I mean okay fair enough, US military air bases are more vulnerable to attack than equivalent Chinese ones. The other points still stand. It's still not a good use of high value limited H-20
Maybe a day 1 surprise attack this would be worthwhile. However after that civilian airports would be taken over, airplanes dispersed, alert levels raised, etc. From sheer distance strikes from H-20 would be sporadic at best. Just like sending a handful of B-2s or B-21s alone against Chinese mainland targets would be ineffective and thus not attempted, the reverse is also true.
It is true that US GBAD battalions are spread out quite thinly but I maintain there is enough available to defend the US west coast that H-20 raids are not worth it. Also we're specifically discussing H-20 raids on US west coast here so counts of short/medium range systems aren't really that relevant, it's the theatre air defense that matters. This is why I compare Patriot to HQ-9 and HQ-9B to show that in terms of theatre GBAD US isn't really that lacking.
I'm sorry but I have no idea what you're trying to say here. It's purely for deterrence for the possibility of strikes on US mainland? I mean it might make the US spend more on hardening sure but I'm pretty skeptical that H-20 would be worth it just for that. As for the stock markets, a general war would do that H-20 or no H-20.
