Defence needs determine aircraft carrier investment

Beijing (CNS) – China will be making military spending decisions based on the nation's economic strength and national defense needs, said Major General Luo Yuan on March 3, addressing inquiries about how many aircraft carriers China will build in the future.

Major General Luo Yuan is a member of the CPPCC (Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference), and deputy secretary general of the China Association for Military Science.

Luo added China will quite possibly build more aircraft carriers, but with respect to the charge that the move would lend more weight to the "China threat" theory, he pointed out that no one speaks of "the US threat" even though it owns 11 aircraft carriers. China, he stressed, has no intention now, nor will it have, to pose a threat to other countries; it is simply initiating aircraft carrier training and test drives.

China's first aircraft carrier, built on the unfinished former Soviet aircraft carrier Varyag, had its maiden test voyage on August 10, 2011.