China Ballistic Missiles and Nuclear Arms Thread

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Hendrik_2000

Lieutenant General
Those FAS number are highly unreliable and cannot be trusted It is way outdated originated from 1980's and hasn't been updated since. FAS like to underestimate Chinese nuclear stockpile
Nobody knows how many nuclear warhead China owned since China is the only country that doesn't publish their Isotope U 238 or plutonium production!
But just counting the DF 41 brigade there are atleast 4 of them and each brigade is 18 missile with at least 5 or 6 warhead give you at least 370 to 400 warhead Not counting other warhead!

Well the difference between V2 and DF series of rocket is 50 years
In meantime technology change and accuracy improve by 100 fold
Those missile are targeted highly value and strategic target like command and control, air field, SAM and radar,
For the follow on attack It was not meant for saturation attack by itself like V2
So any comparison to V2 is meaningless!
 

plawolf

Lieutenant General
I do not believe all DF31s are MIRV'ed, so it's not correct to apply a blanket multiple of warheads against missiles.

That is not to say I believe China only has 300 warheads.

WRT cost, well modern Chinese S/IRBMs can be incredibly accurate, so they are not mere terror weapons like the ancient V2 or even far more recent SCUD.

These missiles are expensive, which is why they will be used against high value and well protected targets.

A LGB may cost a small fraction of a SRBM, but that is a meaningless comparison if the target is so well protected that it would be an effective suicide run for tactical strike fighters to try to hit it, and even then there would only be a very slim chance that the strike fighter would be able to take out the target.

It's the same basic trade off between cruise missiles and LGBs. One does not argue cruise missiles are pointless because there are LGBs would one? Yes LGBs are cheaper, but it's far more risky to try and use them compared to cruise missiles if the enemy has good air defences.

Precision SRBMs are a step up from cruise missiles, offering even more safety for the attacking force while giving you a far greater chance to successfully take out heavily defended enemy targets.
 

Richard Santos

Captain
Registered Member
Those FAS number are highly unreliable and cannot be trusted It is way outdated originated from 1980's and hasn't been updated since. FAS like to underestimate Chinese nuclear stockpile
Nobody knows how many nuclear warhead China owned since China is the only country that doesn't publish their Isotope U 238 or plutonium production!
But just counting the DF 41 brigade there are atleast 4 of them and each brigade is 18 missile with at least 5 or 6 warhead give you at least 370 to 400 warhead Not counting other warhead!

Well the difference between V2 and DF series of rocket is 50 years
In meantime technology change and accuracy improve by 100 fold
Those missile are targeted highly value and strategic target like command and control, air field, SAM and radar,
For the follow on attack It was not meant for saturation attack by itself like V2
So any comparison to V2 is meaningless!

Hardly. In WWII the V2 was an area bombing weapon, as was V2's strategic bomber counterpart. Right now ballistic missiles can be a precision weapon, so is their modern aircraft counterpart. As ballistic missile technology has progressed, so has aircraft technology and the technology of aircraft delivered ordanance in keeping pace and then some.

Ballistic Missiles remain the industrially less demanding solution to penetrating heavy ground and air based air defense than aircraft, but ballistic Missiles also remain the far more expensive and less flexible solution for delivering each piece of ordanance compared to aircraft.

So the relative merits and drawbacks of aircraft vs missile as illustrated by the V2 remains valid today, your emphatic exclamation to the contrary not withstanding.
 
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taxiya

Brigadier
Registered Member
IMO the reason that china has so many M/SRBM is that due to a lack of a credible long-range attack aviation. As for ICBM, i think that china could have more, but they choose not to, perhabs due to political reasons, to not antagonize western public opinions, unlike russia which only exports energy and doesnt care what the west thinks about them (central/eastern europe depend on russia for natural gas).
I think the real reason of China having much less ICBM is her nuclear doctrine is very different from US and Russia. China has the "no first use" policy which means China does not need to try to knock out every enemy ICBM silo in a first strike, that is a high demand. China's retaliatory policy also means that the aim is big population centers rather than numerous military facilities, less number required.

So the demand based on that doctrine is smaller number of ICBMs. If that give the impression of "not to antagonize others", that is good but only a by-product. But then the doctrine itself is a defensive one, so in spirit it does less antagonizing.
 

taxiya

Brigadier
Registered Member
I wonder what was the landing place of the recent DF-26B test. Just two? days afterwards, the Chinese MoD vaguely confirmed a missile test in the Bo Hai area by the rocket force without any more details.
 

