a small force of f-18s is not going to survive j-11 attack.
I have a hard time seeing how a force of fully loaded F-18s launched from carriers in blue water (to avoid the SSKs hunting in litorral waters) will have sufficient range and loiter time to attack targets in the Chinese mainland.
F-14s may have the range.
F-15Es I believe.
B-1Bs and B-2s are made for it.
But the Bug?
Some people here don't know how far the littoral waters go far from the Asian continent. The Asian continental shelves jut out much farther than the American continental shelves. We're talking the waters much west of Japan and Taiwan here. The farther you go out and station your carrier from the nasty SSKs with the 220km Klub missiles, the less range and loiter time the Hornets have. I don't care how good your aircraft is (and I doubt it's really any better than the Flankers), if you don't have the fuel for the fight, don't bother.
An issue about decoys. The Hornets may be escorted by decoys while carrying the AGM-88 Harms to their targets which I don't suppose because of fuel limitations, aren't going to reach that far deep. Have you ever considered that the ground targets may have decoys too?
Also a good number of SAMs are not reliant on radar. They include the commonly used HQ-7 which uses infrared and TV backup guidance.
AGM-88 vs. S-300? My bets is on the S-300. With a 200km range on the 48N6E1 vs 52km on the AGM-88, the S-300 will have a first shoot capability. The Bug will already be tracked and have a missile on its tail before it gets into range to use the AGM-88. And even if you do fire the missile, what chances you won't hit a decoy? Also the S-300 radar systems is redundant. If you take out the search radar, the fire control radar is still seperate and will still track you and guide its missile.
In fact, much of the PLA missile system is both redundant and mobile. The commonly used HQ-2 has four sensor posts and is networked to other arrays. You have to take all of them down simultaneously and more, before you can even stop them from shooting. Then you also have to deal with the layered defenses and SAMs that are not dependent on radar or have their own self contained radar systems.
The use of passive antiradiation FT-2000s (based on the HQ-9) and FT-2000A (based on the common HQ-2) throws a wild card. YOu can't find them with your HARMs, but they can find your jammers,
I got far more faith on the F-117 and the F-22 to take out the PLAAF and air defenses than the Bug. Sorry.
On other things,
I don't believe that Backfires with Kitchens can take out a CBVG. Those Kitchens are old missiles, and the USN has been testing and training their systems to defend against such missiles for decades now. Best chance for China is to do something truly radical, like terminally guided SSMs.
Oh, and there is nothing worth destroying in Hainan either.
