Reason for
writing:
http://www.strategypage.com/dls/articles/Chinese-Carrier-Killer-Works-5-6-2013.asp http://thediplomat.com/the-naval-diplomat/2013/05/03/what-modern-militaries-can-learn-from-battlestar-galactica/
Context:
Pretty much every generation since
1900 has had a new thing come along which has caused commentators to declare
the surface warship was dead and should no longer be built; although since 1945
a variation has appeared where by some merely say it’s the end of the aircraft
carrier…in reality the situation is definitely not so black and white.
Key Words/Phrases:
·
VLS: Vertical Launch System· UCAV: Unmanned Combat Air Vehicle, in this work is mainly used to refer to the X-47 - The currently under development, but conducting carrier deck operations and flying, Unmanned Combat Air Vehicle, the X-47 is the future of stealth strike & reconnaissance; hence there is no coincidence that it looks like a mini B-2 bomber.
· ABM: Anti-Ballistic Missile
· EMP: Electro Magnetic Pulse
· MaRVs: manoeuvrable re-entry vehicle, it’s a warhead which can manoeuvre upon re-entering the Earth’s atmosphere.
· General Exchange – it’s not an officer, in this work the phrase is used to cover a scenario where by the ballistic missiles are fired by both sides at each other’s strategic targets…the very scenario which causes such fear and which helped to keep the Cold War coldish.
· Humit: Human Intelligence – spies or maybe special operations personnel camping near the enemy ports to monitor and report their movements in detail.
· Signit: Signals Intelligence – what is gleaned from reading enemy communications.
· Intit: Internet Intelligence – what is got from reading facebook, blogs, twitter updates… this might be just from some random person walking along writing a status “just saw a big grey ship going out to sea…huh, it was Bitchin” tells everyone that a ship is moving, this sort of thing is very difficult to stop, and can be very useful. Sometimes also called SoMeit meaning Social Media Intelligence…but Intit sounds better.
Key Points:
·
Limitations of weapon: Ballistic missiles are not
infallible; they are in fact rather large rockets, possibly considering their
purpose is to go bang, more accurately rather large fireworks…that’s not to say
they can’t be best of option available for something’s though[1],
but for the Anti-Ship role there are issues:
o Warhead: Nuclear,
conventional or other? If it’s nuclear then a nation which uses it is almost
certainly starting down the path to a general exchange, but if it’s
conventional then the accuracy required to even hit the largest vessels afloat
at such ranges would be virtually impossible to attain at current levels of
technology. The other is EMP, which is actually possibly the most sensible as
if fired it would in theory (something which has to be underlined) be
less likely to result in a general exchange, it might well damage or even
overload & destroy communications/electronic equipment and would certainly
knock out any aircraft any task group had in the air… the problem is that to be
effective against the ‘shielded’ systems of ship that such a weapon would have
just as big an impact on any friendly forces in the area, so instead of it
being a game changer it would be more of a game reseter with victory going to
whichever side recovers quickest with the advantage of course being to the side
which knew it was going to happen. All in all though, even an EMP weapon could
result in the setting off a general exchange…a hefty price to pay for the
tactical advantage that could possibly be bestowed by temporarily damaging the
enemy task force.
o Liquid or
solid fuel? this is important, solid is more difficult to make requiring a
greater degree of industrial and scientific force, but liquid fuel is often
more dangerous to handle and places limitations on the missiles as its often
very corrosive meaning they cannot be left fuelled, so have to be fuelled
immediately prior to launch, delaying it.
