052/052B Class Destroyers

re: PLAN Type 052 Class Destroyer

t_co said:

So back to the point of Type 052s. I have a simple question: assuming a typical anti-surface patrol, what sort of missile loadout would you put into the 64 VLS launchers, and why?

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Why would this class of ships ever be put on "anti-surface patrol"? What exactly is anti-surface patrol in the context of a ship in a modern navy, anyway?

t_co said:

I've also read that the 052D can carry the CJ-10, which would give the Type 052D a strike capability better than nearly all other ships in its weight class (supersonic cruise missile with 4000km range at <10m CEP).

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I call total BS here. Supersonic AND 4,000km range? Last I heard, the CJ-10 wasn't a flying fuel tank. Also, there is absolutely no point in a "strike" version with a range of 4,000km against a moving target like a ship. Missiles with those kinds of ranges are land attack missiles.

t_co said:

Does the Type 052D have the C4ISR necessary to utilize such a powerful weapon?

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No. Nor would any other ship. The troposcatter Mineral-ME (and probably its Chinese copy) only has a quoted range of 450km passive and 180km active per Naval Institute Guide and is not always available depending on location and weather conditions. This would be nearly useless for a missile with a 4,000km range (assuming this number is at least somewhat accurate).

re: PLAN Type 052 Class Destroyer

Mysterre said:

No. Nor would any other ship. The troposcatter Mineral-ME (and probably its Chinese copy) only has a quoted range of 450km passive and 180km active per Naval Institute Guide and is not always available depending on location and weather conditions. This would be nearly useless for a missile with a 4,000km range (assuming this number is at least somewhat accurate).

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I don't think he was insinuating CJ-10 was an anti ship weapon, but rather it was a supersonic 4000 km LACM. Which is ridiculous of course.

Launching cruise missiles from thousands of km away is old technology, re: tomahawk, and I expect 052Ds to feature the relevant C4ISR capability. Satellite/tercom cruise missiles are most autonomous anyway, you don't need shipboard sensors to guide them, the ship itself only needs an ability to control and oversee the missile over datalink.


As for an anti ship weapon with 4000 km range (which I don't think t_co was referring to, but I'll segue upon anyway)... I'm going to be the devil's advocate, and claim that it isn't an impossible suggestion for the far future. The much vaunted AShBM is supposed to be able to hit a moving target at anywhere from 1500-3000 km supposedly, and that will rely heavily on C4ISR assets. The challenge will be the same for a similarly ranged weapon launched from a ship. If you can detect, track and relay that midcourse targeting information to your supersonic 4000 km missile... well it is far less about the ship's own C4ISR capability but more how well you can integrate all your offboard sensors into a coherent, reliable and survivable manner over such a wide area.

re: PLAN Type 052 Class Destroyer

This is not a numbers game. It would not be advantages for China to spend billion's on ships, without an adequate and well trained navy to deploy them accurately, correctly and skillfully.

Not that this would happen but China is always under a first-strike scenario whereby Japanese and S.Korean forces fall under 'national defense'. DDG and FFG development shall continue to operate under carrier strike group coordination as China extends it's naval capabilities further into the air. That is where the advantage comes from in 21st century modern warfare.

It is not a war time scenario so it does not make any sense for China to undergo vast acceleration of their existing fleet development program. The 52 program shall continue to develop into an adequate defensive and offensive strike force, at which time we will most likely see alternative hull developments.

Too fast too soon, isn't the solution.

re: PLAN Type 052 Class Destroyer

drunkmunky said:

This is not a numbers game. It would not be advantages for China to spend billion's on ships, without an adequate and well trained navy to deploy them accurately, correctly and skillfully.

Not that this would happen but China is always under a first-strike scenario whereby Japanese and S.Korean forces fall under 'national defense'. DDG and FFG development shall continue to operate under carrier strike group coordination as China extends it's naval capabilities further into the air. That is where the advantage comes from in 21st century modern warfare.

It is not a war time scenario so it does not make any sense for China to undergo vast acceleration of their existing fleet development program. The 52 program shall continue to develop into an adequate defensive and offensive strike force, at which time we will most likely see alternative hull developments.

Too fast too soon, isn't the solution.

