Strengthening the offensive capability of nuclear weapons is the nub of China's strategic deterrence
It is far from enough for China to rely on ground-based anti-missile technologies to deter the US. China also needs to further strengthen its offensive capability of nuclear weapons, which is the nub of China's strategic deterrence.
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China-US nuclear rivalry and the discovery of China’s missile silos
An air-defense missile system attached to a brigade under the PLA 71st Group Army launches an air-defense missile at a mock target during a field live-fire training exercise in late February, 2022. (eng.chinamil.com.cn/Photo by Xue Weigao)
China on Sunday successfully conducted an antiballistic missile test in a move experts said on Monday is a crucial part of the country's national defense development that is defensive in nature, demonstrating the reliability of China's antiballistic missile umbrella amid US attempts to blackmail China with modern, nuclear-armed intercontinental ballistic missiles and deploying intermediate-range ballistic missiles in the Asia-Pacific region on the doorsteps of China.
China conducted a land-based, mid-course antiballistic missile interception technical test within its borders, China's Ministry of National Defense announced in a press release late on Sunday.
The test reached its desired objective, the press release said, noting that the test is defensive in nature and not aimed at any other country.
A similar test was held in February 2021, according to an announcement of the Chinese Defense Ministry at the time.
The flight of an intercontinental ballistic missile usually consists of three phases. First is the boost phase in which the rocket booster powers the missile. Second, the mid-course phase in which the booster stops as the missile travels outside the atmosphere. Third and last, the reentry or terminal phase in which the missile reenters the atmosphere and dives on its target.
Intercepting an intercontinental ballistic missile during its mid-course is very challenging because during this phase, the missile, usually equipped with nuclear warheads, travels high outside of the atmosphere at very high velocity, experts said.
It is technically easy to intercept a ballistic missile in the boost phase because the missile is still close to the ground and accelerating, but it is difficult to get close to the launch site which is usually deep in hostile territory. In the terminal phase, the interception is also challenging because the speed of the diving missile is very high, analysts noted.
Countries are developing hypersonic missiles with wave-rider gliders that can adjust their trajectories mid-flight when they reenter the atmosphere, which makes terminal interception even more difficult, and mid-course interception has become even more important, analysts said.
A mid-course antiballistic missile system consists of two parts - a booster and an interceptor as its warhead, and moves to intercept the ballistic missile in the second phase of its flight where it is traveling outside the atmosphere, an expert familiar with the technology told the Global Times on the condition of anonymity.
One of the key challenges for a mid-course antiballistic missile system is the miniaturization of the warhead, making it light enough without compromising its flight precision as well as sensitivity, the expert said, adding that it is preferred to use a rapid combustion rocket as the booster for the system so that it can send the antiballistic missile to the atmosphere as fast as possible.
Although small in size, the mid-course antiballistic missile has a complete set of combat systems, including power, tracking, target-identifying systems and the killer part, the expert explained.
The mid-course antiballistic missile interception also has a network of support systems with an early warning and monitoring function. The centerpiece of the warning and monitoring systems is the missile early warning satellite, and support from long-range monitoring radars and a highly efficient and rapid command system are also playing crucial roles in the interception process, the expert said.
The latest test brings the number of publicly announced Chinese land-based ABM technical tests to six. According to media reports and official statements, other known ABM tests were carried out by China in 2010, 2013, 2014, 2018 and 2021. It was not revealed in which interception phase the test in 2014 was carried out, while all other five were carried out in the mid-course phase. All of those Chinese tests ended successfully.
By comparison, the US Ground-based Midcourse Defense system only has a success rate of just 55 percent, according to the Washington DC-based Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation.
The high success rate of China's tests shows that the country's land-based mid-course antiballistic missile system has become mature and reliable, Wang Ya'nan, chief editor of Beijing-based Aerospace Knowledge magazine, told the Global Times on Monday.
For the next step, China needs to conduct tests under more complex scenarios to further hone its antiballistic missile capabilities, Wang said, noting that the US' lower success rate does not necessarily mean China has surpassed the US, because the US tests might involve different and more challenging simulation parameters.
US threats
Despite China's latest test does not target another country, analysts said that the US is the biggest source of ballistic missile threats to China.
The US Department of Defense is modernizing its intercontinental ballistic missile force with the $100 billion Ground Based Strategic Deterrent program in an attempt to deter China and Russia, US media outlet Defense News reported in April, when the US Air Force named its next-generation intercontinental ballistic missile the LGM-35A Sentinel, which is to succeed the 5-decade-old Minuteman III beginning 2029.
Having a reliable antiballistic missile system serves as a deterrent against US nuclear blackmail, experts said.
After withdrawing from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty in 2019, the US began planning an anti-China missile network along the first island chain, media reported.
