A photograph shared this week to a Chinese social media website has captured a clear view of the Chinese navy's most advanced aircraft carrier during recent testing.
The port side shot of the Fujian, which China's defense planners have designated the Type 003, was posted on Sunday by a Weibo user who did not date the image, although the ship's progress suggests it likely was captured late last year.
The People's Liberation Army Navy's new "flat top"—named for a coastal province opposite Taiwan—was launched in June 2022, roughly five years after construction began at the prolific Jiangnan Shipyard in Shanghai.
The vessel is far more advanced than the country's two existing aircraft carriers of Soviet design, having been fitted with a number of technologies that have skipped a generation or more.
Its introduction is symbolic of the rapid armed forces' modernization overseen by President Xi Jinping, who wants China to be the dominant power in Asia by 2027.
The Fujian is still being fitted out at Jiangnan, which is located on Changxing island at the mouth of the Yangtze River, but state media reports confirm that China's most advanced warship has been undergoing mooring tests of its various power systems for nearly one year.
In the latest picture from Weibo, scaffolding was visible on the ship's deck and command center. Water could be seen exiting multiple ports above the waterline, suggesting ongoing system trials before its expected maiden voyage this year.
Similar images are increasingly hard to come by for long-time researchers in the West. In December, China's State Security Ministry warned the country's military enthusiasts that they risked jail time for sharing sensitive photographs online without authorization.
Beijing itself, however, has been drip-feeding official images of the Fujian since January, a sign of its growing confidence in the ship's progress as well as its newest capabilities—in particular, an electromagnetic catapult that further sets the much larger carrier apart from China's homemade Shandong and the Ukraine-built Liaoning, which launch aircraft with a ski-jump.
The Fujian's electromagnetic catapult will allow the PLA Navy to deploy a new generation of carrier-based aircraft—and at a higher frequency—making it only the world's second aircraft carrier to be equipped with the capability, after the U.S. Navy's USS Gerald R. Ford, which also has four launch tracks compared to the Fujian's three.
Crucially, the U.S. Navy's Ford-class supercarriers—at least 10 are planned—is nuclear-powered, while the Fujian relies on conventional diesel-powered steam turbines for propulsion, meaning shorter deployments and regular refueling.
The Chinese navy also trails its American counterpart in overall operational know-how, matured over decades of deployments in multiple theaters.
Chinese researchers, however, are quietly optimistic about China's odds, should its navy ever go head-to-head with the United States.
In late January, Hong Kong's South China Morning Post newspaper said a study published the month before suggested the Ford's command center—the structure on the ship's deck, also called an "island"—could be inferior to that on the Fujian, whose equipment is combined and concealed rather than individually exposed.
The Chinese ship's integrated mast design protects its antennas and sensors from the elements and reduces their footprint—likely advantages in modern warfare, it said.
Uncommon Knowledge
Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
About the writer
John Feng is Newsweek's contributing editor for Asia based in Taichung, Taiwan. His focus is on East Asian politics. He ... Read more
