PLA Strategy in a Taiwan Contingency

Iron Man said:

I like how magnanimous you are to claim that everyone else could do the allegedly easy legwork, yet nobody including you can actually produce the goods despite claiming over and over how easy it is. If you had spent your time actually trying to prove yourself right instead of dishonestly zigging and zagging trying so hard to avoid the consequences of your own words, you would have ended the debate already. The fact is, you only recently realized how absurdly difficult your moronic question is to answer, but are still trying so hard to front like it's some kind of easy peasy basic math solution. You can keep ejaculating that the answer is "simple" all you want, but until you actually demonstrate that it IS actually "simple", all you're doing is jerking off online to your own words over and over.

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I don’t need to “prove myself” dummy. My question was not difficult. You just went from smug to screechy when someone reminded you that the correct way to do any force balance analysis between China and the US in China’s periphery wasn’t “USN vs PLAN” but “USN vs PLAN+PLARF+PLAAF”. Only someone of your low mental and emotional caliber could fly off the handle over such an easy point to validate. You’re the one fronting here, muppet

https://www.reddit.com/r/taiwan/comments/1jmali6
Was really surprised to open this post and see most comments supporting/justifying the TW soldiers' espionage, lol. On Reddit of all places.

peekaboo said:

https://www.reddit.com/r/taiwan/comments/1jmali6
Was really surprised to open this post and see most comments supporting/justifying the TW soldiers' espionage, lol. On Reddit of all places.

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Because there are so many such cases, Taiwanese people are no longer surprised and can even understand it. The DPP administration, especially Tsai Ing-wen's term, has shown no respect for the military, whether in terms of salary and pension or social status.

FairAndUnbiased said:

The original source called Kalibr-M the quasi-ballistic version.

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Ukraine is a big country and the Russians are using the missiles more for tactical capabilities. It also shows the power of morale: Russian destruction of Ukrainian assets is objectively higher than the destruction of Iraqi assets in 1991, but the Iraqis folded and the Ukrainians don't, because the Iraqis were terrified of the US while Ukrainians think that with the US on their side they're invincible no matter what.

It is also true that Ukraine's warfighting capability does not actually reside inside Ukraine.

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I am completely unaware of this claim. Unless it is an air-launched version entirely modified to achieve this profile, the Kalibr-M would cease to be a cruise missile and become a quasi-ballistic missile. All Kalibr-class cruise missiles have a cigar-shaped body, folding wings and tail unit. The first stage with an accelerating rocket engine (booster) and lattice-type stabilizing fins provides the launch system's exit and raises the missile to an altitude of 150 m. After the booster burns, it is ejected, the missile opens its wings and ignites the second stage with a small turbofan engine in the tail and flies at a subsonic speed of Mach 0.6-0.8 at an altitude of 15-20 m over the sea or 50-150 m over the ground. In cruise flight, the missiles are guided by an AB-40 inertial navigation system and RVE-B radar altimeter, and also use a GPS/GLONASS receiver in this phase. This is basically the unified profile of the Kalibr missiles.

Biscuits said:

While US is getting an array with on paper impressive systems, it should be remembered that THAAD-ER let alone GPI is still in development, with no clear timeline to arrive. The currently in service HQ-19 lies somewhere between the two in capability, and this is a real delivered piece used and tested. Not funding requests and presentation slides.

Yemen does not possess ASBM. They fire HQ-2 variants in anti ship mode. It's about as much ASBM as an anti ship mode SM-6 is, except the HQ-2 is much older, something that's not even in formal production today anymore.

That AAMs in surface fire mode can be intercepted quite easily has been a belief on both sides of the Pacific. US initially billed SM-6 surface fire as a stopgap for Harpoon being useless, but quickly realized (and China also showed through its complete lack of concern) that it wouldn't work well at all.

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It appears they do have a few ASBMs in their arsenal:

The 450km-range Asef appears to be a rebranded ASBM version of Iran's Fateh 313 missile, while the Tankil represents a 500km-range anti-ship version. Both designs are the heaviest Houthi anti-ship missiles, both with warheads of over 300kg, and are of Iranian origin.


