Behind the China Missile Hype

NikeX said:

Upon first indication of a launch of the DF-21 the clock will start running. And the DF-21 will be tracked all the way to its target. First by early warning satellite and then handed off to other satellites or sensors along the way. When the DF-21 gets into range he will be ready for an interception and a kill

You may find this bit of news below interesting. The F-35 is capable of tracking ballistic missiles up to 1200 kms away.
And remember F-35 is a carrier assets. It is using the DAS system. Now there is no place for the DF-21 to hide

F-35 Detects Missile Launch 1200kms Away — Military Forum ...

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I'm aware of the supposed potency of the DAS -- how much of that is company hype I wonder? And we can assume early warning satellites will pick up the DF-21Ds launch, sure; in fact this whole discussion I thought we were both assuming the CVBG knew an AShBM was coming its way via early warning satellites or radar (lol why dont' I say, oh the chinese will jam your satellites and radar just like how easily you jam the AShBM's satellite datalinking!! heh)
But you haven't quite answered the question. You can know the missile is coming, how will you jam it?


1: Can growlers, aegis ships etc even jam satellite data linking in orbit?
2: What will the "radius" of this jamming be?
3: Beyond this "radius" of this jamming, DF-21D can fly and have midcourse guidance unmolested. The further out the jamming assets are, the weaker the jamming will be, logic states -- less concentrated in other words. The further in the jamming assets are to the carrier, the stronger it will be but then the DF-21D has a freer run to the terminal stage without challenge.
4: Electronic counter measures has its own counter. that is ECCM.

But this obscurant is a special smoke fine tuned to defeat optical, IR, and radars. The link I give explains it in fair detail. I urge you to take a look

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That doesn't change the fact that other countries out of the US will have experimented and looked into said obscurants -- like I said it's not a new thing, and further developing this soft kill countermeasure is expected.
If this obscurant was so potent why are countries still using active AShMs??

Well somehow the seeker head on the warhead will have to see through these dense clouds of radar evading smoke. There is just not enough room for a strong radar on that warhead nor is there a great deal of time when you are traveling at Mach 10.

Too much radar then you don't have enough room for a powerful warhead. Where is the trade off?

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Whoever said the radar "strength" had to do with seeing through this smoke? Working in different bands could bypass it entirely. I'm no expert but it seems a logical course to take just like how some bands work better against specific kinds of radar stealth coatings/shaping.

The Chinese ASBM strategy has a problem

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Lol ok then.

Bltizo said:

Look. I'll spell this out. The AShBM is not expected to track and home in onto the carrier on its own until the terminal phase. In the mid course phase, it *does not need to keep track* of the CVBG -- that is done by other sensor assets like satellites, UAVs, submarines or what not, and they send their information back to the AShBM in near space flight who will be maneuvering and making corrections to home in onto the (relatively) slow moving CVBG by the data said sensor assets send to it.

TL;DR -- AShBM doesn't need to maintain a track, that's done by other sensors. It just needs to receive data. Its own sensor is used to guide it in the terminal phase to plant itself within the necessary CEP.

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And yes we all know this is vulnerable to ECM, but that's an entirely different subject. Just to throw you a bone, if you somehow managed to jam all datalinking between the AShBM and the sensors then the entire AShBM system will be useless. AShBM's own sensor cannot nor was it designed to seek out targets on its own in mid course (like most long range AShM's)

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To be effective those "other sensor assets" will have to update the DF-21 somehow to the changing situation of the position of the CVN. A tall order indeed.

And indeed this idea of a ballistic missile scoring a pinpoint hit on a CVN is just a pipedream.

This is why the title of this discussion is "The Chinese Missile Hype"

There are too many variables

Theoretically you could just shoot down a DF-21D with a SM-3 from one of your supporting ships. It's shoot down of the USA-193, which was a fairly small target (about 5 meters long and 2 meters wide, probably smaller than the DF-21D's warhead) and was travelling down to earth at almost Mach 30 (a bit over 10,000 meters per second). One shot, one kill.

And the US knew where their own satellite was going. Not real war conditions.

I'm aware of the supposed potency of the DAS -- how much of that is company hype I wonder? And we can assume early warning satellites will pick up the DF-21Ds launch, sure.
But you haven't quite answered the question. You can know the missile is coming, how will you jam it?

