China's Space Program Thread II

jli88

Junior Member
Registered Member
That actually might work, GD is for boost phase interception, nukes in orbit means they have skipped the boost phase, into midcourse now. Plus nukes just 300-400 km above a target, will provide only minutes for interception.

Gosh, I am scared of this world! Nukes in space are scary. They are prohibited by the Outer Space Treaty, but the treaty allows countries to exit the treaty with a years notice.
 

Tomboy

Senior Member
Registered Member
Nukes place in higher orbits than GD satellites? Put a deadman trigger in the system, the moment two or three get destroyed, the rest will be fired. Put sensors on the satellites, when threats against them re detected, they’ll fired.
And what launch their payload? And then get intercepted? Also, first country to put nukes in orbit is going to face vast amount of backlash and give your opponent a sound reason to put their nukes in space as well.
 

jli88

Junior Member
Registered Member
And what launch their payload? And then get intercepted? Also, first country to put nukes in orbit is going to face vast amount of backlash and give your opponent a sound reason to put their nukes in space as well.

Well it will be MAD once again, but this time via space based prepositioned warheads. And this dynamic will actually favor Russia, China more than the US because currently Chinese, Russian nukes need to be launched from much farther, and face far greater risks of interception specially using US defences near Chinese/Russian borders. Space will be a complete neutralizer.

But space is scary, one wrong thing, and we are all dead.
 

iewgnem

Captain
Registered Member
Chatter about Golden Dome is getting stronger which might have a space based interceptor component to it.

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Does anyone know (or would speculate) what China would do if US were to suddenly decide to launch thousands of space based interceptors which builds a reliable missile defense safety net? US has the launch capacity, specially with Starship in future.
US launch vehicle availability isn't actually all that great for SBI. Falcon series are mass and volume constrained for, while Starhip's actual payload to orbit is, shall we say to be determined because it's currently sitting at zero. New Glen might work but New Glen is only slightly more capable than LM5 and not comparable to LM10.

It's also moot because, people always forget its the payload that make up the majority of space system cost, not launch. The cost and complexity of SBI is on such a scale that it does not really care about launch vehicle availability, and there is every indication that US could not even remotely afford such a system.

Regardless what US is doing with GD though, based on experience from so many programs in the past, if China does become convinced America is pursuing SBI, it will actually go ahead and build the Chinese SBI, only to find out Americans didn't. After all China actually does have the resources to build it, and China hasn't been developing megawatt class orbital nuclear power just for a couple of guys on the moon....
 

iewgnem

Captain
Registered Member
Are you serious? The payload quantity US sends is like >5x China already. This gap will stay as it is, since China doesn't have anything like starship in plans currently.
This is an interesting topic because if you only look at aspirational plans, then China also "plans" on building LM9
And if you look actual program in development, LM10's payload to orbit is basically Starship v3 lol
People grossly underestimate the density of steel.

US currently sends more than China because SpaceX sends a lot of Starlinks to LEO on medium lift Falcon 9, but on an individual launch basis US currently does actually have any LV that can match LM5 in payload and volume, except maybe New Glen if it can demonstrate it's claimed LEO capability.
 

Wrought

Senior Member
Registered Member
Chatter about Golden Dome is getting stronger which might have a space based interceptor component to it.

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Does anyone know (or would speculate) what China would do if US were to suddenly decide to launch thousands of space based interceptors which builds a reliable missile defense safety net? US has the launch capacity, specially with Starship in future.

Set off nukes in the upper atmosphere, obviously. Make an artificial Van Allen belt; now nobody has any LEO satellites.

Folks will whine about that, of course, but if you are suddenly launching huge numbers of interceptors unilaterally, then your enemies will obviously assume the worst. "Well just lay down and die" is not a convincing argument.
 

madhusudan.tim

New Member
Registered Member
Set off nukes in the upper atmosphere, obviously. Make an artificial Van Allen belt; now nobody has any LEO satellites.

Folks will whine about that, of course, but if you are suddenly launching huge numbers of interceptors unilaterally, then your enemies will obviously assume the worst. "Well just lay down and die" is not a convincing argument.
This is an interesting topic because if you only look at aspirational plans, then China also "plans" on building LM9
And if you look actual program in development, LM10's payload to orbit is basically Starship v3 lol
People grossly underestimate the density of steel.

US currently sends more than China because SpaceX sends a lot of Starlinks to LEO on medium lift Falcon 9, but on an individual launch basis US currently does actually have any LV that can match LM5 in payload and volume, except maybe New Glen if it can demonstrate it's claimed LEO capability.
Belittling quantifiable achievements by SpaceX and others should not be sexy. Raptor v3 and v4 being quite good wrt to thrust, twr, and isp is non deniable. New booster recovery system engineering, stainless steel based construction and its optimization, heat resistant tile manufacturing and optimization, stage separation system, and others. These innovations came through heavy investment, building skillset of thousands of workers and engineers, and it build very broad and deep institutional skills and experience. It is therefore more than likely that the starship program will be optimized further to launch large sized payloads and male it a reliable super heavy platform. Recreating this is impossible in China because the risk tolerance is minimal. Too much scrutiny. Its like West getting off guard by the rapid dominance of Chinese EVs across the large swath of world. They could never imagine battery being this cheap and ev taking off economically. China shouldn’t get lazy thinking that Starship program wont be successful.
 

enroger

Senior Member
Registered Member
I don't see how the Golden Dome could change the strategic equation for many reasons:

1) Achieving the ability to have hundreds or thousands of heavy space-based interceptors that can accurately track and intercept ballistic missiles from the boost phase would require astronomical amounts of money, money that the US is already struggling to find for its day to day military needs (R&D, procurement, maintenance, etc.).

2) The required satelites would be huge, easy to track, jam or destroy. I mean what's stopping Russia from frying them with an improved peresvet system, even during peacetime? No nation would want to have a weapon system taking a stroll above their land. It's equivalent to saying that a strategic bomber has the right to fly above you at any time if its altitude is more than 100 km. It makes no sense to me.

3) There are already delivery systems that negate whatever advantages the golden dome might theoretically provide, such as the nuclear powered cruise missile or the nuclear powered deep-sea torpedo. All Russia or China have to do is continue to improve them and manufacture them in far greater numbers. At that point economy of scale will take over and make them cheaper. We also shouldn't forget about strategic bombers. They were deemed inferior to ballistic missiles in the past, but they're still pretty good, especially if they were made to be stealthy or hypersonic or both.

4) Strategic balance can be restored by simply building and deploying an equivalent system. Something that China can easily do and Russia would be able to do if they designate it as a priority. But that would also mean that warfare would have to fully transition to the space domain, with counter-interceptors and counter-counter-interceptors. Eventually culminating in space fighter planes. But that's a can of worm I'm not sure the US would be willing, or could afford, to open.

I'll add to that Golden Dome like system cannot deal with concentrated launch, it is fundamentally a spread out system where only a tiny fraction of interceptors can respond to launches from any one geolocation. Theoretically even DPRK can defeat such a system by launching all their missiles from one place, to defend against that you'll need ten times as many interceptors again. They can even add to that mix something that can fake the infrared signature of ICBM, it doesn't need to fake it for long as the response window for boost phase interception is very short.

But I'll say we're underestimating the impact of Golden Dome precisely because of that. It may not be a viable missile defense system but it can be a very effective space blockade system or anti-satellite warfare system. Which is why I think China should not sleep on this, either develop similar system or come up with countermeasures.
 
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