Hendrik_2000

Lieutenant General
I wonder what was the landing place of the recent DF-26B test. Just two? days afterwards, the Chinese MoD vaguely confirmed a missile test in the Bo Hai area by the rocket force without any more details.
It might not DF26B at all it might be test of JL3
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Yesterday on the Weibo (Chinese Twitter) account of the Chinese Ministry of Defense appeared
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publication, mentioning a "recent combat assessment of a new missile" of Chinese rocket forces in a certain maritime area Of the Gulf of Bohai.

Information has quickly gone around the web in China, and many assumptions have been made about it. Many say it is the DF-26B shot that we spoke about two days ago in the "
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", others say New SLBM missile fired by a nuclear submarine launcher, evoking the name of the JL-3 . We will therefore analyze some of these assumptions here.

But first of all, let's review some basic elements. For example, where exactly is the Bohai Sea, and what does the publication of the Chinese Ministry of Defense specifically say?

Communicating through the Bohai Strait with the Yellow Sea to the east and to which it is a part, the Gulf of Bohaï is bounded on the south by the Shandong Peninsula and to the east by that of the Liaodong which separates it from the Gulf of Bohai. Korea. On the west coast of the Gulf, for example, is the only shipyard of Chinese nuclear submarines, or the training center for naval airborne pilots of the Chinese navy.


The Gulf of Bohai

As for the publication of the Chinese Ministry of Defense, it is, indeed, rather strange. The title of the publication read "Response to journalists' question by the Ministry of Defense Information Office", although it is not known whether this response was given at a press conference and Asked the question and when.

The question was: "According to our information, the rocket forces of the Chinese army recently conducted a missile test firing, can you confirm that? ".

And the response stated: "In order to improve the troops' ability to carry out their missions and to deal effectively with threats to national security, the rocket force unit (s) Fighting on a new missile weapon according to the annual training plan, which has achieved the desired objectives. ".

One has the more impression that this is a formal statement than a real question answer.

Whatever it is, what is it? Here are a few hypotheses that can be seen from here and there:



A shot of the new DF-26B variant of the Chinese long-range AShBM
Many Chinese Internet users associate this ballistic announcement in Bohai Bay with the wrecks of the DF-26B, a new variant of the IRBM / AShBM long range DF-26, which were found late April in the Siziwang banner, In Inner Mongolia.

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The wrecks of DF-26B on an amateur video posted on the internet last April 23rd.

At first glance, this hypothesis seems very sexy. There has been a trial shot of DF-26B recently, it's a variant of a ballistic missile capable of hitting large naval targets like aircraft carriers, and the publication mentions a rocket force test in the sea.

All the ingredients seem to be together for the scoop.

Now, if you open a map and look at the location of the Siziwang banner, where the wrecks on the 1st or 2nd floor of the famous E / ADF-26B were found, compared to the Bohai Gulf, you quickly realize that It is a bit complicated for the missile of more than 3,000 kilometers of range to leave its first or second floor in Inner Mongolia and fall back into the Bohai Sea.

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From the Siziwang banner where the DF-26B wrecks were found at the Bohai Gulf.

In order for this to happen, it was necessary to launch on Mongolian soil, that is to say in the neighboring country, and that the missile flies above the intense population areas of Hebei province ( Around the capital Beijing).

In other words, it is a very risky operation - Not impossible, but the game is not worth the candle.



A missile shot from the Korla site, or from the West.
It is a hypothesis that one of our readers spoke yesterday, wondering if it is possible that the missile (it referred especially to the DF-26B quoted above) can be fired from the launch site Of Korla, located in Xinjiang province where Chinese anti-ballistic missiles are launched, for example, or from another ballistic testing center in the West, such as the JSLC or the TSLC.

Technically, this seems to be possible. If we trace a straight line joining the two ends of Korla and the northern part of the Bohai Sea, it actually crosses the Siziwang banner.

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From Korla to the gulf of Bohai, passing by the banner of Siziwang.

But if it is actually the DF-26B in question that was launched from Korla, then the fallout zones will be much further west (left on the map below) and not the Siziwang banner .

