Issues on Intercepting Hypersonic Missile.

Re: Latest PLAN Aircraft Carrier Info & Photos

Engineer said:

So you work for PLA and has insider information on PLA's R&D projects? How can you be 100% certain that ASBM "is not operational" and that none of the associated new technologies have ever been demonstrated?

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A test of a ballistic missile of this order, going down range thousands of kilometers would have been seen in its launch and boost, and would have been picked up across the region and tracked to its likely destination.

That has not happened.

There have been land tests of the system, not full flight tests.

I have never said that the Chinese are not working on it or that it does not exist. I have just stated that there has not been demonstration test of the system and I stand by that.

There is nothing regionally, nationalistic, or in any other way caustic about that statement.

As to the US BMD tests, those tests on land and sea have been conducted against very real world scenarios and against ballistic missiles...not drones...where the tests have been announced in advance with the results presented afterwards. The US has been very open about it.

That's why Korea, Japan, and others are buying the platforms that will allow them the same capability. The market talks pretty loudly in this area.

Again, there is nothing nationalitic about this, or defensive.

I have no doubts that the PRC is working on a system. I also know from my own experience how difficult what they propose is, and have seen no verifiable information, other than announcments of a program being worked on, and have heard no information from my own professional sources of any flight or demonstration test being conducted to date.

That's just a simple statement. When that changes I will be the first to announce it and state to the contrary.

No reason to get testy.

Re: Latest PLAN Aircraft Carrier Info & Photos

Jeff is right. There is no evidence that china has or doesnt have ASBM.

Re: Latest PLAN Aircraft Carrier Info & Photos

kroko said:

Jeff is right. There is no evidence that china has or doesnt have ASBM.

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Well the PLA has given various indications, there was an article where china's "number 2 military official" basically confirmed the project's existence. I'm not going to say the weapon is completely operational, but they must be pretty far along to give such a statement like "It is a limited capability” to meet “the minimum requirement of” China’s national security"



And even if the ASBM does go operational and does manage to hit carriers with good success rates - I would not say that makes the carrier obsolete in any way, they will still be the most flexible, capable, strike and power projection platform in the world. The threat of a war with a country with ASBM capability will not mean countries with carriers will not operate them against other countries without ASBM capability.

Re: Latest PLAN Aircraft Carrier Info & Photos

kroko said:

Jeff is right. There is no evidence that china has or doesnt have ASBM.

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Oh I think there is definitely some evidence that they are working on or towards such a system. I am simply saying that there is no evidence of any type of advanced or major testing of it...and certainly no evidence of any operational capability whatsoever.

I would add that in order to get anything operational that would be of any use, such testing would need to occur and that such testing of a long range ASBM capability would be noticed and logged by other nations.

bltizo said:

And even if the ASBM does go operational and does manage to hit carriers with good success rates - I would not say that makes the carrier obsolete in any way, they will still be the most flexible, capable, strike and power projection platform in the world. The threat of a war with a country with ASBM capability will not mean countries with carriers will not operate them against other countries without ASBM capability.

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I would say that even if some capability were fielded, that the major powers would go ahead with their carrier plans at this point because the defenses against such a system are already in place in many cases (AEGIS BMD) and continuing to develop. It is likely that by the time any such system is fielded and operational those defenses will even be better and more numerous.

But, gentlemen, we are getting far afield of the topic of this thread which is pictures and news regarding the PLAN carrier in general, and the Varyag specifically.

Re: Latest PLAN Aircraft Carrier Info & Photos

Jeff Head said:

I would say that even if some capability were fielded, that the major powers would go ahead with their carrier plans at this point because the defenses against such a system are already in place in many cases (AEGIS BMD) and continuing to develop. It is likely that by the time any such system is fielded and operational those defenses will even be better and more numerous.

But, gentlemen, we are getting far afield of the topic of this thread which is pictures and news regarding the PLAN carrier in general, and the Varyag specifically.

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Just quickly, isn't the SM-3 for ICBM interception? It's different to a theatre ballistic missile which is manouverable and has a different flight path (not to mention having decoys, stealthy apparently).
Half a dozen missiles, should be more than enough to try and destroy a potential carrier.
The US Navy's BMD, unless eventually designed specifically to take down ASBM's, I believe would not be a too potent challenge for a ASBM (in an ideal scenario where the ASBM and SM-3 both have full guidance and can be used to the full of their capabilites).
At this moment and in the near future I think it would be more likely that the attacker would have the advantage over the defender. If countries start putting high energy lasers onto their ships to target ballistic missiles, then I think ASBM's would definitely be outmatched. But I do believe current BMD's do not have the capability to get the better of an ASBM.

All this depends on when the ASBM will be fielded of course, if it's within a couple of years then I think my predictions are true - if it's a decade, then I will concede ASBM missile defence may be quite entrenched into various navies, at least the USN.


(Mods, maybe you can move the last few posts discussing ASBM's into the anti ship missile thread?)

