Quote:Unsurprisingly, the package of 13 Chinese combat aircraft, (including eight H-6 bombers) entering Taiwan’s ADIZ last Saturday were carrying out a mock attack on USS Theodore Roosevelt.
As already reported in detail, a total of 28 aircraft, including as many as eight PLAAF (People’s Liberation Army Air Force) H-6 bombers, “intruded” into Taiwan’s ADIZ (Air Defense Identification Zone) between Jan. 23 and 24, 2021.
In particular, we noticed that the mission on Saturday Jan. 23, was conducted as the Theodore Roosevelt Carrier Strike Group (TRCSG), led by USS Theodore Roosevelt aircraft carrier entered the South China Sea (SCS) “to conduct routine operations”.
At this respect, here’s the comment this Author made in a previous story on the spike in PLA activity near Taiwan as the U.S. flattop entered the same area of operations: “The simultaneous presence of the Chinese Xian H-6K in the region as the TRSG entered the SCS is particularly interesting, if we consider the role of the PLAAF bomber. The H-6K is a highly modified variant from the original H-6 bomber (itself a Tu-16 derivative), designed for long-range/stand-off maritime or land strike capability with long-range anti-ship and land-attack cruise missiles. In short, it is capable of attacking U.S. carrier battle groups or other priority targets with up to six YJ-12 ASCM (Anti-Ship Cruise Missiles) and 6/7 KD-20 ALCMs.”
Dealing with the YJ-12, it has a range of 400 km, can reach speeds of up to Mach 3, and is capable of performing airborne evasive maneuvers approaching the target: these features make this ASCM (Anti-Ship Cruise Missile) difficult for Aegis Combat Systems and SM-2 surface-to-air missiles that protect U.S. carrier strike groups.
A confirmation that the mission flown on Jan. 23 was simulating an air strike on the U.S. aircraft carrier comes from the Financial Times, that on Jan. 29, 2020 reported: “People familiar with intelligence collected by the US and its allies said the bombers and some of the fighter aircraft involved were conducting an exercise that used a group of US Navy vessels led by the carrier USS Theodore Roosevelt in the same area as a simulated target. Pilots of H-6 bombers could be heard in cockpit conversations confirming orders for the simulated targeting and release of anti-ship missiles against the carrier, the people said.”
While not reported to be part of the mission last week, it’s worth mentioning that the People’s Liberation Army Air Force‘s has also developed a further variant of the H-6K, designated H-6N which was specifically designed as a ballistic missile launcher. Its primary weapon should be the CH-AS-X-13, also known as DF-21D, the air launched version of the DF-21 “Carrier Killer” Anti-Ship Ballistic Missile (AShBM), reportedly with a range of 1450 km (780 NM), Mach 6 speed (some sources state even Mach-10) and a 600 kg (about 1300 lbs) payload.
Here’s what we wrote about the DF-21 in a previous article:
“The first reports about the existence of the DF-21D in 2010 sparked some concerns as Pentagon officials stated that, if the claims about the missile’s capabilities are true, the United States may not have a defense against it, as the maneuverable re-entry vehicle (MaRV) and the high speed could complicate the interception by air defense weapons. This led the U.S. Navy to potentiate the Aegis Ballistic Missile Defense System aboard ships in the Pacific Ocean while new advanced systems are developed. China reportedly test-fired two AShBM in the South China Sea in late August, one of them being a DF-21D.”
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Don't worry, China Joe will be letting them land at our military bases soon.
Apparently its not as easy to target a US carrier as people might think. The Chinese ability to get real time locations to a missile warhead is considered to be insufficient at this time to be able to reliably target a US carrier, but its clear they have some fairly concerning weapons in their inventory. This is why I really think its time to come up with a smaller version of the Harrier Pegasus engine and build a small strike capable sub-sonic VSTOL drone big enough to carry the new long range anti-ship missiles that will soon enter the US inventory. It wont be as stealthy as an F-35 due to the nozzle jet system, but it could still be fairly stealthy.
These drones would ideally also be able to carry load outs of sidewinders or longer range air-to-air missiles like the AIM-120 in a stealthy internal bay, or carry they even more air-to-air missiles externally in a non-stealthy configuration. That way these drones could function as extra missile magazines for the F-35.