It’s nothing like as sophisticated as some of the single-class ASBMs in operation.

Iron Man said:

"Dense defensive layer". Please elaborate on specifics. Or is that more like a magic deflector shield around China?

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Density is the planning of air defense following the principle of defense in depth, keeping the enemy engaged from the range of its missiles to the use of low-altitude missiles and cannons, in short, a layered defense in depth.

Obviously, this cannot be done in all of China or Russia, because they are huge countries, but high-altitude and long-range air defense is generally used when it is necessary to create air defense density of sensitive points within a zone of action.

In the case of China, it is even worse to use this example of the B-21 flying over the continent, because to do this, the US and its allies would have to destroy the entire PLAAF/PLANAF aviation force before attempting to penetrate any area on the continent.

Sinnavuuty said:

It appears they do have a few ASBMs in their arsenal:

The 450km-range Asef appears to be a rebranded ASBM version of Iran's Fateh 313 missile, while the Tankil represents a 500km-range anti-ship version. Both designs are the heaviest Houthi anti-ship missiles, both with warheads of over 300kg, and are of Iranian origin.

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It’s nothing like as sophisticated as some of the single-class ASBMs in operation.

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Without knowing roughly their flight profiles, these can hardly be compared to genuine ballistic missiles with manuevering warheads. Given Yemen and Iran's rather low tech level, presuming they can make an Iskander let alone DF-21D equivalent is making very heavy assumptions.

With most certainty, these Yemeni missiles are just the equivalent of launching ATACMS/Himars at seaborne targets, something the Philippines also attempted to demonstrate (but failed due to likely operator error).

While quasi ballistic missiles present a higher challenge than normal cruise missiles, their interception rate in Ukraine (atacms, tornado, himars) has still been quite high. While a true tactical ballistic missile like Iskander has afaik never even been documented as directly defeated. Only "missed" or "survived".

It's the ability of df-16/iskander/df-26 etc to maneuver in erratic trajectories as they near the target which makes them unique. There's afaik no indication Iran would have such sophisticated tech.

Sinnavuuty said:

I am completely unaware of this claim. Unless it is an air-launched version entirely modified to achieve this profile, the Kalibr-M would cease to be a cruise missile and become a quasi-ballistic missile. All Kalibr-class cruise missiles have a cigar-shaped body, folding wings and tail unit. The first stage with an accelerating rocket engine (booster) and lattice-type stabilizing fins provides the launch system's exit and raises the missile to an altitude of 150 m. After the booster burns, it is ejected, the missile opens its wings and ignites the second stage with a small turbofan engine in the tail and flies at a subsonic speed of Mach 0.6-0.8 at an altitude of 15-20 m over the sea or 50-150 m over the ground. In cruise flight, the missiles are guided by an AB-40 inertial navigation system and RVE-B radar altimeter, and also use a GPS/GLONASS receiver in this phase. This is basically the unified profile of the Kalibr missiles.

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So you see that I didn't make it up, I did have a source. It may not be the best source but they're not total BS either.

It still shows that generally, cruise missiles are much easier to intercept than ballistic ones and particularly you can't extrapolate the outcome of a performative political strike with pre-warning, to actual battlefield conditions like you see in Ukraine.

Iron Man said:

No, what you're looking for is SAM launchers and fighters. Which means that a sparsely populated country makes it MUCH easier to find of these things out in the open. Whereas we have already seen recent photos of Taiwanese assets (shamefully) hiding in churches, schools, temples, etc. And for fighters you'll need to look up and down Taiwan's vast highway system to find them.

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Curious, have you been to Taiwan? It’s densely populated along the east coast next to China, the rest of the island is basically mountains. The populated area is tiny. Also it does not have a “vast highway system” basically a couple major North-South highways in the populated areas, that’s it.

Biscuits said:

With most certainty, these Yemeni missiles are just the equivalent of launching ATACMS/Himars at seaborne targets, something the Philippines also attempted to demonstrate (but failed due to likely operator error).

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You are obviously trying to denigrate the Philippines, but you are wrong. The ATACMS demo was by US forces stationed there.