March 27, 2025: Over recent decades, China has outpaced the United States in constructing warships. By year's end, China’s fleet will boast 777 ships and nearly 400,000 personnel, while the U.S. Navy fields about 490 vessels and 667,000 sailors. American ships tip the scales at 4.1 million tons, dwarfing the Chinese total of 2.8 million tons.
China’s Achilles’ heel lies in experience and real-world capability. The U.S. fleet has reigned as the globe’s largest and most potent since 1943. Meanwhile, China has spent decades crafting its first true high seas armada, a departure from its historical reliance on smaller coastal defense craft. Personnel woes compound the issue—China struggles to enlist enough officers and sailors to man its growing fleet. Naval service lacks appeal among Chinese men, deterred by extended stints far from shore. American crews, by contrast, take six-month-or-longer deployments in stride. U.S. naval observers watching Chinese ships and crews at sea spot plenty of greenness and fumbled attempts to shore up shaky seagoing chops.
China knows its weaknesses and has cooked up a bold, unproven fix: a unique weapon to sink American aircraft carriers with ballistic missiles. After twenty years of toil, the Chinese Navy birthed and tested the DF-21D. This beast was built to strike warships over a thousand kilometers away. The basic DF-21, a 15-ton, two-stage, solid-fuel missile, spans 1,700-3,000 kilometers depending on the variant. The DF-21D clocks in at 1,500-2,000 kilometers. Its 500-2,000 kg warhead typically packs a nuclear punch, but conventional options abound—including one tailored for warships. Some of those conventional warheads eye targets in Taiwan. The DF-21’s longer reach and steeper descent outpace the 1,200 shorter-range ballistic missiles aimed at Taiwan, making it a tougher intercept. A decade back, Taiwan’s U.S.-supplied Patriot Pac-3 BMD systems couldn’t handle the DF-21D’s speed. BMD tech has since evolved, but so has China’s missile stable.
In 2020, China unveiled the DF-26B, a beefier cousin to the DF-21D. This 20-ton missile stretches out to 4,000 kilometers. It hit the scene in 2016 as the conventional DF-26, building on the DF-21D’s proven chops. Why not scale up to smack enemy warships—especially carriers—even farther off? By 2022, the smaller YJ-21 joined the fray, slung under bombers or bolted to destroyers and cruisers, borrowing the same targeting tech as its bigger siblings to nail distant ships.
Proof of the DF-21D’s full system remained elusive until 2013, when satellite snaps revealed a 200-meter-long white rectangle in the Gobi Desert, pocked with two craters. Looks like a test target for the DF-21D, with a pair of dummy warheads finding their mark. American carriers stretch beyond 300 meters, though smaller amphibious ships with helo decks hover closer to 200. Maybe China’s eyeing lesser warships with the DF-21D, or just testing its aim.
Over the past ten years, more missile test sites have popped up across western China’s sprawling deserts. Some mimic air bases, others sprawl larger—naval or army supply dumps, harbors stuffed with U.S. warships. China’s gunning for a Pearl Harbor redux, and they might’ve cracked it.
Out in the sands, China’s also sharpened its remote-sensing satellites. Back in 2011, a weird geometric doodle in the desert turned out to be a calibration grid for satellite sensors, including those guiding DF-21D-style missiles.
Between 2011 and 2013, bits of the DF-21D got trial runs, but those 2013 satellite pics were the first hint of a full-up test against a carrier-sized target—especially one ringed by escort destroyers and frigates. That gaggle of ships in a carrier group muddies the missile’s shot. Since 2012, DF-21Ds have rolled out on TEL vehicles, with the first units standing up in 2019. By 2013, successful tests were on the books. What’s still missing? A full-dress rehearsal against a big, moving ship at sea—an old tanker or freighter would do. Another hitch: nailing targets zipping along at 50 kilometers an hour plus. That might yet play out, with American satellites keeping tabs.
Before those 2013 tests, China lofted three remote-sensing satellites into orbit, cruising in formation 600 kilometers up over the Pacific. Packing SAR or digital cameras, these trio can sweep the seas for ships—though China insists it’s all for science. A typical SAR churns out photo-grade images at varying sharpness: 3-meter resolution over 40x40 kilometers, or 20-meter resolution across 100x100 kilometers. This satellite posse smells like a military ocean-spying setup—the missing piece for China’s carrier-killing ballistic missile play.
China’s been grinding on the DF-21D since around 2002, pouring most of the sweat into targeting systems to hunt down carriers. The warhead’s sensors lean on infrared heat-seeking for the final plunge. It’s an idea kicked around for ages, but China’s stitched together tactics, sensors, and missiles to pull it off. The trick? Layered sensor networks—satellites, subs, or patrol planes—to pin the carrier’s rough spot before launch. Those sensors, and the DF-21D itself, eventually showed their cards.
Meanwhile, the U.S. Navy’s quietly beefed up its ABM game—short-range RAM missiles and long-range SM-2s that’ve swatted ballistic missiles and even a satellite. The Navy plays coy about its electronic wizardry—lasers, light-based gizmos, and a growing pile of gear aimed at scrambling or dulling the missiles’ terminal guidance that makes them deadly accurate. The Navy and Air Force are also tinkering with ways to blind China’s remote-sensing satellites.
Layered defenses thrive on sowing doubt about China’s anti-ship missiles. Uncertainty’s the name of the game—one of the slickest perks of a multi-tiered shield. China gleans scraps about U.S. electronic upgrades from trade rags, where new bells and whistles get name-dropped, though not always tied to specific Navy kit. Plenty of Chinese spying—human or cyber—digs for the nitty-gritty on America’s latest tricks and the gear they juice up.
Will China’s gambit pay off? Tests haven’t settled the score, and U.S. ships, planes, and satellites keep watch. China might be bluffing big, betting they can’t tangle with the U.S. Navy and its Pacific pals—South Korea, Japan, Australia—straight-up.