Re: Latest PLAN Aircraft Carrier Info & Photos

Bltizo said:

Just quickly, isn't the SM-3 for ICBM interception? It's different to a theatre ballistic missile which is manouverable and has a different flight path (not to mention having decoys, stealthy apparently).
Half a dozen missiles, should be more than enough to try and destroy a potential carrier.
The US Navy's BMD, unless eventually designed specifically to take down ASBM's, I believe would not be a too potent challenge for a ASBM (in an ideal scenario where the ASBM and SM-3 both have full guidance and can be used to the full of their capabilites).

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The US Navy's BMD defense is a wide ranging, integrated missile defense system that encompasses ICBM (as you say with SM-3) medium range and short range ballistic missiles (with SM-2 Blk IV). The AEGIS system also, of course addresses the full range of cruise missiles. Numerous successful tests have been performed against each.

The following is from an exercise performed in March of this year where both a cruise missile and a ballistic missile (not an ICBM) were downed during the same exercise.

US NAvy said:

San Diego-based Aegis destroyer, USS Benfold (DDG 65) engaged multiple targets during this multi-event exercise with Standard Missile-2 (SM-2) Block IIIA and modified SM-2 BLK IV missiles. The overall objective of
Stellar Daggers was to test the Aegis system's sea-based ability to simultaneously detect, track, engage and destroy multiple incoming air and ballistic missile threats during terminal or final phase of flight.

During the event, Benfold's Aegis Weapons System successfully detected and intercepted a cruise missile target with a SM-2 BLK IIIA, while simultaneously detecting and intercepting an incoming short range ballistic missile (SRBM) target with a modified SM-2 BLK IV. This is the first time the fleet has successfully tested the Aegis system's ability to intercept both an SRBM in terminalphase and a low-altitude cruise missile target at the same time.

Integrated Air and Missile Defense (IAMD), which includes Ballistic Missile Defense (BMD), is a Navy core competency and a key warfighting capability
for the U.S. maritime strategy, which calls for credible combat power to be continuously postured to protect America's vital interests.

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Re: Latest PLAN Aircraft Carrier Info & Photos

Jeff Head said:

The US Navy's BMD defense is a wide ranging, integrated missile defense system that encompasses ICBM (as you say with SM-3) medium range and short range ballistic missiles (with SM-2 Blk IV). The AEGIS system also, of course addresses the full range of cruise missiles. Numerous successful tests have been performed against each.

The following is from an exercise performed in March of this year where both a cruise missile and a ballistic missile (not an ICBM) were downed during the same exercise.

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

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Well that is interesting.

BUT, that's not to say it will be able to take down a manouvering ASBM.
I'm not going to write too much now on ASBM vs BMD, cause we've already done so in previous threads, and whichever will win will depend on the conditions they are used against each other.
I stand by my statement that the ASBM will have some length of advantage over BMD though, but I won't say anymore on it cause we are way off topic now.

Re: Latest PLAN Aircraft Carrier Info & Photos

GreenestGDP said:

My deep apology to everyone that feels offended by my exuberant comments.

I will definitely try very hard to tone down my rhetoric.

I am just extremely worried that PLAN Master Planners will tilt their strategic planning unwisely toward building those "In_Your_Face_Weapons" such as Aircraft Carrier battle group, and sacrificing the precious resources & time at their disposal.

Building and defending Aircraft Carrier requires way too much resources and damaging the Peaceful Rising National brand.

Asymmetric Warfare is definitely the way to go forward.

PLAN should channel their resources to build higher quality Submarines which will function as the forward spotter in order to guide the AShBM in attacking the enemies ships and use the Submarine to launch the flexible UAV to attack the land targets.

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Actually, when we look at why a country actually needed an aircraft carrier, we must first know their intention for such a hardware. What is the actual strategy that the country is adopting.

An ASBM (if it works) is a good denial weapon, it would effectively make a couple of thousands kilometer of the water around the country inassessible to hostile forces in term of ships and stuff.

However as it see, the weapon is a defensive weapon. It is for area denial. China is going into a blue water navy, she wanted to operate her ship globally. But a couple of destroyers and frigates without the coverage of aircraft is pretty open to aerial threats and casaulty is high even against shore or sea base defence.

Thus she need aircraft carrier (which in my opinion is a mobile airbase) to launch aircrafts for both strikes and defence roles against all targets - 3 dimensional - ships, land base target, aerial targets, etc.

An ASBM is a good system (I believe nobody will deny that), but it is only good against ships, and at the most land base objects. And we are always only looking to Taiwan scenario. We must open our mind wider, future PLAN is not just created for defensive roles to the motherland, she is building into a global power with full power projection, and without the capability to bring her fighters anywhere around the globe, such a role cannot be achieved.

Re: Latest PLAN Aircraft Carrier Info & Photos

agree with rhino there, the inspiration for such system came from the 96 Taiwan strait crisis. when the PLA test launched DF-15's, the US ambassador asked a PLA officer if the missile would miss the target and accidentally hit the US carrier fleet nearby...LMAO the Americans were the ones that invented the idea so cant blame the Chinese for using it.

Re: Latest PLAN Aircraft Carrier Info & Photos

Trying to look for an article, I think it's in one of these forums, but there was one recently that mentioned that the ASBM could be capable of doing some bouncing-type maneuvering in the upper atomosphere to fool any BMD. There was graphic.



Here it is...