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You don't have to jam it. You jam the datalinks that send the missile its updates. And since the carrier is moving the updates are critical

1: Can growlers, aegis ships etc even jam satellite data linking in orbit?

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All they have to do is interfere with the warhead receiving its updates. How about sending false datalink information?

2: What will the "radius" of this jamming be?
3: Beyond this "radius" of this jamming, DF-21D can fly and have midcourse guidance unmolested. The further out the jamming assets are, the weaker the jamming will be, logic states -- less concentrated in other words. The further in the jamming assets are to the carrier, the stronger it will be but then the DF-21D has a freer run to the terminal stage without challenge.
4: Electronic counter measures has its own counter. that is ECCM.

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At some point the DF-21 will have to switch over to its own onboard homing systems to locate the CVN. At that point the warhead is most vulnerable and can be misled

IronsightSniper said:

Theoretically you could just shoot down a DF-21D with a SM-3 from one of your supporting ships. It's shoot down of the USA-193, which was a fairly small target (about 5 meters long and 2 meters wide, probably smaller than the DF-21D's warhead) and was travelling down to earth at almost Mach 30 (a bit over 10,000 meters per second). One shot, one kill.

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Certainly, of course it's a possibility. More than that it's a credible weapon to use DF-21D in the right circumstances.
But comparing USA-193 to DF-21D is awkward, given that satellite was theirs in the first place and had all the data and control they needed to make the shootdown easier. Not to mention it wasn't performing evasive maneuvers, designed with small RCS etc.

NikeX said:

To be effective those "other sensor assets" will have to update the DF-21 somehow to the changing situation of the position of the CVN. A tall order indeed.

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Not really -- since 2009 when AShBM began its publicity run the idea was it would receive mid course guidance in addition to MaRV, and terminal sensor capability for it to work.
Long range AShMs use mid course guidance up until they turn on their own seekers as well. It's the same deal with DF-21D only its receiving updates from more sources and is a ballistic missile.
Here's a good article by Feng/tphuang from early 2009 on the weapon, and was widely cited.


In the latter part of this write up too, is notes on AShBM which is worth reading.


This idea has been developed by the PLA since the nineties from the third taiwan strait crisis. They've had a while to make it work and consider the counters and counter the counters.

And indeed this idea of a ballistic missile scoring a pinpoint hit on a CVN is just a pipedream.

This is why the title of this discussion is "The Chinese Missile Hype"

There are too many variables

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I suppose that's your way of agreeing to disagree.

Whoever said the radar "strength" had to do with seeing through this smoke? Working in different bands could bypass it entirely. I'm no expert but it seems a logical course to take just like how some bands work better against specific kinds of radar stealth coatings/shaping.

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And that is the beauty of passive smoke to screen the carrier. Particles suspended in the smoke can be tuned to absorb and diffuse radar waves to confuse radar seeker heads. And these obscurants are just one layer of defense against the ASBM

The application of obscurants on the modern battlefield has been widely examined by U.S. Army strategists and operators for over a decade and a half; (2) obscurants are firmly imbedded in U.S. Army doctrine. (3) Moreover, the effectiveness of obscurants against a panoply of terminal homing systems, from the visual to the millimeter-wave spectrum, is proven. In simple terms, the particles suspended in the medium of smoke can be adjusted in size to absorb and diffuse radar waves emanating from the seeker heads of incoming antiship missiles, thereby denying any homing information to the missile. In the modern naval battle space, where antiship cruise missiles (ASCMs) are a principal threat, adapting obscurant systems and developing tactics and operational schemes for their use at sea is prudent. Given the stark potential of antiship ballistic missiles (ASBMs), this adaptation may be essential. (4)

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Well all this is speculation since the DF-21 has never been tested in a real world application of the technology. Until they somehow test this missile on a ship at sea this will all be guesswork.

Are they afraid of failure in a test?

NikeX said:

You don't have to jam it. You jam the datalinks that send the missile its updates. And since the carrier is moving the updates are critical

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you're preaching to the choir about the fact said updates are critical dude.

Jamming satellites, jamming datalinks -- you'll have to jam between the satellites varying earth orbits with the DF-21D's near space mid course phase, it's just another word of saying what I've been saying.

