Page 109 - Australian Defence Magazine Dec-Jan 2023

DECEMBER 2022-JANUARY 2023 | WWW.AUSTRALIANDEFENCE.COM.AU
REGIONAL CAPABILITIES 109
THIS has seen the conceptualisation, development, and in- troduction of new weapon systems and platforms that are longer ranged, more precise and increasingly sophisticated at negating adversary countermeasures.
And these systems are not always expensive. Loitering mu- nitions, which as their name suggests can loiter over the bat- tlefield before being directed onto a detected target, are rela- tively cheap and can be mass produced for swarming attacks.
Meanwhile, hypersonic weapons are also being rapidly intro- duced in the region. These are usually based off existing bal- listic missile designs with new boost-glide warheads and highly manoeuvrable, bringing a different threat vector compared to ballistic missiles, which fly a more predictable flightpath.
More regional countries are also introducing existing long-range, stand-off weapons and developing electronic warfare/electronic attack capabilities, as well as venturing into the cyber domain.
HYPERSONIC/STANDOFF WEAPONS
The war in Ukraine has shown the utility of longer-ranged weapons, not only to keep an adversary’s rear areas under threat but also to out-range their own long-range systems. It has also demonstrated that today’s long-range missiles, when used in concert with proper Intelligence, Surveil- lance and Reconnaissance (ISR) capabilities as part of a coherent kill-chain, has the capability to strike even mo- bile, fleeting targets in near real-time.
China possesses the biggest missile arsenal in the Indo- Pacific region, with thousands of cruise and ballistic mis- siles at its disposal. These range from short range ballistic missiles that can reach across the Taiwan Strait to inter- continental ballistic missiles.
With Beijing holding out the possibility that it might use force to re-incorporate Taiwan, a Chinese invasion of the island will almost certainly be preceded by a massive mis- sile campaign, lasting for weeks and attacking anything and everything of military utility.
Such a campaign would certainly include China’s hyper- sonic boost-glide weapons. The country is the global leader in such weapons, having put into service at least one such system and is likely developing several more.
The former is the DF-17, a truck mounted system with a missile combining a DF-ZF hypersonic glider with the booster section of a DF-16 short-range ballistic missile. Unlike conventional ballistic missiles, hypersonic gliders fly at a suppressed (lower) trajectory while being able to maintain speeds around Mach 5.
The suppressed trajectory, together with increased ma- noeuvrability, complicates the task of ballistic missile de- fences by reducing the amount of time available to attempt an interception and by widening the likely avenues of ap- proach compared to a conventional ballistic trajectory.
China has also developed air-launched versions of hyper- sonic gliders and ballistic missiles, using its modernised Xi’an H-6K bombers as launch platforms. Photos have emerged of a hypersonic glider being carried on the belly of a bomber in October 2020, while a pair of air-launched ballistic missile mock-ups was being carried by a H-6K on display at the Zhuhai Airshow in early November.
The latter is likely to be based on the YJ-21 ship- launched anti-ship ballistic missile, which Chinese state media showed being launched from a Type 055 cruiser in April, with the air-launched version differing from its ship- launched counterpart in lacking a first stage booster for the vertical launch sequence.
More worryingly, China has shown recently that its mis- sile capabilities could be a lot more advanced that previ- ously imagined, with reports in October 2021 that it had tested a missile in August that circled the globe before heading towards its target at a range in China.
When asked later if the missile hit its intended target, then Vice-Chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen-
LEFT: China’s DF-17 is a truck mounted system with a missile combining a DF-ZF hypersonic glider with the booster section of a DF-16 short-range ballistic missile
CHINESE PLA