Moreover, no fallout zone is reported in Bohai Bay to receive the head of the missile, for example.

And this shooting direction, from west to east, is unusual in Chinese ballistics trials, which always start from east to west to benefit from the monitoring facilities rather located in the west of the country.



A shot from AShBM DF-21D from Northeast China
The Chinese rocket forces have already been firing their anti-ship ballistic missile into the Bohai Gulf in the past. One can quote for example the two (supposed) shots of DF-21D in the month of November 2015.


The maritime area closed to navigation during the tests of DF-21D in November 2015.

According to a navigation alert issued by the Maritime Safety Administration of Liaoning, a maritime area was banned from any ship from 20 to 22 April in the Bohai Gulf for "military missions", See in yellow on this diagram:
Although we believe this area was reserved for the certification of the 6th promotion of the embarked pilots and the LSO of the aircraft carrier Liaoning (see our file "
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"of April 24), but we can not completely dismiss this hypothesis.
 

Hendrik_2000

Lieutenant General
(cont)
(cont)

Underwater ejection tests of the new SLBM JL-3
The last hypothesis that we are going to study here is that it concerns the submarine ejection tests of the new Chinese SLBM JL-3 .

What drives us to advance this working hypothesis is above all the publication of a somewhat peculiar navigation alert which prohibits navigation on two maritime zones in the Bohai Sea from 28 April to 6 May.

Alert LN0058 (航 警 警 0058) requires any vessel to move away from two areas on the west coast of Bohai. One is shaped like an area, with a radius of 3 km, and the other a circular zone with a radius of 2 km.

The two zones are located about fifty kilometers southwest of Bohai Shipyard where Chinese nuclear submarines are assembled. They are too close to the coasts and also a little small to be the target areas of a ballistic missile, but large enough for submarine SLBM missile ejection tests.

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The two maritime zones closed due to military operations.

Secondly, it is known that the Chinese missile aerospace group CASIC started in 2013 the development of solid-ergol engines of large diameter (2.2 meters?) For a "major naval project" that is believed to be the Future Chinese SLBM, the JL-3.

It is also known that the shipyard of Bohai will soon start the construction of a new generation of nuclear submarine SNA and SNLE, known as Type 09V and Type 09VI respectively.

Referring now to the development of the Chinese SLBM JL-2 which equips the SSBLE Type 09IV today, the first submarine model missile launch test dates back to August 2001, before the first missile was launched On the ground in May 2003, and the first submarine launch in August 2004, for a planned entry into service at the time in 2009.

So we are in the right time for the Chinese to begin the first preliminary tests for their JL-3, which is expected to enter service by 2026, when the Type 09VI should be operational.

The only doubt that remains is that this assumption does not exactly correspond to what the Chinese Ministry of Defense's publication says of a "combat assessment" under the "annual training plan".

What if the truth is elsewhere? Give us your opinion on the question:

What is this ballistic test of Chinese rocket forces in Bohai Bay?

  • A DF-26B from the West
  • A DF-21D from the North
  • Another missile from the West
  • JL-3 underwater ejection tests
  • Other...
 

Hendrik_2000

Lieutenant General
Hardly. In WWII the V2 was an area bombing weapon, as was V2's strategic bomber counterpart. Right now ballistic missiles can be a precision weapon, so is their modern aircraft counterpart. As ballistic missile technology has progressed, so has aircraft technology and the technology of aircraft delivered ordanance in keeping pace and then some.

Ballistic Missiles remain the industrially less demanding solution to penetrating heavy ground and air based air defense than aircraft, but ballistic Missiles also remain the far more expensive and less flexible solution for delivering each piece of ordanance compared to aircraft.

So the relative merits and drawbacks of aircraft vs missile as illustrated by the V2 remains valid today, your emphatic exclamation to the contrary not withstanding.

We agree to disagree it is not either or. Missile will be used to take out high value target that is too dangerous for man aircraft. It was never intended to be use as stand alone weapon. so your comparison is meaningless!

V2 is used as stand alone weapon to create panic. And it is strategic failure. So what if you blow off couple of building in the city. At that time it doesn't have the accuracy or guidance to target airfield or harbor. Does it slow down the spitfire ? Nope.
It was tried to hit Remagen bridge but missed completely.