Essentially, you could use these things to attack targets far away while never getting your carrier strike group anywhere close to the target. Additionally, these drones could create picket lines far from the strike group that could intercept incoming missiles long before the fleet is threatened. I could see them being used as air refueling tankers loaded with special bolt-on external fuel tanks or as recon platforms. Lots of uses for a VSTOL drone capable of carrying 2 to 3 thousand pound payloads--and the more range the better (which is why I prefer a subsonic drone). The engine is already proven and cheap---so much of whats needed is already developed. Best of all, these could be launched from any navy ship with a helicopter deck. Thus, most any small combatant ship could suddenly be a small aircraft carrier/refueling station/rearming station for these drones.
Space Force "Trumps" that.
We have simply looked the other way for too long, while allowing China to get way out of control.
What we should have done is GTFO from the Mideast no later than 2005, and focus on making a serious effort to contain China. We are now in Cold War II, and this time the enemy is China, not Russia. As an aside, I think we could probably do some good by triangulating Russia against China, but that's for another post.
How we won Cold War I was very simple. Truman bribed up an alliance in Western Europe to contain the Soviets, and then Reagan put pressure on their economy to bring down the USSR. I still think something similar could work with China, but not as well as it could have if we had started 15 years ago. But no, we were so busy trying to impose peace and democracy militarily on a region that has never in its history been even remotely peaceful or democratic.
In 2005 or earlier, we should have done the following in the Mideast:
1) Split Iraq into three countries, Kurdistan in the north, Shia Mesopotamia in the east, and Sunni Iraq in the west. Turkey didn't want Kurdistan, but at that time Turkey really wanted into the EU, so give he Halliburton contract for Kurdistan to Schlumberger, and tell France that this is their payback for getting screwed at San Remo, and it's their job to convince Turkey that Kurdistan is the price of EU.
2) Realize that there is no two-state solution within the current footprint of Israel, because there isn't enough room, so create a Palestinian state in their ancient homeland, Sinai. Bribe Egypt to give up everything east of 33E, give Sinai between 33E and 34E to the Palestinians, call it Palestine or Philistia or whatever, and put in enough infrastructure to make it way more appealing than either the East Bank or Gaza. Don't force people to move, but offer them a better deal and enough will take it to let Israel take over the East Bank.
3) Do the Tom Clancy thing for Jerusalem--free International city, patrolled by an international force (Clancy said Swiss Guards, or it could be blue helmets) with a buffer zone to the Jordanian border, with an international airport in the buffer zone, so that visitors can come in from anywhere without having to pass through Israel.
Make those three things the focus of our efforts, which would be more diplomatic than military. By now, Sunni Iraq would have allied with Sunni eastern Syria (with considerable Saudi support) and would be fighting a civil war to split Syria--Alawite (Shia) along the western mountains and Mediterranean coast and Sunni east. Let them.
That would have freed up resources to devote to containing China. We have some tools at our disposal.
1) We already have the Quad alliance with Japan, Australia, and India. Build that up and it can pretty well contain China at some point.
2) Fully support the proposed CANZUK, and negotiate a very close relationship. We already have NAFTA/USMCA with Canada and the aforementioned Quad with Australia, and UK is our long-time closest ally, so the pieces are there. I would start it out by bringing UK into NAFTA/USMCA now that Brexit has freed them of their EU obligations. As a member of NAFTA/USMCA, UK would immediately become a primary waypoint for shipping goods from the EU to the USA. The CANZUK proposal has mentioned a combined military, which would be probably 4th strongest in the world, so a military as well as trade alliance could be very useful.
3) Leverage the CANZUK relationship into an alliance with the entire British Commonwealth. That strengthens ties to India and brings Malaysia and Singapore into the fold. The combined military proposal has also at times suggested the whole Commonwealth. That would be no worse than the 4th strongest military in the world and the 2nd strongest Navy. We could get rid of a lot of our world policeman duties by having either CANZUK or the Commonwealth take them on.
4) Bring non-Commonwealth countries in the region--Indonesia, Philippines, Vietnam, Thailand--into the fold with a revamped TPP that creates both a military and a trade alliance. If we have India, Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, and the Philippines in an alliance, we can pretty much shut down China's westbound export trade and its inbound oil lifeline, both of which are essential to its continued existence. Not that we would do either short of a declared war, but we would create threats that they would have to address in some way, and those threats would create substantial negotiation leverage that we currently lack.
The situation is a bit more complicated with China because they have significantly more economic power than the Soviets ever had. We need to be able to contain them militarily, and then defeat them economically.