China depends less on Russian Technology

Roger604 said:

The F-15 missile was not a direct-ascent satellite kill. Tailing a low-flying satellite and shooting it down from behind is much easier than a direct-ascent interception.

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The kinetic kill vehicle has to go head on with the target satellite for the reason that the vehicle's velocity is very much smaller than the target's orbital velocity. This is especially so in the case of the US ASAT test where the missile fired from a F-15 jet is relatively much smaller than a ground based ASAT's missile. The only question is how successful was the US's ASAT program back then.

Quickie said:

The kinetic kill vehicle has to go head on with the target satellite for the reason that the vehicle's velocity is very much smaller than the target's orbital velocity. This is especially so in the case of the US ASAT test where the missile fired from a F-15 jet is relatively much smaller than a ground based ASAT's missile. The only question is how successful was the US's ASAT program back then.

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Actually, my understanding is that the F-15 acquired a lock on the low-orbit satellite and then fired the missile, which is faster than the satellite and hit it from behind. Just as it would hit a fast and high flying aircraft.

Roger604 said:

Actually, my understanding is that the F-15 acquired a lock on the low-orbit satellite and then fired the missile, which is faster than the satellite and hit it from behind. Just as it would hit a fast and high flying aircraft.

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That would require the KKV carrying missile to travel more than 15 mach! That just wouldn't be possible with a missile fired from a jet fighter.

Quickie said:

That would require the KKV carrying missile to travel more than 15 mach! That just wouldn't be possible with a missile fired from a jet fighter.

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Actually it can if the "warhead" is small enough. The one used here is very small, only 13kg. Also the missile is launched near the upper atmosphere so that would minimize drag issues. Once the rocket is past the atmosphere, it will only keep gaining speed.

Personally I'm not sure if that test had a head or rear end collision. My impression is that it was head on.

Addendum:

After reading this it appears to be head on.

crobato said:

Actually it can if the "warhead" is small enough. The one used here is very small, only 13kg. Also the missile is launched near the upper atmosphere so that would minimize drag issues. Once the rocket is past the atmosphere, it will only keep gaining speed.

Personally I'm not sure if that test had a head or rear end collision. My impression is that it was head on.

Addendum:

After reading this it appears to be head on.

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The issue here is the size of the missile or rocket, and therefore the energy required to attain orbital velocity. A fighter jet would have trouble carrying a missile of that size even if the missile is multistaged without a payload. (The payload normally contributes only a small percentage of the total rocket mass.) There would be less atmospheric resistance at higher altitude but much of the energy expended goes to the payload's K.E and P.E.

China is a child that no other kid wants to play with.
If any kid invites China to play with his toys, his parent United States would say no.
Russia is the only friend that would share his toys with China.
China would not depend on Russia toys when he can get his own toys.

This is true that the Chinese would eventually lessen her dependency on Russian technology.

The Chinese are still new and less experienced than the West, mainly the US and the Russians in terms of weapons technology and development.

In a few decades the Chinese would be more self reliant.

more article on this matter, I guess the recent lack of orders has finally affected the deliveries.

I don't think anyone is surprised that the delivery total dropped 63% in 2007, considering that the final sov was handed over in 2006 and most of the kilos were handed over in 2006 also. As we look forward to this year, I'm guessing there is not going to be much deliveries this year.

majority of russian weapon system purchased by China were either decade or 2 decade behind west of US.
I suspect China may decided to wait until better equipment emerge.

challenge said:

majority of russian weapon system purchased by China were either decade or 2 decade behind west of US.
I suspect China may decided to wait until better equipment emerge.

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By then, that better equipment will most likely be designed and made in China itself rather than Russia. That, and the fact that China's prudent (if often necessary) resort to dual-use technologies has led them to forgo some of the Western-style long-lead, "gold-plated" approach to some military R&D, which encourages direct resort to whatever is readily available on the commerical market. Although technology changes so quickly, China is able to quickly upgrade just by following commerical technological trends. Open Source R&D, if you will. No substitute for a good deal of the higher-end stuff, but a good approach for a lot of the less esoteric stuff. In any case, it would appear that the Russian tech-well has effectively dried up for China's purposes.