o How manoeuvrable
is it in flight? Can it be given mid-course guidance or will a splatter gun
effect have to be employed? Now whilst reports have varied, but it is claimed
that the MaRVs have some capability to be given course corrections in the case
of the DF-21C (CSS-5 Mod-3)[2] if
it’s true it’s brilliant, but at speeds of Mach 10 a minor error could be
colossal and its hard to see how terminal guidance radar would work with the
amount of heat generated by the air-resistance during re-entry. The solution if
such a capability is real[3],
is most likely that these MaRVs go slower so as the reduce heat; in which case
they lose the crucial advantage of ballistic missiles which is their sheer
speed and the difficulty that presents in dealing with them[4],
or alternatively the terminal guidance is based on telemetry received from
another system by a link transmitting/receiving from the ‘cold side’ of the
MaRV – although such a system would seem to be purely a theoretical construct
at present time.
o Range, the
DF-21 is not an inter-continental ballistic missile system, it’s a theatre
ballistic missile system, which means there is limited strike radius – in the
case of this system its claimed to be roughly 3,000km or 1,900mi
The range of the DF-21
Source: http://blog.usni.org/2011/01/26/getting-beyond-the-%E2%80%98transparency%E2%80%99-discussion
·
Limitations of locating target: it’s not just the
weapon system though which will be causing issues.
o Ships move
– it’s obvious right, but in 45mins an 18knot Royal Navy amphibious task group
will have moved 15miles from where they were when the missile was launched,
it’s not like the land targets or large exposed troop concentrations that are
the traditional targets of ballistic weapons…these targets are not unshielded
and could move out of the way. A carrier battle group moving at 32knots could
have moved nearly 28 miles; in any direction, this makes accurate targeting
analysis and mid-flight course correction a necessity, because even a nuclear
bomb at its most powerful doesn’t have a big blast radius.
o The ocean
is big, really, really big; the Soviet government found this out when they
threw RORSATs, TU-142 Bears[5],
IL-38 May’s, a huge submarine fleet and more than likely a hefty Humit &
Signit effort at it… and still the USN and other NATO forces eluded them more
often than not. The Chinese are investing in lots of satellites, UAVs and more
than likely other systems as well – added to Humit and Signit, there is now Intit.
All these things could well be deployed, but so can false leads, jamming, smoke
pots and probably has other options as well…
o They don’t
make it easy, even when ships are being tracked they can speed up/slow down,
zig zag, in fact throw in every option they want to, including choosing the
time & place of when they move into the missiles strike radius
·
Problems of command & control[6]
o Information
comes in, this weapon system is not going to be a local command one (there are
simply just too many strategic factors for even a theatre commander to be given
the keys), and all the time it takes to make the decision as to launch the data
is going to be degrading in accuracy, meaning at a certain point it becomes it
becomes pointless to launch.
o Furthermore
the system is going to depend upon a vast array of data, and a very robust
network to bring all that data from such disparate sources together…these are
both things which can be attacked.
·
Diplomatic/strategic problems
o Launching a
Ballistic Missile is launching a Ballistic Missile; it’s not a road which can
be easily travelled in reverse. Even in the post-Cold War era of détente, the
Russians were not accepting of a planned American conventional ballistic weapon
for quick strikes[7]
- during a war fighting scenario, any launch runs the risk that the US
president (who under such circumstances would be under already enormous strain)
might not be a strong person, and might have hawkish advisors advising them to
immediately launch their weapons in reply… quite possibly leading to the
scenario of failing to destroy an American carrier battle group (or for that
matter destroying it) results in the destruction of pretty much the whole
country…not exactly the scenario either Sun Tzu or Alfred Thayer Mahan would
advise.
o Furthermore
there is the fact that launching such a weapon may get a response from an
unintended target, for example consider the scenario, China launches a spread
of DF-21s against a USN force in the Indian Ocean that has been detected, a)
the missile’s flight path will lead to protests being filed by even friendly
Burma, Bangladesh will also file a diplomatic protest, India because of recent
flares up exacerbating long term disputes over territory (and operating at
heightened state due to the conflict going on around it) sees the missiles and
thinks they are an attack on it so immediately launches a reply in kind – again
leading to a general exchange.
