China Ballistic Missiles and Nuclear Arms Thread

[Max Demian]

Good analysis, but I would suggest that the sensor package would be much easier and effectively deployed as a mini-satellite. Because if it is deployed in atmosphere, it would already be past the plasma sheath phase of re-entry, and would have to have its own heat shield and slowing and stabilising mechanisms, and would be very little time to sort itself out, find the target and that would leave very little time for the warhead to do any meaningful course corrections.

Deploying the sensor package (as well as other decoys) once the AShBM has left the atmosphere would then serve the stated purpose of decoying (only mid-course intercept would have any realistic chance of success, so I don’t think they would even bother with terminal phase decoys); and also provide much more timely course updates for the warhead before it starts it’s re-entry phase.

During the re-entry phase, the mini-satellite would be able to see both the warhead and its target and thus can provide high precision, lag-free course update data to the warhead to guide it such that once it clears the plasma sheath, it’s own sensors would be perfectly aligned to acquire the target.

This is an excellent practical engineering solution that exemplifies Chinese problem solving at its best. Rather than trying to brute force an impossible seeming challenge, they neatly sidestep it instead to delivery practical solutions without ridiculous budget and time investments.

This is referring to the MARV warhead, right? The mini-satellite cannot be that mini since it has to accommodate a battery and a radar large and powerful enough to detect, track and discriminate targets from potentially more than 100km range. Something of fighter radar size would be needed.

HGV by definition fly within the atmosphere. Important to point out: HGV cannot maneuver at low altitudes: they have to dead reckon the target position for the last 20km segment and properly align themselves. Their speed is their best defense against SAMs and point defense systems.

 

[tupolevtu144]

Taiwanese news is as trustworthy as Indian news, if not worse, and Indian news is basically as accurate as Bollywood movies when it comes to representing the truth. The thread on Ladakh will show you...

Just last year, a Taiwanese economist declared on news that mainland’s economy is in ruins and people cannot even afford zha cai (a type of food, extremely cheap) because the stock price of a large zha cai company is falling. Even Gordon Chang would not make a comment like that, and he has been predicting collapse of Chinese economy for over 20 years.

Please filter your sources before you post, Minnie Chan is already terrible enough, let’s not actually spend time looking at anything from the mainstream Taiwanese outlet. If I want to watch Epoch Times type of shit from Fa Lun Gong I’d go to their site, not on sinodefense forum.

Finally, I want to rant a bit. As a group of people who claim to be the true and legit descendent of the Chinese culture compared to “the communist thugs”, the level of intellectualism displayed in public discourse in Taiwan has set the bar really low, it is basically embarrassing. No wonder any sane Chinese mainlander will support the Non-serious “留岛不留人” policy when it comes to how the reunification should proceed once they become informed about what occupies the mind of your average Taiwanese.

I'm just posting claims put out by our local media. If the claims are false then I'm happy for counter-arguments to debunk such claims. Of course I won't post things which are outrageously false (such as stuff from the Epoch Times and New Tang Dynasty), but if there are claims which may be real (since they claimed they got their intel from US military sources), then I'll still post it nevertheless.

After all this is a forum for professional discussions and if we can't even debunk false claims, then we have a problem. If claims are false, then naturally they will be proven false with evidence. That's how a professional, academic debate works.

 

[tupolevtu144]

BTW if we come up with counter-arguments against false claims then we can also fight the spread of fake news in other forums. Just like when I was browsing Reddit there are already posts of fake news from Twitter saying that the missiles have failed and unfortunately people seem to be buying into it (in fact their claims are even more outrageous. They said that a missile missed, a missile crashed into a village, and a missile blew up immediately during launch lol. The poster even tried lying by saying that the DF-21 has no stages at all when people questioned the photos).

 

[ougoah]

Taiwanese news is as trustworthy as Indian news, if not worse, and Indian news is basically as accurate as Bollywood movies when it comes to representing the truth. The thread on Ladakh will show you...