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currently China is simply replacing the 051 with the 052 on the one-to-one base, all crews are trained; it remains to be seen if China wants to expand her DDG fleet after the replacement is completed.

re: PLAN Type 052 Class Destroyer

Bltizo said:

I don't think he was insinuating CJ-10 was an anti ship weapon, but rather it was a supersonic 4000 km LACM. Which is ridiculous of course.

Launching cruise missiles from thousands of km away is old technology, re: tomahawk, and I expect 052Ds to feature the relevant C4ISR capability. Satellite/tercom cruise missiles are most autonomous anyway, you don't need shipboard sensors to guide them, the ship itself only needs an ability to control and oversee the missile over datalink.


As for an anti ship weapon with 4000 km range (which I don't think t_co was referring to, but I'll segue upon anyway)... I'm going to be the devil's advocate, and claim that it isn't an impossible suggestion for the far future. The much vaunted AShBM is supposed to be able to hit a moving target at anywhere from 1500-3000 km supposedly, and that will rely heavily on C4ISR assets. The challenge will be the same for a similarly ranged weapon launched from a ship. If you can detect, track and relay that midcourse targeting information to your supersonic 4000 km missile... well it is far less about the ship's own C4ISR capability but more how well you can integrate all your offboard sensors into a coherent, reliable and survivable manner over such a wide area.

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The same C4ISR used for a ASBM will not work for a cruise missile of similar range. The reason is simple: the cruise missile flies alot slower. It will take ~3 HOURS for a cruise missile to go 3,000km flying at high subsonic speed. The same can be achieved by a MRBM in, what, 15-20 minutes? What asset could you possibly have that could stay with an enemy ship for 3 hours, that wouldn't have gotten shot down by that time? Nothing. Any AEW or UAV would long have been destroyed, and no satellite that can track could do so for that long before crossing over the horizon. The reason ASBM's can do it is because they can act in nearly real time based on brief moments of contact between your detection asset(s) and the enemy. A cruise missile acting on information that it obtained 3 hours ago could find itself searching for a target that would now be 200km away or more from its last known location, potentially in any direction.

re: PLAN Type 052 Class Destroyer

Mysterre said:

The same C4ISR used for a ASBM will not work for a cruise missile of similar range. The reason is simple: the cruise missile flies alot slower. It will take ~3 HOURS for a cruise missile to go 3,000km flying at high subsonic speed. The same can be achieved by a MRBM in, what, 15-20 minutes? What asset could you possibly have that could stay with an enemy ship for 3 hours, that wouldn't have gotten shot down by that time? Nothing. Any AEW or UAV would long have been destroyed, and no satellite that can track could do so for that long before crossing over the horizon. The reason ASBM's can do it is because they can act in nearly real time based on brief moments of contact between your detection asset(s) and the enemy. A cruise missile acting on information that it obtained 3 hours ago could find itself searching for a target that would now be 200km away or more from its last known location, potentially in any direction.

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I assume you realize that there will be more than one surveillance satillete in operation, and for a high priority target like an enemy carrier group, it will be more than worth while to re-task several satilletes to provide continuos coverage by synchronising their orbits so that a new satillete enters range just as another passes out of range.

Since AShMs have onboard radar, you only need to guide them to an approximate area where the enemy ships are before they can lock on with their own radars. OTH radars and subs could all be used to track and guide friendly missiles.

It is harder, but certainly not impossible to so as Bltizo suggested.

re: PLAN Type 052 Class Destroyer

Mysterre said:

The same C4ISR used for a ASBM will not work for a cruise missile of similar range. The reason is simple: the cruise missile flies alot slower. It will take ~3 HOURS for a cruise missile to go 3,000km flying at high subsonic speed. The same can be achieved by a MRBM in, what, 15-20 minutes? What asset could you possibly have that could stay with an enemy ship for 3 hours, that wouldn't have gotten shot down by that time? Nothing. Any AEW or UAV would long have been destroyed, and no satellite that can track could do so for that long before crossing over the horizon. The reason ASBM's can do it is because they can act in nearly real time based on brief moments of contact between your detection asset(s) and the enemy. A cruise missile acting on information that it obtained 3 hours ago could find itself searching for a target that would now be 200km away or more from its last known location, potentially in any direction.

