For several years, shipyards have shown great dynamism in the construction of experimental ships for the Chinese Navy. In recent months alone, we have been able to observe a large autonomous ship, a new model of submarine and even an aircraft carrier, the function of which is still not established.
However, the latest satellite observations of the Guangzhou shipyards, near Hong Kong, have shown the construction of new ships whose function is beyond doubt in the minds of specialists.
In fact, these are large transshipment and landing barges, equipped with a tilting bridge several tens of meters long, capable of being used in the form of an artificial port, in the spirit of the famous Mulberry of the Operation Overlord, during the Second World War.
The simultaneous construction of several large units excludes the hypothesis of an experimental ship. Therefore, these ships disrupt the timetable envisaged until now, concerning the hypothesis of a Chinese aero-amphibious action against Taiwan, with a much closer potential timetable, likely to overtake the parades envisaged by Taipei and Washington.
3 to 5 landing craft under construction at Guangzhou shipyards
According to observations made by naval specialist HI Sutton, relayed by the NavalNews site, 3 to 5 of these barges intended as floating landing docks are now being built in Guangzhou.
This shipyard made a lot of noise in 2024, with the construction of a very large drone ship, and especially that of an aircraft carrier using the codes of the America class LHA, and without a raft, in record time.
According to HI Sutton, always relevant on this type of subject, the ships under construction are equipped with a tilting bridge of several tens of meters, making it possible to span the wetland, to allow transhipped vehicles to reach land directly, thus considerably streamlining disembarkation maneuvers.
The vehicles and disembarked troops would be transported by the immense fleet of Roll-In Roll-out, or RORO, ferries, operating in the China Sea under the Chinese flag, and providing shuttles between the country's major ports.
In doing so, each barge would be able to unload a constant flow of several dozen armored vehicles and supply trucks every hour, supplying men, vehicles, ammunition and supplies to the assault forces, while awaiting the capture of one or more deep-water ports on the western coast of the island of Taiwan, that facing the mainland.
Chinese Navy commits to building ships specifically for assault on Taiwan
The construction of these new barges constitutes a new example of the direction pursued today by Chinese military naval construction, with the sole objective, in the short term, of the possibility of carrying out an aero-amphibious operation to seize the island of Taiwan.
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