PLA missile defense system

rhino123 said:

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Thanks rhino. I was hoping someone will fill me in on what that Mandarin was all about. Now I know. BTW, where did you learn that sharp Mandarin ??? I mean beats me. My mother tongue is Cannuck Chinglish. Quite distinct from Mandarin actually. Do they teach Mandarin in Calcutta as well :rofl:???

Harley-One said:

Thanks rhino. I was hoping someone will fill me in on what that Mandarin was all about. Now I know. BTW, where did you learn that sharp Mandarin ??? I mean beats me. My mother tongue is Cannuck Chinglish. Quite distinct from Mandarin actually. Do they teach Mandarin in Calcutta as well :rofl:???

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Actually I will just take what you say in face value:rofl: But actually I am a Singaporean. I am an oversea Chinese, not born in China, if you know what I mean.

Oh... btw. In case someone else bring this up again, let me clarify what does Mandarin actually mean. Mandarin (Madarin Chinese) usually means "Speech of Official" (translated directly from the language as stated in Wikipedia, and I quote,

"In English, Mandarin can refer to either of two distinct concepts:

1) In everyday use Mandarin refers to Standard Chinese or Standard Mandarin (Putonghua / Guoyu / Huayu), which is based on the particular Mandarin dialect spoken in Beijing. Standard Mandarin functions as the official spoken language of the People's Republic of China, the official language of the Republic of China (Taiwan), and one of the four official languages of Singapore. "Chinese"—in practice Standard Mandarin—is one of the six official languages of the United Nations.

2) In its broader sense, Mandarin is a diverse group of Mandarin dialects spoken in northern and southwestern China (Guanhua / Beifanghua / Beifang fangyan). This group of dialects is the focus of this article. "

Oh and by the way, in some countries, when you said that you speak Chinese, the authority would take it that you actually speak Cantonese. And if you said that you speak Mandarin, then they would take it that you speak Standard Chinese (Beijing or Beifang Chinese).

Note to mod: This thread had suddenly become a language thread... if the content is not valid, please feel free to edit or even delete what I have written.

-- OT -- From my experience there is no official language in China, one finally learns one dialect, then traverse a province border only to be met with quizzical faces on the other side...*sigh* -- OT --

I agree the real strength of nuclear weapons is fear factor. At least back in the Cold War days ABM systems were viewed as merely an attempt to face this fear and calm the populace, well knowing a real defence against a massive nuclear attack was impossible (aside from first strike decapitation). Indeed, you wouldn't put all faith into a couple of ABMs if a nuclear missile was aimed at you. To my knowledge, this was the background for the ABM treaty, ABM systems were ineffective, expensive, and the only real effect they produced was incentive for the other side to add more missiles to their arsenal.

I do not know if ABMs today are any more effective than back then (though technological advances would suggest so), but I believe, as many of the above posters, that this ABM test is mainly for sending a message. As with China's meager nuclear arsenal (compared to a potential US adversary), the ABM capability is all about fear factor and having the capability to do something, while not actually seriously following through on the capability.

PS: I was unaware the UK and France had ABM capabilities?

Actually I was wondering how much does an ABM system cause, the missile, the warhead, tracking devices, etc. And how much does a nuclear missile with all supporting system costed.

As mentioned by Maggern, the ABM is extremely expensive and I kind of believe in what he said. That is why it might be important to focus mainly on obtaining as much nuclear missiles as possible rather than spending billions into a system that basically is not very efficient.

Plus I believe that US is able to develope and deploy the ABM and this idea is sound for the US case. This is because of the following reasons,

1) US had a huge arsenal of nuclear weapons already, and they do not need to keep obtaining more nuclear weapons.

2) US already had a very advance tracking, detection and targeting system that was an integration of spy satellites, targeting satellites (??), ships, aerial vehicles, land base radars, etc, thus developing the ABM might be simpler and faster.

3) US had huge number of allies and could deploy the ABM system near the precinity of her opponents. This would disallow enemy's from launching a missile, because the ABM umbrella will knock these missiles off the sky even before they left the airspace.