Fears are that the US could deploy intermediate range missiles in places like Japan, South Korea, Guam and Australia, despite Japan, South Korea and Australia ruling out this US proposal for the time being, according to media reports. As the Western missile network is pressing in on the Asia-Pacific region, China needs to develop antiballistic missile systems as well as far-reaching weapons like aircraft carriers and hypersonic missiles to defend itself, analysts said.
If the US succeeds in deploying intermediate range missiles near China, it means China will face not only more missile threats, but also more uncertainties. If US missiles are deployed in multiple locations along the island chains, it would be more difficult to predict from where those missiles could come from, Wang said.
That is why China needs both spear and shield, Wang pointed out.
When needed, China should be able to use its long-range strike capabilities and destroy those missile positions, and use missile defense systems to intercept those that have made into the air, Wang said.
China just launched its third aircraft carrier, the Fujian, on Friday, and showcased its DF-17 hypersonic missiles at the National Day military parade in 2019. If US missiles are deployed on China's doorsteps, they are likely targets of those Chinese weapons if they aim at China, analysts said.
China already has a military advantage over the US on the doorsteps of China, and further national defense development is needed to deter the US and lower casualties in case of a conflict, analysts said.
China follows a national defense strategy that is defensive in nature, so both the spears and the shields it develops are aimed at safeguarding its national sovereignty, territorial integrity and development interests, as well as contribute to regional stability and world peace, analysts said, noting that this is totally different from the US' aggressive military development that aims to maintain global hegemony.
Costs billions ... the DDG-1000, the US Navy's next-generation destroyer. Photo: AP
A super-stealthy warship that could underpin the US
Navy's China strategy will be able to sneak up on coastlines virtually
undetected and pound targets with electromagnetic "railguns" right out
of a sci-fi movie.
But at more than $US3 billion a pop, critics say the new
DDG-1000 destroyer sucks away funds that could be better used to bolster
a thinly stretched conventional fleet. One outspoken admiral in China
has scoffed that all it would take to sink the high-tech American ship
is an armada of explosive-laden fishing boats.
With the first of the new ships set to be delivered in
2014, the stealth destroyer is being heavily promoted by the Pentagon as
the most advanced destroyer in history - a silver bullet of stealth. It
has been called a perfect fit for what Washington now considers the
most strategically important region in the world - Asia and the Pacific.
Though it could come in handy elsewhere, like in the Gulf
region, its ability to carry out missions both on the high seas and in
shallows closer to shore is especially important in Asia because of the
region's many island nations and China's long Pacific coast.
"With its stealth, incredibly capable sonar system,
strike capability and lower manning requirements - this is our future,"
Admiral Jonathan Greenert, chief of naval operations, said in April
after visiting the shipyard in Maine where they are being built.
On a visit to a major regional security conference in
Singapore that ended on Sunday, US Defence Secretary Leon Panetta said
the Navy will be deploying 60 per cent of its fleet worldwide to the
Pacific by 2020, and though he didn't cite the stealth destroyers he
said new high-tech ships will be a big part of its shift.
The DDG-1000 and other stealth destroyers of the Zumwalt
class feature a wave-piercing hull that leaves almost no wake, electric
drive propulsion and advanced sonar and missiles. They are longer and
heavier than existing destroyers - but will have half the crew because
of automated systems and appear to be little more than a small fishing
boat on enemy radar.
Down the road, the ship is to be equipped with an
electromagnetic railgun, which uses a magnetic field and electric
current to fire a projectile at several times the speed of sound.
But cost overruns and technical delays have left many
defence experts wondering if the whole endeavour was too focused on
futuristic technologies for its own good.
They point to the problem-ridden F-22 stealth jet
fighter, which was hailed as the most advanced fighter ever built but
was cut short because of prohibitive costs. Its successor, the F-35
Joint Strike Fighter, has swelled up into the most expensive procurement
program in US Defence Department history.
"Whether the Navy can afford to buy many DDG-1000s must
be balanced against the need for over 300 surface ships to fulfill the
various missions that confront it," said Dean Cheng, a China expert with
the Heritage Foundation, a conservative research institute in
Washington. "Buying hyperexpensive ships hurts that ability, but buying
ships that can't do the job, or worse can't survive in the face of the
enemy, is even more irresponsible."
The Navy says it's money well spent. The rise of China
has been cited as the best reason for keeping the revolutionary ship
afloat, although the specifics of where it will be deployed have yet to
be announced. Navy officials also say the technologies developed for the
ship will inevitably be used in other vessels in the decades ahead.
But the destroyers' $US3.1 billion price tag, which is
about twice the cost of the current destroyers and balloons to $US7
billion each when research and development is added in, nearly sank it
in Congress.
Though the Navy originally wanted 32 of them, that was cut
to 24, then seven.
Now, just three are in the works.
