BEIJING -- China's top military spokesman said it is seriously considering adding a first aircraft carrier to its navy fleet, a fresh indication of the country's growing military profile as it prepares for its first major naval deployment abroad.At a rare news conference Tuesday, Chinese defense-ministry officials played down the importance of Beijing's decision to send warships to the Gulf of Aden to curb piracy -- China's first such deployment in modern history -- saying it doesn't represent a shift in defense policy. The two destroyers and supply ship are to depart Friday for the Middle East.
But officials also made clear that China's navy, which has been investing heavily in ships and aircraft, now has the capability to conduct complex operations far from its coastal waters -- and that Beijing is continuing to expand its reach and capability, perhaps with a carrier.
It's unclear what parts of an aircraft carrier China would build itself and what parts it might need to acquire from abroad. China has bought carriers before, but none ended up in the country's fleet.
In some of the most direct public statements on current thinking behind Beijing's naval policy, defense military spokesman Col. Huang Xueping said Tuesday that "China has vast oceans and it is the sovereign responsibility of China's armed forces to ensure the country's maritime security and uphold the sovereignty of its costal waters as well as its maritime rights and interests."
Col. Huang said China is "seriously considering" adding an aircraft carrier to its fleet, as "the aircraft carrier is a symbol of a country's overall national strength, as well as the competitiveness of the country's naval force."
China has stepped up spending on its navy and the rest of its armed forces in an effort to modernize and strengthen them. Much of the defense push has been driven by China's increasingly global commercial interests. Its economy depends on trade and imported oil and raw materials.
China says its ships in the Gulf of Aden will operate under United Nations rules of engagement, including a U.N. policy on when to engage pirates.
"We are sending our naval force as part of international cooperation, according to a specific situation," Capt. Ma Luping, director of the navy bureau of China's general staff, said at the news conference. However, China doesn't plan to "always send the navy whenever there is the loss of Chinese personnel or Chinese property," he said.
The new mission includes protecting deliveries of humanitarian aid to Somalia. China will cooperate with other navies and commercial ships operating in the area, Capt. Ma said.
Since Aug. 15, countries have dispatched warships and planes to participate in antipiracy patrols in the Gulf of Aden and Indian Ocean waters of Somalia. But international forces have been stretched too thin to effectively curb the increasingly daring and sophisticated pirates.
Col. Huang's comments on the possibility of adding a carrier indicate renewed interest in an idea whose popularity has waxed and waned in Chinese defense circles for decades.
In 1985, China purchased a decommissioned carrier from Australia. It was scrapped after Chinese technicians studied the ship, but a replica of the flight deck was built for pilot training. China later acquired three former Soviet carriers. Two have been turned into floating military theme parks, while the Pentagon says the third -- unfinished when purchased -- has undergone work; it remains unclear what China plans to do with it.Carrier operations are extremely complex. Building the hull of an aircraft carrier is relatively easy. Learning to integrate air and surface operations, training air wings, and developing the sophisticated systems required for modern naval aviation could take years. U.S. government and independent analysts say it could be 2015 or 2020 before China could be ready to deploy an operational carrier.
