Crafting a suitable fleet

China's navy needs to develop aircraft carriers to protect its growing interests and defend its marine sovereignty

A Ministry of National Defense spokesman's recent confirmation that China has almost completed fitting out an aircraft carrier intended for scientific research and training marks the country's first but crucial step toward building a navy proportional to its international status.

With the deepening of globalization and its ever-expanding openness to the outside world, China's national interests have increasingly become interconnected with that of the whole world, which poses a growing challenge to how the country can effectively maintain its national interests in the complicated international arena.