China’s Recently-Commissioned Large Destroyers ‘Ready for Combat’

Two of China's recently-commissioned Type 055 10,000 ton-class large destroyers, the Anshan and the Wuxi will be ready to take on enemy forces by year-end, Chinese experts say.

The Chinese People's Liberation Army (PLA) Northern Theater Command Navy said in a press release on Saturday that a vessel training center affiliated with the Chinese recently organized a warship flotilla consisting of the Anshan, Wuxi and Baotou to conduct a series of maritime exercises under complex weather conditions for several consecutive days.

“Judging from official media reports covering the progress of the ships' training since their commissioning, they will likely achieve initial operational capability (IOC) within this year,” a Chinese military expert who requested anonymity told the Global Times on Sunday.

The two powerful warships - Anshan and Wuxi - will join their sister ships in island chain-breaking far sea operations like encircling Japan and patrolling near Alaska.

The drills featured dozens of training objectives, including maneuvering in formation, formation change, live-fire main gun shooting at both daytime and nighttime against targets at sea and on land, joint air defense, anti-submarine warfare, reconnaissance and counter-reconnaissance, torpedo defense as well as joint search and rescue in coordination with vessel-based helicopters, according to the PLA Navy press release.

The Navy says these exercises are designed to simulate real battlefield environments, and the training objectives are intended to be difficult, dangerous and complicated, so that the individual warships and the flotilla as a whole can improve.

Both the Anshan and Wuxi are Type 055 large destroyers. Ships of this class have a displacement of more than 12,000 tons, are equipped with 112-cell missile vertical launch units and are endowed with the capability to gain strong situational awareness, analysts said.

The Baotou is a Type 052D destroyer that is comparable to the U.S. Navy’s Arleigh Burke-class destroyer.

All three ships were announced to have entered service with the PLA Navy around April 23 this year, the 73rd anniversary of the founding of the PLA Navy.

The complexity of the training courses is becoming increasingly realistic and combat oriented, and applying the experience gained by previous warships of the same classes will also accelerate the process, the expert said.

Both the Nanchang and the Lhasa, the first two Type 055 large destroyers, have conducted far sea exercises that broke the first island chain. The Nanchang reportedly sailed near the U.S. state of Alaska in 2021, and the Lhasa reportedly sailed in a full circle around Japan in June this year.

“The Anshan and Wuxi are expected to follow the Nanchang and the Lhasa in similar missions once they reach operational capability,” observers said.

Two more Type 055 destroyers, the Dalian and the Yan'an, are also reportedly in service with the PLA Southern Theater Command Navy, taking the total of such warships in service to six.