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By Ryan Chan
China News Reporter
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A Chinese aircraft carrier continues to operate beyond a strategic island chain in the Pacific Ocean as the United States is sending another aircraft carrier to the region.
The Joint Staff Office under Japan's Defense Ministry on Tuesday released a second update on the Chinese aircraft carrier Shandong's movement in the Philippine Sea during the past week, which began on July 9 and ended on Monday.
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It has been operating mostly in waters southeast and south of Miyako, one of the Japan's southwestern islands which serve as the boundary between the East China Sea and the Philippine Sea. The shortest distance between them was 242 miles while the farthest was 335 miles.
The Shandong was launched in 2017 and commissioned two years later. It is China's first indigenous aircraft carrier and the second one in operation, after the Soviet-built, Chinese-refurbished Liaoning.
Unlike the 100,000-ton U.S. Navy aircraft carriers, the 70,000-ton Shandong is not equipped with catapults for launching aircraft efficiently. It instead requires fighter jets to use a ski-jump to assist take-off.
The Miyako Island is part of the so-called first island chain, which starts from Japan in the north and extends southward to Taiwan and the Philippines. Its objective is to contain Chinese naval activities in the region.
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However, China has accomplished a breakthrough of the first island chain, where its fast-growing fleet operates in the wider Pacific Ocean frequently. Chinese warships even sailed close to the Aleutian Islands in Alaska.
At least six other Chinese warships are assigned to the Shandong carrier strike group. The surface escorts included two 11,000 tons Type 055 destroyers, which are equivalent to the U.S. Navy Ticonderoga-class cruisers.
The rest of the surface escorts are comprised of two Type 052D destroyers, one Type 054A frigate, and one Type 901 fast combat support ship.
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The Shandong conducted multiple flight operations while underway in the Philippine Sea, where it launched and recovered J-15 fighter jets 240 times and helicopters 140 times, Japan's Joint Staff Office added.
Japan Self-Defense Forces deployed three vessels to surveil the Chinese carrier strike group and to gather intelligence. Japanese fighter jets have scrambled in response to the Shandong's flight operations.
Newsweek has contacted the Chinese defense ministry for comment by email.
During the last deployment from late October to early November 2023, the Shandong operated in the Philippine Sea but sailed further to the east, where it was halfway between the Philippines and Guam, a strategic U.S. military hub.
The Chinese aircraft carrier remained in waters southeast of Taiwan and northeast of the Philippines in the current deployment so far. China views the self-ruled Taiwan as a breakaway province while having disputes in the South China Sea with the Philippines.
According to open-source satellite imagery, the Shandong departed its homeport in Hainan, a Chinese island province facing the South China Sea, on June 20. It sailed toward the Luzon Strait, a waterway between Taiwan and the Philippines, on July 2.
Newsweek could not independently verify the satellite imagery.
While China was flexing naval muscles in the Western Pacific, the U.S. Navy deployed a West Coast-based aircraft carrier last week. USS Abraham Lincoln left San Diego in California on Thursday.
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The Abraham Lincoln kicked off a scheduled deployment in the Pacific region, USNI News, run by the U.S. Naval Institute, quoted Navy officials in its report.
Another West Coast-based aircraft carrier, USS Theodore Roosevelt, has been operating in the Middle East since Friday, U.S. Central Command announced. It was repositioned from its original area of operations in the Western Pacific.
The former Japan-based aircraft carrier USS Ronald Reagan, currently in the Eastern Pacific, will hand over its duty to sister ship USS George Washington during a ceremony in San Diego later, USNI News reported.
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