"Costs spiraled - surprise, surprise - and the program
basically fell in on itself," said Richard Bitzinger, a security expert
at Singapore's Nanyang Technological University. "The DDG-1000 was a
nice idea for a new modernistic surface combatant, but it contained too
many unproven, disruptive technologies."
The US Defence Department is concerned that China is
modernising its navy with a near-term goal of stopping or delaying US
intervention in conflicts over disputed territory in the South China Sea
or involving Taiwan, which China considers a renegade province.
China is now working on building up a credible aircraft
carrier capability and developing missiles and submarines that could
deny American ships access to crucial sea lanes.
The US has a big advantage on the high seas, but
improvements in China's navy could make it harder for US ships to fight
in shallower waters, called littorals. The stealth destroyers are
designed to do both. In the meantime, the Navy will begin deploying
smaller Littoral Combat Ships to Singapore later this year.
Officially, China has been quiet on the possible addition of the destroyers to Asian waters.
But Rear Admiral Zhang Zhaozhong, an outspoken
commentator affiliated with China's National Defence University, scoffed
at the hype surrounding the ship, saying that despite its high-tech
design it could be overwhelmed by a swarm of fishing boats laden with
explosives. If enough boats were mobilised some could get through to
blow a hole in its hull, he said.
AP
China laughs at Planned American Stealth destroyer "It really sucks"
The US Navy is readying a $7 billion boat that can launch attacks faster
than the speed of sound and is practically invisible to detection. Even
with that hefty cost, however, China says it will only take a few
fishing boats to blow up the DDG-1000.
The chief of US naval operations says that the DDG-1000 super-stealth
destroyer warship is the “future” of America’s on-the-water weaponry,
and at that price tag it better be. Right now the ship is costing
taxpayers around $3.1 billion but the price of research and development
is likely to bring the tally to more than double. The ship is several
years in the making and the first of its kind is expected to be ready by
2014, but critics in China — the very place Uncle Sam plans to send his
up and coming fleet — are laughing at America’s latest endeavor.
"It would be a goner," Rear Adm. Zhang Zhaozhong of China's National
Defense University tells the nation’s CCTV military channel.
The US intends on sending its newest ship towards China’s Pacific Coast
where it will be able to monitor activity in the budding region without
being easily detected. The boat’s wave-piercing hull will leave almost
no wake in the water, reports the Associated Press, and upgrades to the
ship will eventually equip it with electromagnetic railguns that can
shoot projectiles by using an electric current and magnetic field to
fire at enemy targets. Zhaozhong warns, however, that where the US
invests in unnecessary weaponry and sleek, stealth technology, it fails
to properly outfit the ship with the material to keep it from going
kerplunk.
According to the AP, Zhaozhong claims that the DDG-1000’s impressive
design could be easily overwhelmed by a mere fleet of fishing boats that
are laden with explosives. If enough of those boats could be mobilized
around the stealth ship, says Zhaozhong, its high-tech hull could be
blown apart sending the boat straight to the bottom of the sea.
That, of course, is not how the Pentagon wants to spend a few billion
dollars. "Whether the Navy can afford to buy many DDG-1000s must be
balanced against the need for over 300 surface ships to fulfill the
various missions that confront it," Dean Cheng, a China expert with the
Heritage Foundation, adds to the AP. "Buying hyper-expensive ships hurts
that ability, but buying ships that can't do the job, or worse can't
survive in the face of the enemy, is even more irresponsible."
A 2008 report on the ship from US Navy Vice Admiral Barry McCullough
revealed that “the DDG-1000 cannot perform area air defense” and that
the ship essentially lacked any ability to fire at enemies located
above, making it a sitting duck for air attacks. At the time, a naval
source with Defense News said that the ship "could carry and launch
standard missiles, but the DDG 1000 combat system cant guide those
missiles onward to a target."
Off the sea and in the air, the Pentagon is having other problems with
costly crafts that aren’t operating up to snuff. After a serviceman was
killed on board an F-22 Raptor stealth jet in 2010, the Air Force has
repeatedly grounded the fleet over security concerns. Recently, several
pilots announced that they would refuse to board the craft until all of
its kinks were worked out. The Air Force has spent around $77.4 billion
on its F-22 fleet so far — the cost of building and maintaining around
11 of the DDG-1000s — but has been forced to ground them time and time
again. Around $400billion worth of high-tech F-35 fighter jets have been
grounded no fewer than three times as well.
Although the Navy first ordered 32 of the DDG-1000s, they have slashed
that figure three times; once the first boat is finished, only two more
are currently slated to join it.
** FILE ** A security officer walks on the roof of the Pentagon. (AP Photo/Charles Dharapak)
The Pentagon lifted the veil of secrecy Wednesday on a new battle concept aimed at countering Chinese military efforts to deny access to areas near its territory and in cyberspace.
The Air Sea Battle concept is the start of what defense officials say is the early stage of a new Cold War-style military posture toward China.
