months ago. Moreover, the Carl Vinson has been conducting high-intensity combat readiness training in the South China Sea, and there are real-time deployments around it. Monitoring PLA fighter planes and ships.

It is not allowed to deal with high-intensity take-off and landing aircraft. If this continues for a long time, the personnel will be overworked and will not get sufficient repair time. Therefore, it is not surprising that the F-35C fighter jet took off and landed into the sea. The F35 was simply not brought, and the initial deployment was no longer delayed. It can be seen that the impact and psychological shadow caused by the last crash in the South China Sea on the US Navy was not small. The US Navy also obviously learned lessons after the incident. Summary and improvements.

In contrast, the USS Ronald Reagan is currently in the early stages of deployment in the South China Sea. It only began deployment in May after a break. It has only been more than two months so far. There will be no overdue deployment like the USS Carl Vinson, which will lead to personnel fatigue. In order to cope with and transition fatigue situations, accordingly, the possibility of accidents during training will be smaller.

According to the consistent deployment practices of the U.S. Navy, deploying stealth fighters on aircraft carriers requires long-term flight training. For example, the USS Carl Vinson aircraft carrier equipped with F-35C has the 147th Squadron equipped with F-35C carrier-based aircraft. It was selected as a new stealth fighter force as early as three years ago. After more than three years of training and a running-in period with sufficient personnel and equipment, it was officially deployed to the USS Carl Vinson aircraft carrier last year. However, I did not expect that it would be very difficult due to the overdue deployment. Something went wrong soon. The precious F35C carrier-based aircraft fell directly into the South China Sea and fed the fish. In the same way, if the USS Ronald Reagan wants to carry the F-35C, in addition to the necessary training and personnel and equipment mentioned above, the aircraft carrier must also be modified and upgraded accordingly.

But now it seems that, at least in the short term, the Reagan aircraft carrier The possibility of installing the F35C is not high. After all, the US Navy has not given the Reagan aircraft carrier an order to transform its carrier-based aircraft squadron into a stealth aircraft squadron, and the equipment conditions do not allow it. According to the U.S. Navy’s procurement plan for fiscal year 2023, it can only purchase 9 F-35C stealth carrier-based aircraft.The main reason is that the COVID-19 epidemic has caused the collapse of the overall supply chain, and production has been severely affected. Nine F-35Cs are a drop in the bucket, not even enough to evenly share one for each of the 11 U.S. aircraft carriers, and the U.S. Navy does not have enough F-35Cs. Refitted carrier squadrons and provided to USS Reagan.

Therefore, the current USS Reagan nuclear aircraft carrier can only carry the original Super Hornet for deployment in the Asia-Pacific region. For some time to come, this aircraft carrier will be the only duty aircraft carrier deployed by the United States in the Asia-Pacific. Of course, facing the problem that the Reagan cannot carry stealth fighters, the U.S. Navy already has a new approach, which is to dispatch the "Tripoli" Lightning aircraft carrier, a U.S. Navy amphibious assault ship that can carry F-35B, to the Asia-Pacific region for deployment. This quasi-aircraft carrier carries 2 squadrons of 20 F-35B fighters. It was in the Philippine Sea a few days ago. It is expected that it may enter the South China Sea to join the Reagan for large-scale sea and air exercises. This situation is completely controllable for the People's Liberation Army. We have too many means to deal with aircraft carriers. Therefore, no matter how "hard" the US aircraft carrier performs in the South China Sea, its deterrence capability is very limited. If it is in During the war, our Rocket Force and combat anti-ship strike waves would not give U.S. aircraft carriers a chance to cruise in the South China Sea. The performance significance of U.S. aircraft carriers strolling in the South China Sea is far greater than the actual significance from a military perspective.