PLA Strategy in a Taiwan Contingency

bsdnf

bsdnf

Junior Member
Registered Member
Lai administration announces to build T-Dome air defense system

They're following the Iron Dome and Golden Dome trend. But are 370mm rockets and those handcrafted by resistance groups the same thing? And still no one dares to address the elephant in the room: how to defend against hypersonic missiles.
 
plawolf

plawolf

Lieutenant General
Wrought said:
Trying for a MAD-breaker is dumb. It's dumb when people push for Golden Dome to do it, and it's dumb for China to try as well. As soon as you start deploying it, the other guy will just set off a couple dozen nukes in the upper atmosphere and fry every satellite in orbit. The resulting Van Allen belt will ensure any replacements get fried too. So the end result is simply no satellites of any kind for anyone. Plus a few percentage points added to global cancer statistics.

Perfect example of a lose-lose scenario.
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Firstly, when there is mounting evidence the other side of the MAD balance equation is growing increasingly unhinged and insane, breaking MAD becomes the only sane response.

Secondly, it’s for this precise reason that I am saying both sides are laying the foundations needed by massively increasing orbital lift capabilities and not actively putting significant pieces in position yet. The idea is that once you give the go ahead, you will deploy your network faster than opfor can respond, and once you do seize the literal high ground, you have to be ruthless in exploiting it to basically enforce an orbital no-fly zone where anything heading to orbit that doesn’t have your prior permission to do so is immediately engaged and destroyed before it can breach the atmosphere.

Thirdly, your idea is only a viable counter if Star Wars is LEO only. In this day and age, it has zero need to be.
 
O

Overbom

Brigadier
Registered Member
bsdnf said:
Lai administration announced that the defense budget will account for more than 3% of GDP next year and reach 5% in 2030.

This essentially means massive cuts in other government spending and tax increases. Good luck to the Taiwanese people.
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Lai can announce lots of things. Let's see if the legislature will actually give him the funds to do it
 
Wrought

Wrought

Senior Member
Registered Member
plawolf said:
Firstly, when there is mounting evidence the other side of the MAD balance equation is growing increasingly unhinged and insane, breaking MAD becomes the only sane response.

Secondly, it’s for this precise reason that I am saying both sides are laying the foundations needed by massively increasing orbital lift capabilities and not actively putting significant pieces in position yet. The idea is that once you give the go ahead, you will deploy your network faster than opfor can respond, and once you do seize the literal high ground, you have to be ruthless in exploiting it to basically enforce an orbital no-fly zone where anything heading to orbit that doesn’t have your prior permission to do so is immediately engaged and destroyed before it can breach the atmosphere.

Thirdly, your idea is only a viable counter if Star Wars is LEO only. In this day and age, it has zero need to be.
Click to expand...

Breaking MAD because you are afraid of an irrational nuclear exchange is a textbook self-fulfilling prophecy. And how on earth can you launch many thousands of interceptors before the other guy—who is presumably running LOW—responds with a few dozen launches of his own?

I'm not familiar with any technical proposals for non-LEO interceptors. How would that even work? Like how can you physically cover enough distance in time to catch a boost-phase ICBM if you aren't in LEO? Or is the idea to use some ridiculously huge orbital laser? In any case, you should provide a link to whatever paper you have in mind.
 
N

no_name

Colonel
plawolf said:
Firstly, when there is mounting evidence the other side of the MAD balance equation is growing increasingly unhinged and insane, breaking MAD becomes the only sane response.

Secondly, it’s for this precise reason that I am saying both sides are laying the foundations needed by massively increasing orbital lift capabilities and not actively putting significant pieces in position yet. The idea is that once you give the go ahead, you will deploy your network faster than opfor can respond, and once you do seize the literal high ground, you have to be ruthless in exploiting it to basically enforce an orbital no-fly zone where anything heading to orbit that doesn’t have your prior permission to do so is immediately engaged and destroyed before it can breach the atmosphere.

Thirdly, your idea is only a viable counter if Star Wars is LEO only. In this day and age, it has zero need to be.
Click to expand...
My feel is that the Chinese manned moon mission will eventually (longer timeline) results in a moon base that can be militarized in relatively short period of time if needed.

From the moon the Earth is orbitally locked. No deep space exploration is possible without going past the moon guard gate.
It is easy to intercept something from the Earth on the Moon than the other way round, because it takes much less to lift off from the moon than the Earth, and also you only have to travel 10% of the distance between them before the Earth's gravity works in your favour, versus the 90% of the distance other way round.

