A soldier of the Chinese Naval Special Force holds a grenade launcher in his hands.

　　
K－27 ship-borne helicopter

　　
"Haikou" guided missile destroyer

　　
Arm badge for the Special Force of the Chinese Navy

　　
Ship-borne artillery shooting training

　　
"Wuhan" guided missile destroyer

　　
"Weishanhu" comprehensive supply ship

　　Combat effectiveness of the naval ship escort formation

　　"Wuhan" guided missile destroyer

　　The "Wuhan" guided missile destroyer, the commanding warship which shoulders the mission of escort operation in the Gulf of Aden and water off Somali coast, is a new-type modern guided missile destroyer independently designed and built by China. With a length of 155.5 m, a width of 17.2 m, and a hull number of 169, the load displacement of the warship is over 5,000 tons.

　　The main anti-ship weapon of the warship is a new-type anti-ship missile with rather mature technology. Under the guide of a new-type naval radar, the warship can implement beyond-visual-range attack on enemy warships and can attack surface objects of a multiple of batches at the same time. The cannon system is composed of one front main cannon and two near-distance anti-missile warship cannons, of which, the front main cannon can attack objects on the sea surface, in the air and on the bank and the near-distance anti-missile war-ship cannon is an effective weapon for defense against missile at the end of the warship.

　　In terms of anti-submarine warfare, the ship has rather strong underwater searching and reconnaissance competence as it is installed with a multiple sets of sonar systems and can exert effective attack on underwater objects.

　　"Haikou" guided missile destroyer

　　The "Haikou" guided missile destroyer is a modern guided missile destroyer independently designed and built by China. With a length of 155.5 m, a width of 17.2 m, and a hull number of 171, the load displacement of the warship is over 5,000 tons.

　　The most conspicuous feature of the "Haikou" destroyer is the installation of a home-made new-type radar .It's competence in air distance measurement and guiding and the number of objects being processed at the same time are at the front in the world. Another obvious feature of the destroyer is that it is the first home-made surface warship being installed with vertical missile launch system. A new-type ship-to-air missile launched vertically can offer an aerial defense network for the warship and the whole formation and the performance in hitting distance and the percentage of hits are increased significantly.

　　The cannon system of the "Haikou" destroyer is composed of one front main cannon and two near-distance anti-missile ship cannons. Different from that on the "Wuhan" warship, the near-distance anti-missile ship cannons on the warship are placed vertically on the platform right in front of the cab and the top of the helicopter hanger respectively. Such a design can effectively raise the combat effect.

　　The anti-ship missile system of the "Haikou" destroyer is rather advanced and the new-type naval radar can offer information of objects within a radius of several hundreds km away to the anti-ship missile and guide the new-type anti-ship missile to exert beyond-visual-range attack, which have effectively raised the suddenness of attack and the stealth of itself.

　　To effectively cope with underwater objects, the "Haikou" destroyer is equipped with a water sound confrontation system and trio torpedo launching device and rocket launch device. Under the cooperation of ship-borne helicopter, it can exert effective reconnaissance and attack on underwater objects.

　　"Weishanhu" comprehensive supply ship

　　The "Weishanhu" comprehensive supply ship is a large supply ship independently designed and built by China. With a tonnage of nearly 30，000 tons, the ship can supply three warships and one helicopter at the same time and can take one helicopter. The Ship has already successfully accomplished the accompanying support mission for Chinese naval formation s' visit to Pakistan, India, Thailand, Russia, the UK, Spain, France and Japan as well as support missions for oceanic trainings and joint military exercises. Presently, it has safely navigated for nearly 100，000 sea miles.

　　Two k-27 ship-borne helicopters participate in the task of fighting against Somali pirates together with the Chinese naval ship formation. This type of helicopter is mainly used to perform maritime or land search and emergent rescue missions and can jointly operate with warships under complicated sea conditions. It is characterized in small size, big take-off weight, better control performance and strong searching and rescue competence.

　　By Luo Yunchun, head of the Armaments Division of a destroyer detachment of the PLA Navy