Just last year, a Taiwanese economist declared on news that mainland’s economy is in ruins and people cannot even afford zha cai (a type of food, extremely cheap) because the stock price of a large zha cai company is falling. Even Gordon Chang would not make a comment like that, and he has been predicting collapse of Chinese economy for over 20 years.

Please filter your sources before you post, Minnie Chan is already terrible enough, let’s not actually spend time looking at anything from the mainstream Taiwanese outlet. If I want to watch Epoch Times type of shit from Fa Lun Gong I’d go to their site, not on sinodefense forum.

Finally, I want to rant a bit. As a group of people who claim to be the true and legit descendent of the Chinese culture compared to “the communist thugs”, the level of intellectualism displayed in public discourse in Taiwan has set the bar really low, it is basically embarrassing. No wonder any sane Chinese mainlander will support the Non-serious “留岛不留人” policy when it comes to how the reunification should proceed once they become informed about what occupies the mind of your average Taiwanese.

I think that's unfair. There is actually decent Taiwanese reporting as well. Objective and relatively politically neutral. Maybe things have changed somewhat but like Indian media, there are the occasional balanced pieces written by sober and emotionally competent people. We just don't give those much attention here.

I know Taiwanese who are not the stereotypical militant anti-mainlander. There are actually more than people think. It's just not "cool" for them to be vocal about it. As for the haters, yeah no doubt they exist as a majority, just like in India.

Communist thugs are long gone. Replaced by another semi pseudo thuggish? group but they're doing a fucking fine job and socialism is a joke in China. Maybe socialism with Chinese characteristics etc lol but China can be sort of viewed as a splintered group. Just like how the American states fought the British for independence, Taiwan wants the same. Years and years later, emotions are cooled and people who remember the hatred are long dead. It's entirely possible for Taiwan to become an independent sovereign nation and then eventually develop incredibly close ties to the mainland. It'll all be part of the vestige of Greater China not too different to how the US and UK are basically the old Anglo empire in many ways. At the moment in this tiny footnote of human history, Chinese people from Dandong to Singapore, have very little unity but continue to share more than they realise. It'll not take long for the petty, superficial anger to subside.

 

[Orthan]

Here are three pictures currently circulated by many Taiwanese media, all seems authentic and quoted from Weibo:

Have ever any of these pictures been posted before all of this?

Also, do the size of these boosters approach anything that we know of the ASBM´s ? seems to me that they are too small to be space rocket boosters, but perhabs someone in the forum knows better.

 

[tupolevtu144]

I think that's unfair. There is actually decent Taiwanese reporting as well. Objective and relatively politically neutral. Maybe things have changed somewhat but like Indian media, there are the occasional balanced pieces written by sober and emotionally competent people. We just don't give those much attention here.

I know Taiwanese who are not the stereotypical militant anti-mainlander. There are actually more than people think. It's just not "cool" for them to be vocal about it. As for the haters, yeah no doubt they exist as a majority, just like in India.

Communist thugs are long gone. Replaced by another semi pseudo thuggish? group but they're doing a fucking fine job and socialism is a joke in China. Maybe socialism with Chinese characteristics etc lol but China can be sort of viewed as a splintered group. Just like how the American states fought the British for independence, Taiwan wants the same. Years and years later, emotions are cooled and people who remember the hatred are long dead. It's entirely possible for Taiwan to become an independent sovereign nation and then eventually develop incredibly close ties to the mainland. It'll all be part of the vestige of Greater China not too different to how the US and UK are basically the old Anglo empire in many ways. At the moment in this tiny footnote of human history, Chinese people from Dandong to Singapore, have very little unity but continue to share more than they realise. It'll not take long for the petty, superficial anger to subside.

Umm... I don't agree with this one. I know we're going off topic so I'll put this short. People like me, especially the younger crowd, who aren't vehemently anti-China are so rare nowadays it takes once in a blue moon to come across one (excluding boomers who had lived under Chiang-Kai-Shek, they mostly relate to China but unfortunately they are dying away fast).

