10
Loading video...
By Ryan Chan
China News Reporter
0
Share
Newsweek is a Trust Project member
See more of our trusted coverage when you search.Prefer Newsweek on Googleto see more of our trusted coverage when you search.
China, which operates the world's largest navy, recently deployed four 10,000-ton-class destroyers for training to demonstrate its sea power.
In footage released on Tuesday, China's Defense Ministry said the Type 055 destroyers CNS Nanchang, CNS Lhasa, CNS Anshan and CNS Wuxi departed a naval base and headed toward the Yellow Sea to conduct their first training mission of the new year.
The Chinese Foreign Ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Read More on World
Why It Matters
China's navy has more than 370 vessels, and the country's naval modernization is a key part of President Xi Jinping's ambitious efforts to build a "world-class" military to displace the United States as the most powerful nation in the world, according to the Pentagon's latest assessment of Chinese military power.
Among the Chinese warship fleet—which includes three aircraft carriers—the eight Type 055 destroyers are often viewed as Beijing's premier surface combatants, capable of carrying up to 112 missiles of various types, such as anti-ship hypersonic weapons.
Facing China's continuous naval buildup, including a second batch of six Type 055 destroyers, the U.S. has announced a plan to build up to 25 Trump-class battleships, each with a displacement of over 35,000 tons and equipped with up to 140 missiles.
What To Know
China's Defense Ministry said the four Type 055 destroyers, which were commissioned between January 2020 and April 2022, trained in a range of missions, including anti-ship strikes and sea-to-shore assaults. Footage shows the warships firing their weapons.
The participating destroyers are assigned to the Northern Theater Command, which is responsible for protecting the sea approaches to northern China but could support other theater commands during contingencies, according to a Pentagon report.
The Type 055 destroyers, called "large destroyers" by Chinese media because of their displacement, are designated by the Pentagon as the Renhai-class cruisers, equivalent to the U.S. Navy's Ticonderoga-class cruisers, which have been in service since the 1980s.
According to the U.S. Navy, a cruiser is a large surface combatant designed to conduct multiple missions, including air, undersea and surface warfare, as well as naval surface fire support. It is capable of operating independently or deploying with aircraft carriers.
In 2025, China sent Type 055 destroyers on missions across the Pacific, including a circumnavigation of Australia between February and March and a deployment with an aircraft carrier to waters northeast of Guam, the U.S.'s westernmost territory, in June.
...
While each Ticonderoga-class cruiser has a large weapon load of 130 missiles, the U.S. is retiring its 22-ship cruiser fleet, with only three vessels expected to remain in service beyond their planned service lives, from fiscal 2026 to 2029, following modernization.
The premier U.S. surface combatants are more than 70 Arleigh Burke-class destroyers, which displace up to 9,700 tons and carry up to 96 missiles, along with three 16,000-ton Zumwalt-class destroyers set to be armed with 92 missiles following upgrades.
China also operates a fleet of smaller Type 052D destroyers, which are equipped with 64 missiles and have a displacement of 7,000 to 7,500 tons. According to the defense outlet Naval News, almost 40 Type 052D destroyers have been built over 14 years.
...
What People Are Saying
Alex Luck, an Australia-based naval analyst, wrote in a Naval News article: "The PLAN [People's Liberation Army Navy] surface fleet already benefits from veritable quantitative advantages projecting power into the waters around the People's Republic of China. Meanwhile, qualitative and numerical growth of PLAN does not appear to slow down. Such observations will presumably compel neighboring states to increasingly revise their own force postures."
The Pentagon said in its 2025 Chinese military power report: "China's People's Liberation Army (PLA) has for decades marshaled resources, technology, and political will to achieve its vision of a world-class military. … China's historic military buildup has made the U.S. homeland increasingly vulnerable. China maintains a large and growing arsenal of nuclear, maritime, conventional long-range strike, cyber, and space capabilities able to directly threaten Americans' security."
What Happens Next
It remains to be seen whether additional Type 055 destroyers will be built to further bolster China's surface combatant fleet to counter the planned Trump-class battleships.
View 0 Comments
Submit Correction
View Editorial & AI Guidelines