4) US is a rich country even after the financial crisis, and so could afford large number of anti-ballistic missile missiles.

Reasons why I think China is not in a position for the ABM,

1) ABM is expensive and not really very effective if the missiles had already closes in on the mainland. And unless the Umbrella could be extended far away from the mainland, it practically is not very effective. Thus the umbrella deployed by the Chinese could only achieve limited capability and efficiency aganist very close neighbours.

2) China's spy satellites and other tracking and detection system is still not very effective or she lack these capability altogether, thus it is really not a very effective means of deterrence.

3) China's nuclear weapon arsenal is very small... and thus it would be better to spend her resources in getting a second strike capability and improve on the survival of her ground base ballistic missiles.

4) China might be rich now, but she might still want to spend her resources (military resources) in obtaining, building and developing modern weapons such as ships and aircrafts. And also to improve her infrastructure, especially to those structures that are more towards the west and north of the country so that her forces could move with more ease within the nation by itself.

So in another word, the country's effort in the ABM is applaudable... but was it really necessary?

Maggern said:

-- OT -- From my experience there is no official language in China, one finally learns one dialect, then traverse a province border only to be met with quizzical faces on the other side...*sigh* -- OT --

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Actually, I think there is. The definition of the official language of Chinese dialect is the use of pronunciation of Beijing dialect combined with Southern Chinese tones. For instance, how each word should be pronounced is strictly defined according to this definition. This is taught in every school in China. Of course, you won't be persecuted for speaking your own local dialect, but in school the official dialect is what is taught and tested. I think in most big cities, only the official dialect is permitted in school. You can only speak your own local dialect outside the school. Of course, how strictly people enforce these rules is a completely different matter. I think I heard this from a friend from Shanghai. So please correct me if I'm wrong. And if you want to pass those all important tests to go to college, you better know the official Chinese is spoken.

Also, ALL vocal communication and entertainment, such as radio and TV programs, have to be in the official dialect, no matter what your local dialect is. So in that sense, China has an official dialect.

BTW, I think we are talking about dialect, not language (so not to confuse our fellow forum members who don't speak Chinese). The official Language in China is no doubt CHINESE, no matter it is Mandarin , Cantonese, Shanghai-ness, Minnaness or whatever.

rhino123 said:

So in another word, the country's effort in the ABM is applaudable... but was it really necessary?

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IMHO, as long as another country has ballistic missiles, a development of ABM is not only necessary, but essential. As for the nuclear weapons, I don't think you need a whole lot. As long as you have the ability to launch and hit a few enemy targets, that should be enough to keep the enemy from using the nuclear weapons all together. It's a deterrent weapon, not meant for actual fighting.

vesicles said:

IMHO, as long as another country has ballistic missiles, a development of ABM is not only necessary, but essential.

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Yes, I acknowledged that it is necessary to have an ABM umbrella... but as mentioned in my previous post, China might not be in the position for this system yet.

Mainly because... at present moment, it really is questionable of how effective the ABM is. The system that China is building cover only its own ground... and I questioned the numbers of ABM missiles China has or is afforded to build. And how many of these missiles will be required to knock off one ballistic missile even from... say, India in a real war situation when there are huge number of unknowns, such as location of launch, which area will the missile hit, the terrain, the environment, the weather, etc.

And my arguement as to why US is in a position to develope and deploy ABM, mainly because, she had huge number of allies all over the world... allies such as Japan, South Korea, Philipines, Taiwan... even Thailand, etc. And I believe that if US was to request for placing her ABM in Singapore, the country will not resist the idea too.

So China or any of asia country who happen to launch a ballistic missile (in the most unlikely scenario) at US, their missile will be knock off sky without even leaving the airspace.

However China do not have such a luxury. When the missile was launched, the limited range of her umbrella will only be able to hit and destroy a ballistic missile only when it is near her airspace. And if the missile was to escape her ABM umbrella, there simply is very little or nothing China could do to knock the missile off.