We are not comparing the accuracy of missile or plane but the utility of new found use of highly accurate missile.

Not to mention that it is much more difficult to shoot missile than aircraft specially if it mirved
 
Last edited:

taxiya

Brigadier
Registered Member
It might not DF26B at all it might be test of JL3
Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!


Yesterday on the Weibo (Chinese Twitter) account of the Chinese Ministry of Defense appeared
Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!
publication, mentioning a "recent combat assessment of a new missile" of Chinese rocket forces in a certain maritime area Of the Gulf of Bohai.

Information has quickly gone around the web in China, and many assumptions have been made about it. Many say it is the DF-26B shot that we spoke about two days ago in the "
Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!
", others say New SLBM missile fired by a nuclear submarine launcher, evoking the name of the JL-3 . We will therefore analyze some of these assumptions here.

But first of all, let's review some basic elements. For example, where exactly is the Bohai Sea, and what does the publication of the Chinese Ministry of Defense specifically say?

Communicating through the Bohai Strait with the Yellow Sea to the east and to which it is a part, the Gulf of Bohaï is bounded on the south by the Shandong Peninsula and to the east by that of the Liaodong which separates it from the Gulf of Bohai. Korea. On the west coast of the Gulf, for example, is the only shipyard of Chinese nuclear submarines, or the training center for naval airborne pilots of the Chinese navy.


The Gulf of Bohai

As for the publication of the Chinese Ministry of Defense, it is, indeed, rather strange. The title of the publication read "Response to journalists' question by the Ministry of Defense Information Office", although it is not known whether this response was given at a press conference and Asked the question and when.

The question was: "According to our information, the rocket forces of the Chinese army recently conducted a missile test firing, can you confirm that? ".

And the response stated: "In order to improve the troops' ability to carry out their missions and to deal effectively with threats to national security, the rocket force unit (s) Fighting on a new missile weapon according to the annual training plan, which has achieved the desired objectives. ".

One has the more impression that this is a formal statement than a real question answer.

Whatever it is, what is it? Here are a few hypotheses that can be seen from here and there:



A shot of the new DF-26B variant of the Chinese long-range AShBM
Many Chinese Internet users associate this ballistic announcement in Bohai Bay with the wrecks of the DF-26B, a new variant of the IRBM / AShBM long range DF-26, which were found late April in the Siziwang banner, In Inner Mongolia.

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

The wrecks of DF-26B on an amateur video posted on the internet last April 23rd.

At first glance, this hypothesis seems very sexy. There has been a trial shot of DF-26B recently, it's a variant of a ballistic missile capable of hitting large naval targets like aircraft carriers, and the publication mentions a rocket force test in the sea.

All the ingredients seem to be together for the scoop.

Now, if you open a map and look at the location of the Siziwang banner, where the wrecks on the 1st or 2nd floor of the famous E / ADF-26B were found, compared to the Bohai Gulf, you quickly realize that It is a bit complicated for the missile of more than 3,000 kilometers of range to leave its first or second floor in Inner Mongolia and fall back into the Bohai Sea.

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

From the Siziwang banner where the DF-26B wrecks were found at the Bohai Gulf.

In order for this to happen, it was necessary to launch on Mongolian soil, that is to say in the neighboring country, and that the missile flies above the intense population areas of Hebei province ( Around the capital Beijing).

In other words, it is a very risky operation - Not impossible, but the game is not worth the candle.



A missile shot from the Korla site, or from the West.
It is a hypothesis that one of our readers spoke yesterday, wondering if it is possible that the missile (it referred especially to the DF-26B quoted above) can be fired from the launch site Of Korla, located in Xinjiang province where Chinese anti-ballistic missiles are launched, for example, or from another ballistic testing center in the West, such as the JSLC or the TSLC.

Technically, this seems to be possible. If we trace a straight line joining the two ends of Korla and the northern part of the Bohai Sea, it actually crosses the Siziwang banner.

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

From Korla to the gulf of Bohai, passing by the banner of Siziwang.

But if it is actually the DF-26B in question that was launched from Korla, then the fallout zones will be much further west (left on the map below) and not the Siziwang banner .

Moreover, no fallout zone is reported in Bohai Bay to receive the head of the missile, for example.

And this shooting direction, from west to east, is unusual in Chinese ballistics trials, which always start from east to west to benefit from the monitoring facilities rather located in the west of the country.



