They don't need to be great. They need to be numerous and just able to lob some attacks. There is only so much "work" a US carrier group can do, only so many bombs they have, and only so much active defense munitions.

Sure a modern US carrier has fantastic defenses, ones that can shoot down anything the Chinese have. But it has ammo, only so many shots possible against incoming threats. And if you have seen the radar guided AA guns the ships use, its not 1 bullet vs 1 missile. Its often hundreds of bullets to take out 1 incoming missile.

Against large enough odds, and large enough vollies of anti-ship missiles, it would be overwhelmed and the carrier would be sunk.

And while China is not amazing innovators of highest quality, China is also not Iraq. They have very successfully stolen, or gained though western treason, the latest and greatest military tech and have copied it. So who cares if its only 50% as effective if they have 10x as many and it still mostly works?

The biggest problem for the carrier is they have like 60 aircraft and only 2/3rds of those are combat aircraft. If the enemy SAMs are even 30% effective, losses are going to wipe out the carrier flights long before they kill the entire Chinese navy. And The Chinese have contracts with the Russians, who have the best SAM's in the world, as its where Russia poured most of its time and energy for military tech: SAM's to defend Russia from NATO air strikes and cruise missles. Russia's other tactic with great SAM's is to area-deny to NATO aircraft and missiles to force NATO to fight on the ground, which Russia excels at close-range, man to man, tank to tank, brutal ground war, which they demonstrated amply both in WW2, and in the modern era by curb stomping out ISIL in Syria even in entrenchments in cities.

IMO because of Biden and dozen other factors, the US will never fully commit to any military action inside of China.

The Russians though, are zero fans of China. While they have been allies in the past, that is pretty frayed right now over China basically bootlegging the Su-27 as the J-11, and cutting into Russia export arms market, and China recently claiming that Vladivostok belongs to them.

Its also worth noting in the past the Russians and Chinese have scuffled in the past too. And every time the Russians utterly curb stomped the Chinese though sheer brute force. Russians have MUCH higher morale than China, their equipment is better, and they are far more fierce.

They don't need to be great. They need to be numerous and just able to lob some attacks. There is only so much "work" a US carrier group can do, only so many bombs they have, and only so much active defense munitions.

Sure a modern US carrier has fantastic defenses, ones that can shoot down anything the Chinese have. But it has ammo, only so many shots possible against incoming threats. And if you have seen the radar guided AA guns the ships use, its not 1 bullet vs 1 missile. Its often hundreds of bullets to take out 1 incoming missile.

Against large enough odds, and large enough vollies of anti-ship missiles, it would be overwhelmed and the carrier would be sunk.

And while China is not amazing innovators of highest quality, China is also not Iraq. They have very successfully stolen, or gained though western treason, the latest and greatest military tech and have copied it. So who cares if its only 50% as effective if they have 10x as many and it still mostly works?

The biggest problem for the carrier is they have like 60 aircraft and only 2/3rds of those are combat aircraft. If the enemy SAMs are even 30% effective, losses are going to wipe out the carrier flights long before they kill the entire Chinese navy. And The Chinese have contracts with the Russians, who have the best SAM's in the world, as its where Russia poured most of its time and energy for military tech: SAM's to defend Russia from NATO air strikes and cruise missles. Russia's other tactic with great SAM's is to area-deny to NATO aircraft and missiles to force NATO to fight on the ground, which Russia excels at close-range, man to man, tank to tank, brutal ground war, which they demonstrated amply both in WW2, and in the modern era by curb stomping out ISIL in Syria even in entrenchments in cities.