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Well it isn't 4000km, rather ~1500km, but the upcoming tomahawk block iv will have sophisticated anti ship capabilities similar in role to the original TASM.





My argument was more directed towards the C4ISR and targeting aspect of the question than the delivery system itself. I agree a subsonic cruise missile won't be the best weapon to strike at ships 4000 km away, but if stealthy, and supported by a very robust C4ISR it should be survivable and able to find the enemy even 3 hours after with midcourse guidance.

But reliable and timely strikes at maritime targets that far away will probably only be available through ballistic missiles at present, or by more exotic supersonic or hypersonic cruise missiles in decades to come.

re: PLAN Type 052 Class Destroyer

plawolf said:

I assume you realize that there will be more than one surveillance satillete in operation, and for a high priority target like an enemy carrier group, it will be more than worth while to re-task several satilletes to provide continuos coverage by synchronising their orbits so that a new satillete enters range just as another passes out of range.

Since AShMs have onboard radar, you only need to guide them to an approximate area where the enemy ships are before they can lock on with their own radars. OTH radars and subs could all be used to track and guide friendly missiles.

It is harder, but certainly not impossible to so as Bltizo suggested.

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The problem with satellites is that for your plan to work there would be need to be many many satellites all passing over the same region of the Western Pacific sequentially, and this pattern of flyovers needs to have already been establised before a potential engagement. Nice enough in theory, but I'd like to see it actually being done before I believe it can be done.

Bltizo said:

Well it isn't 4000km, rather ~1500km, but the upcoming tomahawk block iv will have sophisticated anti ship capabilities similar in role to the original TASM.

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My argument was more directed towards the C4ISR and targeting aspect of the question than the delivery system itself. I agree a subsonic cruise missile won't be the best weapon to strike at ships 4000 km away, but if stealthy, and supported by a very robust C4ISR it should be survivable and able to find the enemy even 3 hours after with midcourse guidance.

But reliable and timely strikes at maritime targets that far away will probably only be available through ballistic missiles at present, or by more exotic supersonic or hypersonic cruise missiles in decades to come.

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I'd like to see this Block IV Tomahawk being able to hit anything in the 1,500km range without near continuous cueing. In that video with the strike on the poor lonely Sov it looks like the missiles are being cued by something that looks like a JStars or something similar. But as I said, any PLAN equivalent would have been swatted out of the sky by F-18's or F-35's long before any missiles it was cueing could reach their targets. If you got really lucky and obtained a fix on the carrier group via satellite just before the CJ-10's (or whatever) arrived in the area and could transmit that information in real time to the missiles, then maybe you have something to work with. But this would just be an extremely expensive version of "spray and pray".

re: PLAN Type 052 Class Destroyer

Yeah, by "strike capability" I meant land attack capability (not anti-ship capability).

And by "anti-surface" patrols, I meant basically either a deterrence patrol in the littorals of the SCS or a CBG hunt in the ECS. What sort of loadout would be appropriate for those scenarios?

re: PLAN Type 052 Class Destroyer

t_co said:

Yeah, by "strike capability" I meant land attack capability (not anti-ship capability).

And by "anti-surface" patrols, I meant basically either a deterrence patrol in the littorals of the SCS or a CBG hunt in the ECS. What sort of loadout would be appropriate for those scenarios?

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Well this is confusing then because earlier you said "anti-surface patrol" and also mentioned the "strike" capability of CJ-10's in the same post. "Strike" in a naval context refers to an attack against enemy ships.

In any case, a deterrance patrol or CBG hunt would not involve CJ-10's because this is a LACM and not an anti-ship missile. A CBG hunt also would not involve ships until after detection was already achieved by a much faster asset with a better view, such as a plane, a UAV, or a satellite. Even contacts made by OTH radars would still need to be confirmed by these means since their resolution is horrible, and they could only tell you something is present within a relatively large area of the ocean.

052D's are anti-air warfare ships through and through. Their massive AESA panels serve as a prominent reminder of what they do best. IMO antishipping warships like the Sovremenny class are now floating anachronisms unsuitable for the modern world of high end naval warfare where masses and masses of antiship missiles are needed to overcome a fleet of warships all networked together by robust datalinks and shared defenses.