A shot from AShBM DF-21D from Northeast China
The Chinese rocket forces have already been firing their anti-ship ballistic missile into the Bohai Gulf in the past. One can quote for example the two (supposed) shots of DF-21D in the month of November 2015.


The maritime area closed to navigation during the tests of DF-21D in November 2015.

According to a navigation alert issued by the Maritime Safety Administration of Liaoning, a maritime area was banned from any ship from 20 to 22 April in the Bohai Gulf for "military missions", See in yellow on this diagram:
Although we believe this area was reserved for the certification of the 6th promotion of the embarked pilots and the LSO of the aircraft carrier Liaoning (see our file "
Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!
"of April 24), but we can not completely dismiss this hypothesis.
very good and detailed analysis.

What we know is that Someone specifically asked about Rocket force missile test, and the MoD spokesman confirmed it without saying the type, we saw a photo of DF-26B very recently. So I don't know why (neither was I aware of any rumor of) someone speculated JL3. Therefor, without more information, I would not consider JL3.

I agree with you that "Siziwang banner" (if truly is the location of the wreckage as claimed) would be a strange location for the first stage if the launch site is Korla. However, if it is launched from somewhere near Jiuquan, it is not strange, because these sites just use the name of the nearby town/city, their real location can be far, for example Jiuquan site is actually in inner-Mongolia while Jiuquan city is in Gansu.

Regarding flying over Mongolia, it is risky if the missile fails and fall in Mongolia, otherwise I guess the missile flies over Mongolia in outer space which is free.

Regarding the range, I think is a common practice to test a ballistic missile in a shortened range, like most of China's ICBM tests are within 5000km(?) instead of 8000km (DF-31), 12000km(DF-5 or DF-41).
 

taxiya

Brigadier
Registered Member
(cont)
(cont)

Underwater ejection tests of the new SLBM JL-3
The last hypothesis that we are going to study here is that it concerns the submarine ejection tests of the new Chinese SLBM JL-3 .

What drives us to advance this working hypothesis is above all the publication of a somewhat peculiar navigation alert which prohibits navigation on two maritime zones in the Bohai Sea from 28 April to 6 May.

Alert LN0058 (航 警 警 0058) requires any vessel to move away from two areas on the west coast of Bohai. One is shaped like an area, with a radius of 3 km, and the other a circular zone with a radius of 2 km.

The two zones are located about fifty kilometers southwest of Bohai Shipyard where Chinese nuclear submarines are assembled. They are too close to the coasts and also a little small to be the target areas of a ballistic missile, but large enough for submarine SLBM missile ejection tests.

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!


Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

The two maritime zones closed due to military operations.

Secondly, it is known that the Chinese missile aerospace group CASIC started in 2013 the development of solid-ergol engines of large diameter (2.2 meters?) For a "major naval project" that is believed to be the Future Chinese SLBM, the JL-3.

It is also known that the shipyard of Bohai will soon start the construction of a new generation of nuclear submarine SNA and SNLE, known as Type 09V and Type 09VI respectively.

Referring now to the development of the Chinese SLBM JL-2 which equips the SSBLE Type 09IV today, the first submarine model missile launch test dates back to August 2001, before the first missile was launched On the ground in May 2003, and the first submarine launch in August 2004, for a planned entry into service at the time in 2009.

So we are in the right time for the Chinese to begin the first preliminary tests for their JL-3, which is expected to enter service by 2026, when the Type 09VI should be operational.

The only doubt that remains is that this assumption does not exactly correspond to what the Chinese Ministry of Defense's publication says of a "combat assessment" under the "annual training plan".

What if the truth is elsewhere? Give us your opinion on the question:

What is this ballistic test of Chinese rocket forces in Bohai Bay?

  • A DF-26B from the West
  • A DF-21D from the North
  • Another missile from the West
  • JL-3 underwater ejection tests
  • Other...
To make JL-3 test a creditable candidate in this recent test, we should be clear of whether the naval SSBN force is part of Rocket Force or the Navy, I believe organizationally and administratively it is part of the Navy. I know that SSBN is operationally controlled directly by CMC, but still I wonder if the MOD spokesman would actually used Rocket Force in the answer. I would have just say "the military" than specifically Rocket Force if I were him.
 
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