It's very misleading to say that the Chinese Navy has not grown, nor is it actually true. China's navy was dogshit before 2010, it was always behind technologically, none of its vessels were modern (before the early 2000s). That's not the case anymore, it's the opposite. PLAN will basically be fully modern by 2020, after that it's goodbye for Pax Americana (I'm mainly talking about Western Pacific, not some global Chinese hegemony).
This is my rough estimate for the Chinese Navy in 2030:
5-6 carriers
5-6+ helicopter carriers
10+ LPDs
40-50+ destroyers (not an exaggeration)
40+ frigates
60-100 corvettes
60 missile boats (if they keep them)
20+ SSNs (they will technologically also more or less catch up with Russia with their Type 095, especially considering that Russia will certainly not have 20 Yasens by 2030, closer to 10 + older upgraded boats)
60+ modern SSKs
China's blue water capability will be stronger vis-a-vis the US in 2030 than the USSR's ever was, for the most part, maybe not in regards to SSNs, but nothing's certain.
Comparing China's current capabilities to Russia's Syria operation is difficult, because their geography is so different, but China could certainly pull off a similar operation and then some. That is, from a similar distance to the mainland, let's not also forget that Russia had access to bases in Syria from day 1. However, I do agree that there are very few countries that could do that, but China is certainly one of them. Let's not even talk about PLAN of 2030... Those numbers above should be clear enough.
And as has already been pointed out, by 2030 Russia will have:
0 new carriers operational
0-1 Liders
I'm also not saying any of this really matters, Russia really is much less of a sea power than China, but come on now...