·
Evolution of target; the trouble is American carrier
o Long range
stealthy UCAV, the X-47B[8] is
the one which is turning all the heads at the moment, it looks like a mean mini
B-2 Spirit bomber, but this aircraft is far more than that. It has an
un-refuelled range of 2,100nm or roughly 3,889km; but its capable of doing
air-to-air refuelling, this means that even if they were dispatched on a one
way trip these aircraft would allow the USN’s aircraft carriers to start
hitting the targets whilst they are well outside the range of the DF-21 or in
fact any of the other systems. Refuelling would enable them to loiter, waiting
for the vehicles to move from their hardened bunkers and head for their launch
positions so they can take them while they are exposed[9]. So
whilst the missiles might be relatively cheap in comparison to a battle group,
the launch vehicles and more importantly the personnel would not be so cheap
& easy to replace…destroying enough of them would undermine if not put out
of commission the whole system – the often most effective method of stopping an
attack is not hitting the weapons, but the source, the ability to shoot down
the weapon is important because things go wrong and surprises happen…but attack
at source is truly the best form of
defence.
o Laser
defences[10],
‘missiles are cheaper than ships’ is a constant refrain when talking about the
future of warfare, usually followed quickly by prediction of massed (thanks to
an integrated network of systems) saturation attacks decimating fleets… well
lasers are even cheaper than missiles, and whilst at the moment they are
limited to blinding missile sensors in some versions, or in some of the more
recent larger systems shooting down UAVs and burning small boats. They are
advancing just as quickly as missile technology is, and as ships all by virtue
of necessity carry very large power generation systems, the future of laser
weaponry is looking good…after all as long as the ship has power it will be
able to fire lasers, and as they ‘move at the speed of light’, saturation
attacks could well have to change. More importantly there is the option (with
even the current generation) that the laser could be used to provide a more
accurate targeting of the inbound enemy weapon, thereby smoothing the
interception and increasing chances of it being stopped before it could do any
damage.
A USN produced graphic explaining the current laser system
being tested
o ABM/ASSAT
weapons, for the USN, IJN and the RAN the SM-3 & Aegis is the primary
system for ABM work[11],
it has a ceiling of over 100 miles and a range of over 270 nautical miles
meaning it can provide protection over an area roughly 500x the Area of Greater London. The USN is aiming to put this
system on every one of their Arleigh
Burke class destroyers – and every other AEGIS equipped vessel they have; this
means that multiple escorts in any task group will have the capability to
defend it should attack at source fail or should they be caught by surprise… it
also makes the job of the attacker that much more difficult as they have to
factor in the likelihood of success into their use of a ballistic weapon, the
more of those fire the greater the chance that a general exchange might be
brought about.
Missiles being fired by Ticonderoga
class cruiser CG 69 USS Vicksburg,
the Flight I Arleigh Burke class
destroyers DDG 64 USS Carney &
DDG 68 USS The Sullivans and the
Flight IIA (5”/54 variant) Arleigh Burke class
destroyer DDG 80 USS Roosevelt
Furthermore, whilst the Aegis ships armed with SM-3s in the
Pacific fleet might well consider the DF-21s and their kind to be their primary
targets in any conflict, the ships in the Atlantic fleet might well be used to
target the very satellites which would be used to hunt their Pacific brethren. For
such a mission the system has already been demonstrated against a satellite which
was 133 nautical miles(a little over 153 miles) above the earth moving at
roughly 17,000mph[12],
this is important because the majority of satellites are maintained in the Low
Earth Orbit…and even in that most of them are within 90 minute range (Meaning
they complete an orbit every 90minutes) or roughly 100miles above the earth,
now whilst communication satellites and GPS systems are as a rule in higher
orbits, intelligence & reconnaissance satellites (as a rule) are in the
lower orbits putting them in range of SM-3.
