China Ballistic Missiles and Nuclear Arms Thread

[AmiGanguli]

Re: China's DF-41

I don't think relying on satellites would make sense for China. The U.S. has the ability to shoot them down too easily. A highly redundant optical fibre network would make more sense. Fibre is immune to EM interference and can't be jammed, only blown up. And for that you need to locate all the cables and hit them with bunker-busters.

Even in the absence of direct evidence either way, it makes no sense that a country with sophisticated civilian communications and cheap labour for burying cables (the most expense part of building the network), would neglect this part of their military infrastructure.

If you're making the claim that they somehow forgot about this, then I think you need to provide some sort of evidence. Otherwise it's more sensible infer the existence of a sophisticated military infrastructure from the existence of a sophisticated civilian infrastructure.

... Ami.

 

[Violet Oboe]

Re: China's DF-41

Kongo please, use smilies or irony tags if you intend to make some jokes!
I assume to your own advantage that your comparison of China's milcom infrastructure with the ragtag crap fielded by tinpot saddamite Iraq was irony at best. (perhaps and ignorance at worst?)

Of course China does not emulate a indeed capable US C3-I since China has simply a different force structure (regarding numbers and capabilities) and a different doctrine (stringent no first use). Furthermore it is unclear whether the chinese leadership has made a decision to create strategic parity with Russia and/or US and correspondingly we wil have to wait and see.

Also dear Kongo I must repeat myself: Second Artillery C3-I is heavily classified in China and naturally neither of our members can prove something which is currently beyond public knowledge. Nevertheless it is probably a safe bet that the ´control freaks´in Beijing do not bicker about necessary funds needed for controlling their ultimate weapons and paying up for the bills will be obviously not of foremost concern for them like we have today already learned (18% hike in FY 07 PLA budget).

The capacity of US military forces to destroy or interrupt PLA C3-I is dependent on their ability to identify and locate them; simply put: What you cannot see you cannot hit! (former secretary of defense Rumsfeld described this dilemma as ´known and unknown unknown´) China's military planners are paying utmost attention to this decisive problem and we will probably witness in the coming years whether they had some success or not. Although a nation with nearly 10 million sq km territory and more than 1.3 bn people should have ample resources to turn perceptions into false realities and vice versa.

P.S.kongo: I recommend reading a couple of books authored by former NSA chief William E. Odom:
Collapse of the Soviet Military (2000), America's Inadvertent Empire (2005), Trial After Triumph: East Asia After the Cold War (1992). The guy is an excellent strategist and he explains US successes and failures during the Cold War very instructively.:coffee:

 

[crobato]

Re: China's DF-41

It is very difficult to locate and target a hidden military fiberoptic infrastructure, when you are confronted with what is literally a massive jungle of civilian network infrastructure that also includes telephone and power. This is especially when the cables are easily buried deep underground and even through hills and mountains.

Really, was destroying Iraq's that hard? I can't imagine how a cash starved, sanctioned hit 3rd world country can have a massive first class fiberoptic infrastructure in the first place. Much less consider the size of the respective countries which allows for massive target dispersion and redudancy, and the population which amounts to a magnitudinally sized infrastructure you can hide your own C31 within. If you're trying to take out the communications alone, there are so much potential targets, you can't know which are the right ones. And it would require so much resources that you cannot devote to attacking anything else.

 

[maozedong]

Re: China's DF-41

DF-3/CSS-2 ranrge:2,700Km-3,500Km

DF-4/CSS-3 range:4,000Km-5,000Km

DF-5/CSS-4 range:12,000Km DF-5A range:15,000Km

DF-15/CSS-5 range:3,000Km

JL-1/CSS-N-3 range:3,000Km

DF-31 range: 8,000Km

JL-2/SSN-4 original type range:8,600Km improved type range:unknow

DF-41 range:14,000Km

 

[Violet Oboe]

Re: China's DF-41

Cool collection, thanks mao!

Regarding the last pic:
This impressive view shows does not show an DF-41 but an early mod launcher of a Russian Topol-M (SS-27) (may be in the late 90'?). Interestingly the launcher is different in many minor details from the older standard Topol (SS-25) and from the newer currently deployed Topol-M (SS-27) launcher. Correspondingly the most likely explanation would be that the pic is infact showing an early prototype (possibly without a missile inside) but perhaps China has bought some launcher units from Belarus for testing purposes?

(Belarus produced advanced TEL's during the soviet era and they retain obviously valuable knowhow and the leadership in Minsk is politically and economically close to China. So a tech transfer to China would certainly be possible.)

 

[renmin]

Re: China's DF-41

It looks too Russian to be Chinese. That launcher does not look like any of the versions of the Russian TOPOL M launcher. Infact, the chasis of the laucher looks like that of a overstretched Maz SCUD launcher. I still think it is fake. It does not look real at all.
This is the Russian TOPOL M

What the heck is this? It looks like a DF-11 but there are 2 extra wheels

 

[Violet Oboe]

Re: China's DF-41

Well, actually I mentioned that the ´russian launcher´looks awkwardly different for a Topol-/M dear renmin but this could be a prototype or even a testing model for cross country capability.

Perhaps three explanations are plausible:

1. The thing is a russian modified (testmodel?) launcher for a topol class missile (around mid-late 90's).

2. The pic shows a TEL of the road mobile version of the ´Molodets´ICBM (SS-24). During the mid-late 80's the soviets built several prototypes of TEL's for this giant solid missile. Possibly they conducted also successful live firing tests from these mobile launchers. Experts agree that a handfull of these ´big ones´have been built and perhaps we have a look of them now, although a `real`SS-24 TEL should be even bigger than this ´baby´ in my opinion (I do not know of verified pics of them being already around but may be a knowledgeable russian friend knows more??).

3. China bought a number of TEL's in Belarus for testing and tech transfer and the ´thing´is a belarussian import during ´duty´in China. (possible but quite unlikely in my opinion)

@renmin:
China has exported the M-18 technology to Pakistan in the mid 90's (i.e. a DF-15 with an additional stage and up to 2000 km range). May be a chinese version of M-18 (Shaheen-1/2) exists as a conventional complement to the nuclear armed DF-21 and equipped with a high precision MARV warhead. Kanwa has published in Jan/Feb '07 some interesting articles about Pakistan's nuclear ballistic and cruise missile arsenal and they maintain that the TEL's of Shaheen missiles are from China or are at least manufactured under chinese license. Your picture bears some similarities with the pakisitani TEL's and probably PLA has a more advanced indigenous IRBM similar to Shaheen-2 meanwhile in service.
(Well, that's just my guess!)

 

[Violet Oboe]

Re: China's DF-41

@renmin:
Is that the only pic of a 5x5 TEL around or have some other pics surfaced? Probably a reloading vehicle containing two reserve missiles exists also (like the TEL + reload vehicle team of DF-15).

@kongo: Have you been to the library recently? Could you post some of your consolidated findings please, or do you not want to share them?

 

[fishhead]

Re: China's DF-41

First time I saw this picture, 2 in the drill, seems in the service status.

 

[maozedong]

Re: China's DF-41

this is nice pic, the missiles in the good launch place where hiding in mountain area.
the scenery is so nice, maybe some tunnels arround.