PLAN Anti-ship/surface missiles

Forget about it. If this thing can hit air target reasonably well, it will be powerful, even if suboptimal. If you are a bomber pilot you are in danger every time you are 2000km range at potential missile site, which is basically everywhere. The longest dedicated SAM like HQ-9, S-400, has range 400km, or somewhere around it. Long but predictable. At 2000km and beyond nowhere is safe. Always have to plan around unexpected casualty.

But at what point are you going to accept making 10 HQ-1000s and potentially scoring only a single kill. When those resources could have made 10 CJ-1000 which could score 2 or 3 kills of surface warships or valuable ground targets?

It is definitely easier guiding and hitting a 20 knot warship at 3000km than it is hitting an AEWC or tanker moving at mach 0.8.

Especially when you have air dominance at ranges where those AEWC and tankers need to be well within. This air dominance gap in favour of China will only increase and that range of air dominance increase as PLAN and PLAAF progress in tech, application and units faster than the USAF and USN.

At this point, unless the USAF and/or USN has flying saucers with DEW, the air superiority gauge is shifting very fucking quickly in favour of China as more USAF and USN units retire while China's mostly modern airframes push this needle further. The only threat to this air superiority is regional US bases and B-21 that can potentially target Chinese airfields and the PLAN. The other threat is USN submarines.

ACuriousPLAFan said:

Right, but it is likely to not be optimal for its role as a ULRSAM (similar to how the SM-6 is also capable of anti-ship strikes apart from anti-air and terminal ballistic missile defense, though not excelling in the former), isn't it?

To be honest, taking that CJ-1000 is indeed capable of shooting down larger/heavier enemy air assets (bombers, tankers, transporters, special mission aircrafts etc) - I do feel that there's something more that's missing from the equation.

While I do admit to take the L in this context, and that CJ-1000 is indeed anti-air capable - I still don't think that it's the best/most optimal option for the PLA for taking down enemy large aerial assets in the 4-digit kilometers of ranges. Color me highly skeptical, but I strongly believe that there should be (if not must be) something else for the PLA which are more suited than and superior to the CJ-1000 (if not being outright dedicated) for such roles.

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Multiple people have explained it to you already why the CJ-1000 might make sense, such as @BoraTas's post just above. In short, ULRAAM strike is likely considered a niche use case at least with currently available ISR capabilities, and as such does not warrant the resources needed to develop and field a dedicated platform.

In general going forward the limiting factor in range and lethality for all militaries will probably be ISR. Just looking at currently available technology, a DF-26 carrying a hypersonic glide vehicle can theoretically carry a couple terminal stages of a PL-15/16, thus allowing for strikes on air targets within the 3IC from China. Such a missile wouldn't cost that much either, probably no more than a larger CCA. The problem would be effectively and cost-efficiently detecting and tracking high valued targets from that range.

ougoah said:

But at what point are you going to accept making 10 HQ-1000s and potentially scoring only a single kill. When those resources could have made 10 CJ-1000 which could score 2 or 3 kills of surface warships or valuable ground targets?

It is definitely easier guiding and hitting a 20 knot warship at 3000km than it is hitting an AEWC or tanker moving at mach 0.8.

Especially when you have air dominance at ranges where those AEWC and tankers need to be well within. This air dominance gap in favour of China will only increase and that range of air dominance increase as PLAN and PLAAF progress in tech, application and units faster than the USAF and USN.

At this point, unless the USAF and/or USN has flying saucers with DEW, the air superiority gauge is shifting very fucking quickly in favour of China as more USAF and USN units retire while China's mostly modern airframes push this needle further. The only threat to this air superiority is regional US bases and B-21 that can potentially target Chinese airfields and the PLAN. The other threat is USN submarines.

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As I mentioned before, the most important use case of such a system would be to intercept enemy stealth bomber on cruise missile raid. To intercept those target by using conventional method would involve ensuring air dominance thousands of km away from nearest airbase, and maintain said air dominance for extended period of time, needless to say this is just prohibitively expensive.

Ultra-long range anti-air does provide a cost effective counter in this niche area. However all this discussion is moot if the early warning system that can support such a missile dose not exist. I think we can all agree that the missile itself is the easy part for China, the detection system for it is way harder

ACuriousPLAFan said:

Sorry, but can anyone make sense of this?

Why is Yankee (or the Guancha Gang in general) simultaneously dismissing the suggestion/notion of China developing the 1000-2000-kilometer ULRSAM, while also still strongly hinting at the capability of the CJ-1000 hitting aerial targets?

If anything - Shouldn't a dedicated (i.e. designed-from-the-ground-up) ULRSAM be much more capable at engaging aerial targets than a cruise missile with surface strike as its primary mission, instead of the other way around?

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I think they are saying, why would the PLA need to develop a dedicated thousand km+ SAM when the CJ1000 already exists and can engage air targets at that range?

Using AG missiles for AA is not actually unprecedented. The U.S. use of hellfires for anti-drone work is just a recent example.

As others have pointed out, this isn’t meant to be shooting at fighters at that range, but rather high value support assets like bombers, tankers, AWACS and transports.

Yes, aircraft move at great speed in the air, but if your missile is designed to hit targets at M7, does a few hundred knots of airspeed on the target make any practical difference? Especially when coupled with the expected massive warhead of the CJ1000?

I think this capability was probably discovered rather than designed for. Where they probably first looked to extend the engagement envelope to cover the obvious scenario of, if I use a CJ1000 to target a high value enemy air asset on the ground and opfor managed to scramble it into the air before the missile arrived, can the CJ1000 still hit it? If so, at what airspeed and altitude can the target aircraft be flying at for the CJ1000 to still be able to hit it? It seems that after they did the math, and potentially field tested it, they discovered that being airborne didn’t actually matter all that much to the CJ1000’s ability to prosecute such targets.