Since President Lee pro-independence groups have unfortunately successfully destroyed the Chinese identity here in Taiwan and sadly most people nowadays (yet again, excluding boomers who had lived under Chiang-Kai-Shek) identify more with Japan and look fondly to Japanese colonization rather than Chinese rule. (there are a surprising number of people, even in real life, who defend Japanese colonialism here in Taiwan) Heck there are even some people who identify with Imperial Japan and its militaristic policies (war crimes) in China.

Meanwhile if you dare talk about China (or even KMT's Nationalist China) they treat you with utmost hostility and spite. It's so bad nowadays that people are even starting to become literally racist against Chinese (and even Singaporean and Malaysian Chinese) people. They harbor the same attitude just like the Hong Kong rioters. They literally can't wait for China to collapse, Chinese society to get destroyed and China to get forever balkanized like Yugoslavia so the Chinese people can live under the boot of foreign powers to eternity.

It's sad, very sad, that the people here in Taiwan are literally brought up to hate China (and Chinese people) and look up to Japan. Unfortunately from what I see nowadays things are only going to go in the pro-Independence (pro-DPP) crowd's way. Forget having close ties and sharing Chinese heritage, I only see more hostility and hatred in the future towards China and the culture here in Taiwan trying to throw away its Chinese heritage harder than ever. I don't know what the endgame is and I only hope that it won't become full-blown hatred like that between the Hutu and Tutsi of Rwanda in my lifetime.

 

[ougoah]

Have ever any of these pictures been posted before all of this?

Also, do the size of these boosters approach anything that we know of the ASBM´s ? seems to me that they are too small to be space rocket boosters, but perhabs someone in the forum knows better.

These cylindrical boosters do look correct and are the size we expect for MRBM and IRBM. The jungle looks like it's more southern China as well. But boosters should have fallen somewhere in north western or central China. So maybe these are second stage boosters or the location is central China.

 

[supercat]

but if there are claims which may be real (since they claimed they got their intel from US military sources), then I'll still post it nevertheless.

I personally do not give a damn about what Western or U.S. government-intelligence-think tank-mainstream media complex says after all those false accusations such as North Vietnam attacked the U.S. military in the Gulf of Tonkin, Iraq had WMD, Qaddafi gave his troops Viagra so they could rape civilians who supported the rebels, and Assad gassed his own people etc.

The Chinese internet is not nearly tightly regulated as some people imagine. There are 1.4 billion Chinese. Some of them do not like Chinese government and they will not miss any opportunity to embarrass the government. Thus we have this fake news of 4 missiles launched and two failed, while in reality, the most likely scenario was probably two were launched and two first stage boosters fell inside China.

 

[Temstar]

The simplest argument for why the missile test was a success is thus:

This missile test isn't for the PLA, they already know it works, that's why they're showing it off.
It's not for the rest of the world, they're not picking a fight with China so it doesn't concern them
It's not for Taiwan, the range is far too excessive for use against Taiwan and Taiwan do not possess any naval targets worthwhile of using such weapon on

This test is for the USA and USA alone. It's a warning that their carriers are not welcome in the Western Pacific and should they attempt military adventurism against China anywhere within 4,000km of Chinese coast they should do so with the understanding that their carriers will be subject to attack with such weapon.

The US understands this well, they have looked into the matter of AShBM for many years. They have all the intelligence gather tools they can muster trained on this, and PLA did it in broad day light inviting them to gather as much data as they wish so they can fully understand the credible threat these AShBM present.

The US saw everything, and went silent except for a brief cookie cutter statement that China's test will further destabilise the region. Had the test been anything short of complete success US would have responded by now mocking the test. They are not doing this and are maintaining their silence.

That should tell you all you need to know about the result of the test. Everyone else's opinion is irrelevant.

 

[horse]

Taiwanese "media" doesn't know the difference between a booster stage and the actual warhead, got it.

So Mr. T is really here participating in the humour?



You know, the other Mister T here just did not seem like the real one.