All they have to do is interfere with the warhead receiving its updates. How about sending false datalink information?

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The same question arises, the missile will be in mid course flight/near space, can growlers and aegis ships jam/reach that high?
If anything it'll be harder to send false data because you'll have to break into the datalink in the first place, instead of just trying to disrupt it.

At some point the DF-21 will have to switch over to its own onboard homing systems to locate the CVN. At that point the warhead is most vulnerable and can be misled

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That wont' be until the missile is right on top of the CVN and is uses its own sensors not to guide into the "general area" of the CVBG but rather to hit the CVN with a CEP of <30m. The fallibility of the terminal sensor has been discussed before.

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NikeX said:

And that is the beauty of passive smoke to screen the carrier. Particles suspended in the smoke can be tuned to absorb and diffuse radar waves to confuse radar seeker heads. And these obscurants are just one layer of defense against the ASBM

The application of obscurants on the modern battlefield has been widely examined by U.S. Army strategists and operators for over a decade and a half; (2) obscurants are firmly imbedded in U.S. Army doctrine. (3) Moreover, the effectiveness of obscurants against a panoply of terminal homing systems, from the visual to the millimeter-wave spectrum, is proven. In simple terms, the particles suspended in the medium of smoke can be adjusted in size to absorb and diffuse radar waves emanating from the seeker heads of incoming antiship missiles, thereby denying any homing information to the missile. In the modern naval battle space, where antiship cruise missiles (ASCMs) are a principal threat, adapting obscurant systems and developing tactics and operational schemes for their use at sea is prudent. Given the stark potential of antiship ballistic missiles (ASBMs), this adaptation may be essential. (4)

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I'm not quite sure why you keep posting that paragraph -- I've read it and re read it already?

And what exactly is the beauty of your smoke? It's a soft kill system which is just advances on existing smoke obscuration countermeasures used on ships and tanks.

Well all this is speculation since the DF-21 has never been tested in a real world application of the technology. Until they somehow test this missile on a ship at sea this will all be guesswork.

Are they afraid of failure in a test?

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Well I would be afraid of potential foes gaining information about the DF-21D's flight path and other elements, and potentially using that to develop counters (namely ABM) a little easier.

The potency of DF-21D without having demonstrated a "real" test has been discussed before to great lengths as well.

I suppose that's your way of agreeing to disagree.

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I guess you are right. Thanks for the discussion

NikeX said:

And that is the beauty of passive smoke to screen the carrier. Particles suspended in the smoke can be tuned to absorb and diffuse radar waves to confuse radar seeker heads. And these obscurants are just one layer of defense against the ASBM

The application of obscurants on the modern battlefield has been widely examined by U.S. Army strategists and operators for over a decade and a half; (2) obscurants are firmly imbedded in U.S. Army doctrine. (3) Moreover, the effectiveness of obscurants against a panoply of terminal homing systems, from the visual to the millimeter-wave spectrum, is proven. In simple terms, the particles suspended in the medium of smoke can be adjusted in size to absorb and diffuse radar waves emanating from the seeker heads of incoming antiship missiles, thereby denying any homing information to the missile. In the modern naval battle space, where antiship cruise missiles (ASCMs) are a principal threat, adapting obscurant systems and developing tactics and operational schemes for their use at sea is prudent. Given the stark potential of antiship ballistic missiles (ASBMs), this adaptation may be essential. (4)

---------- Post added at 12:37 AM ---------- Previous post was at 12:33 AM ----------

Well all this is speculation since the DF-21 has never been tested in a real world application of the technology. Until they somehow test this missile on a ship at sea this will all be guesswork.

Are they afraid of failure in a test?

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Notice how you pick and choose what you want to believe in this paragraph?

Given the stark potential of antiship ballistic missiles (ASBMs)

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According to you it has no chance.

Did I ever say it will work perfectly and flawlessly? I gave it as much chance as any ABM. So if you believe SM-3 will work, then you just given the ASBM that same chance. I left it up to you to decide. You don't know if they haven't already tested it. The US kept secret from the public that China did two other ASAT tests before the third successful attempt. But in such the case here, no one but those if they were conducting an ASBM test would know if it were successful. We know that every ABM test conducted was done in the most ideal conditions possible. And what was the track record? Not very good.