US on the other hand could deploy and set many layers of ABM, even shorter range SM-3 and land based patriot all over her allies, thus a ballistic missile really have to escape larger number of defence the US had.

Also US had a very powerful second strike capability (nuclear submarine, destroyers and carriers), thus even if the ballistic missiles of enemy hit her mainland, she could still retaliate with catashropic effect.

China do not have such ability. In recent years we saw alot of developement in submarine technology for China, but up till now, she only have very limited second strike capability.

Thus I would believe that resources should be allocated more for larger and more capable second strike capability such as more nuclear submarines (more of them), destroyers (more of them), aircraft carriers (at least 3 or 4).

This would be a more viable defence, in the sense that no country would try to attack mainland china, as they knew, the country would have a credible second strike even when the mainland was hit.

I believe this is much more important than building defensive ABM umbrella that had questionable capability and efficiency.

rhino123 said:

Actually I will just take what you say in face value:rofl:

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You mean you don't have any confidence in what I say? Shame!

But actually I am a Singaporean. I am an oversea Chinese, not born in China, if you know what I mean.

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O'h! Sorry to hear that. I guess that's why we call it :nana::nana: 星洲炒米 :nana::nana: instead of 咖喱炒米 ... No! Just kiddin'

Oh... btw. In case someone else bring this up again, let me clarify what does Mandarin actually mean. Mandarin (Madarin Chinese) usually means "Speech of Official" (translated directly from the language as stated in Wikipedia, and I quote,

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Hehe roflol

Done with my kiddin' round, rhino. No hard feelin's buddy. shakes :china::china:

Maggern said:

-- OT -- From my experience there is no official language in China...

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I don't think that's quite true. Officially, Chinese is China's national language.

Official Chinese national dialect however is another thing altogether. By Chinese law, pǔtōng huà (普通話) or another more down to earth term for it would be guóyǔ (國語) is China's official dialect...

Damn!!! Laowi's, what do they know anyway ...

ABM test is mainly for sending a message.

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That too is also untrue. While I seriously doubt any of the major nuclear powers would wager their security solely on the gist or the security the ABM and/or the NMD offers, the ABM/NMD system however does qualify as an acute variable with respect to the survivability of hostile missiles.

For this, you have to give the Chinese credit for having taken one step forward in this missile defense arena, namely militarization of space. Militarization of space is one notch up from the NMD system gist...

Imagine hordes and hordes of manned Jeteye starfighters blanketing the upper atmosphere on a kill mission going after, yes, hordes and hordes of hostile ICBM's as it reaches the upper atmosphere heading to a certain or specific target ...

As with China's meager nuclear arsenal

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How would you know if whether or not China's nuclear arsenal is as you put it: "MEAGER"??? Can you prove that?

:nana:

Harley-One said:

Done with my kiddin' round, rhino. No hard feelin's buddy. shakes :china::china:

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No worries Harley. But I think we will have to get back to the topic before the mod jumped at us.

Anyway, like I have mentioned before, I think it really is a waste of precious resources (China is rich, but not that rich, because she is just climbing out from the slump in recent decades and her population is huge, so not everyone is out of proverty yet) to develope the ABM missile shield.

My arguement had already been posted in previous posts and so I will only do a summary here,

1) Questionable efficiency without (and even with) state of the art space technology such as spy satellites and stuff like that.

2) Limited to only mainland China. Which means she would only be able to hit and knock off missiles when they closes in onto their air space (even when the missiles are still above atmosphere).

3) ABM system is very expensive to develope, manufacture and I believe to maintain too. So the question is how many do the Chinese have now?

Thus I would think that it would be better for China to first develope a powerful second strike capability which would include more ballistic missile nuclear submarines, a couple of carrier battle group, more destroyers and cruisers... which is basically a bigger blue water navy.

And she would also do good to develope and deploy strategic bombers that could carry longer range cruise missiles and stuff.

Only with these capabilities being built up, could she finally achieve the deterrence that was needed to prevent hostile nations from launching missiles at them. This is what I call Offensive Defence Deterrence... rather than purely defensive.