The plan calls for preparing the Air Force, Navy and Marine Corps to defeat China's "anti-access, area denial weapons," including anti-satellite weapons, cyberweapons, submarines, stealth aircraft and long-range missiles that can hit aircraft carriers at sea.
Military officials from the three services told reporters during a background briefing that the concept is not directed at a single country. But they did not answer when asked what country other than China has developed advanced anti-access arms.
A senior Obama administration official was more blunt, saying the new concept is a significant milestone signaling a new Cold War-style approach to China.
"Air Sea Battle is to China what the maritime strategy was to the Soviet Union," the official said.
During the Cold War, U.S. naval forces around the world used a strategy of global presence and shows of force to deter Moscow's advances.
"It is a very forward-deployed, assertive strategy that says we will not sit back and be punished," the senior official said. "We will initiate."
The concept, according to defense officials, grew out of concerns that China's new precision-strike weapons threaten freedom of navigation in strategic waterways and other global commons.
Defense officials familiar with the concept said among the ideas under consideration are:
• Building a new long-range bomber.
• Conducting joint submarine and stealth aircraft operations.
• New jointly operated, long-range unmanned strike aircraft with up to 1,000-mile ranges.
• Using Air Force forces to protect naval bases and deployed naval forces.
• Conducting joint Navy, Marine Corps and Air Force strikes inside China.
• Using Air Force aircraft to deploy sea mines.
• Joint Air Force and Navy attacks against Chinese anti-satellite missiles inside China.
• Increasing the mobility of satellites to make attacks more difficult.
• Launching joint Navy and Air Force cyber-attacks on Chinese anti-access forces.
Pentagon press secretary George Little said the new office "is a hard-won and significant operational milestone in meeting emerging threats to our global access."
"This office will help guide meaningful integration of our air and naval combat capabilities, strengthening our military deterrent power, and maintaining U.S. advantage against the proliferation of advanced military technologies and capabilities," Mr. Little said.
He noted that it is a Pentagon priority to rebalance joint forces to better deter and defeat aggression in "anti-access environments."
Earlier this month, Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta said during a visit to Asia that U.S. forces would be reoriented toward Asia as the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan wind down. The new focus will include "enhanced military capabilities," he said without elaborating.
The military officials at the Pentagon on Wednesday did not discuss specifics of the new concept. One exception was an officer who said an example would be the use of Air Force A-10 ground attack jets to defend ships at sea from small-boat "swarm" attacks.
China in recent years has grown more assertive in waters near its shores, harassing Navy surveillance ships in the South China Sea and Yellow Sea.
China also has claimed large portions of the South China Sea as its territory. U.S. officials said the Chinese have asserted that it is "our driveway."
The Pentagon also is concerned about China's new DF-21D anti-ship ballistic missile that can hit aircraft carriers at sea. Carriers are the key power-projection capability in Asia and would be used in defending Japan, South Korea and Taiwan.
"The Air Sea Battle concept will guide the services as they work together to maintain a continued U.S. advantage against the global proliferation of advanced military technology and [anti-access/area denial] capabilities," the Pentagon said in announcing the creation of a program office for the concept.
Although the office was set up in August, the background briefing Wednesday was the first time the Pentagon officially rolled out the concept.
The Army is expected to join the concept office in the future.
One defense official said the Army is involved in cyberwarfare initiatives that would be useful for countering anti-access weapons.
"Simply put, we're talking about freedom of access in the global commons. Increasing ranges of precision fire threaten those global commons in new expanding ways," said a military official speaking on condition of anonymity. "That, in a nutshell, is what's different."
Defense officials said some administration officials opposed the new concept over concerns it would upset China. That resulted in a compromise that required military and defense officials to play down the fact that China is the central focus of the new battle plan.
A second military official said the new concept also is aimed at shifting the current U.S. military emphasis on counterinsurgency to the anti-access threats.
The office was disclosed as President Obama sets off this week on trip to Asia designed to shore up alliances. He is set to meet Chinese President Hu Jintao in Hawaii on Saturday.
The concept grew out of the 2010 Quadrennial Defense Review that, in its early stages, had excluded any mention of China's growing military might.
China military specialist Richard Fisher said the new Air Sea Battle office is necessary but may be "late in the game."
"A Pentagon office focused on China's military challenges in Asia or beyond will be insufficient," said Mr. Fisher, of the International Assessment and Strategy Center. "This challenge will require Cold War levels of strategic, political and economic policy integration well beyond the Pentagon's writ."
Said former State Department China specialist John Tkacik: "This new Air Sea Battle concept is evidence that Washington is finally facing up to the real threat that China has become an adversarial military, naval and nuclear power in Asia, and that the only way to balance China is to lend the weight of U.S. air and naval forces to our Asia-Pacific allies' ground forces."