In the case where two major powers block each other from launching from Earth, the one with a working station on Moon can still launch towards Earth and also towards deep space. The one with a working moon station can keep everyone else in a zoo, really.

The advantages are so great the Chinese leadership will surely not ignore the implications and put in long period, continuous investment and work towards this goal.
 
R

Ringsword

Senior Member
Registered Member
jiajia99 said:
Pretty sure at the rate things are going, the USA will destroy itself well before China has to fire a single nuke. Also, the nukes in the USA has a use by date and given how they really suck when it comes to the things that matter (maintenance and upgrades, both of which are lacking), whose to say if the nuclear stockpile of the USA has been already compromised long ago. It’s only a matter of time before the bluff is called and given the current win rate, the USA is bound to lose yet again. Also I do wonder, given how hush hush things are, I wonder, is Fort Knox already empty?
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IIRC a report came out some years ago that the USN's Polaris A1/A3 SLBM warheads actually didn't work despite being carried on deterrent patrols because of some problem with the warhead electronics/warhead itself etc melting/fusing itself??Deeply shocked to have read it.
 
E

enroger

Senior Member
Registered Member
Wrought said:
Breaking MAD because you are afraid of an irrational nuclear exchange is a textbook self-fulfilling prophecy. And how on earth can you launch many thousands of interceptors before the other guy—who is presumably running LOW—responds with a few dozen launches of his own?

I'm not familiar with any technical proposals for non-LEO interceptors. How would that even work? Like how can you physically cover enough distance in time to catch a boost-phase ICBM if you aren't in LEO? Or is the idea to use some ridiculously huge orbital laser? In any case, you should provide a link to whatever paper you have in mind.
Click to expand...

There was a concept called "Brilliant Pebbles" in the cold war and it is the basis for the so called "Golden dome" project now. Basically you launch thousands of space based interceptors and spread them in LEO similar to Starlink, each interceptor has a certain delta-V available to maneuver.

Upon the detection of a launch, the interceptor that happens to be in the right place and the right time can maneuver to intercept it in boost phase.

There're reports that point out such a system is something of a lemon though and I tend to agree with them:
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The gist is that time window for boost phase interception is extremely short (3 to 5 mins), very small portion of your space based interceptors is in range to respond. A geologically concentrated launch from even a small nuclear state (say DPRK) can overwhelm you defense. Keep in mind your typical interceptor is not feather light tiny thing like your Starlink sate, those are KKV with at least 4km/s delta-V, the cost to launch and deploy them in numbers is far higher than Starlink. A credible defense system of this type is not economically viable.

While "Golden dome" maybe a lemon in missile defense, it could be extremely potent in the role of space warfare and space blockade. This is where I think it pose the greatest threat should US is able to field it.
 
Temstar

Temstar

Brigadier
Registered Member
enroger said:
There was a concept called "Brilliant Pebbles" in the cold war and it is the basis for the so called "Golden dome" project now. Basically you launch thousands of space based interceptors and spread them in LEO similar to Starlink, each interceptor has a certain delta-V available to maneuver.

Upon the detection of a launch, the interceptor that happens to be in the right place and the right time can maneuver to intercept it in boost phase.

There're reports that point out such a system is something of a lemon though and I tend to agree with them:
Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

The gist is that time window for boost phase interception is extremely short (3 to 5 mins), very small portion of your space based interceptors is in range to respond. A geologically concentrated launch from even a small nuclear state (say DPRK) can overwhelm you defense. Keep in mind your typical interceptor is not feather light tiny thing like your Starlink sate, those are KKV with at least 4km/s delta-V, the cost to launch and deploy them in numbers is far higher than Starlink. A credible defense system of this type is not economically viable.

While "Golden dome" maybe a lemon in missile defense, it could be extremely potent in the role of space warfare and space blockade. This is where I think it pose the greatest threat should US is able to field it.
Click to expand...
I thought Brilliant Pebbles was to feature (nuclear) bomb-pumped x-ray laser were the interceptor release a cloud of lasing medium each with independent aiming system, then the nuke at the centre explodes and excite the lasing medium and causing them to shoot out x-ray laser in every direction before they are vapourized.
 
E

enroger

Senior Member
Registered Member
Temstar said:
I thought Brilliant Pebbles was to feature (nuclear) bomb-pumped x-ray laser were the interceptor release a cloud of lasing medium each with independent aiming system, then the nuke at the centre explodes and excite the lasing medium and causing them to shoot out x-ray laser in every direction before they are vapourized.
Click to expand...

You're thinking of another Star War concept in competition with Brilliant Pebbles
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