Explaining the
Orbits
Points of Interest:
·
In his 1925 book “Winged
Defence; the development and possibilities of modern air power - economic and
military”¸ Billy Mitchel proclaimed
“Surface
navies have entirely lost their mission of defending the coast because aircraft
can destroy or sink any seacraft coming within their radius of operation. In
fact aircraft today are the only effective means of coast protection. Consequently,
navies have been pushed out on the high seas. The menace of submarines from
below and aircraft from above constitutes such a position that the surface ship
as an element of war is disappearing. Today, the principal weapon in the sea is
the submarine with its mine layers, gun fighters and torpedo craft.
In the future,
campaigns across the seas will be carried on from land base to land base under
the protection of aircraft. Expeditions across the sea such as occurred in the
World War will be an impossibility. Water spaces between land bases in the
northern hemisphere are very short. The space from America to Asia is only
fifty-two miles across the Bering Straits and across the Atlantic it is
scarcely more than four hundred.”[13]
Now leaving
aside invading Siberia from Alaska and the logistical nightmares that would
entail, it was an interesting claim, and supported by many such as Trenchard of
the RAF and the Italian Air Power theorist Giulio Douhet… it was thinking like
this which underpinned many decisions in the 1920s, unfortunately for the
theorists whilst some of their arguments were later proved in the course of
World War II, they were disproved on many more of them, including the notion
that ships would only not be able to fight where land aircraft dominated… the
evacuations of Dunkirk, Crete and many others all showed that whilst casualties
would be taken, operations could be accomplished.
·
What drives the size of aircraft carriers, and their
capability is the air group – aircraft are getting bigger, because more is
expected of them and so they have to include more equipment as standard… this
means to accommodate an air group of even the same size as a previous aircraft
carrier, the ship will need to be bigger… and that’s before factoring the fact
that an aircraft carrier will at minimum see two generations of aircraft fly
from its decks, which means it needs to factor in some space for future
proofing…otherwise the money will be wasted after just a decade and a half of
service. Furthermore, when talking about an aircraft carrier it is necessary to
consider the ship, a) may be any kind of large aviation ship (i.e. an LHA or
LHD[14]),
and b) it’s air group/role within the Task Force. Why is this point of interest
to this report?
Well simply
put the aircraft carrier is often set up as a ‘straw man’ for the arguments, or
others say that these weapons mean that aircraft should be spread around more
smaller aircraft carriers…these notes are not weighing into that argument, but
to say that such points are missing the point, these missiles if used are not
likely to be used against a Carrier Battle Group, more likely an Amphibious
Task Group, it would be a very sceptical person who could believe there is no coincidence that the DF-21’s range
is advertised at being enough to provide support to forces operating within the
second island chain[15]…and
Amphibious Task Groups even launching assaults from beyond 10 nautical miles
are still a lot more predictable in area than Carrier Battle Groups...and to a
certain frame of mind, whilst bombing can damage or destroy, its marines &
soldiers when landed by a navy which recapture or capture.
The First & Second Island chain
Summary:
The reality of anti-ship ballistic
missiles is it is they which are really the white elephant, not the aircraft
carrier or the surface warship; they are drain on resources, as they will have
to be defended, maintained and manned… all things which will cost money, but
unlike the aircraft carrier they cannot be used – for if they are used then the
likelihood of a general exchange depends upon the thinking of the least well
informed/least prepared government leader whose nation is affected by such a
launch. There is the very real possibility that success or failure would both
lead to massive retaliation… under these circumstances, whilst defences must be
built against such systems (as failure to prepare will certainly lead to failure,
and it isn’t an impossibility that actually taking the step/running the risk of
firing an Anti-Ship Ballistic Missile, and it then failing to sink its target
could lead to leadership change in the country that fired it/peace talks); the
reality of future conflict is more likely to involve dealing with attacks by
incredibly sophisticated cruise missiles/UAVs (frankly the line is starting to
blur between these two systems[16])…
the good thing for navies is that defences that can deal with ballistic
inbounds can most likely also give a very good effort against the more likely
threats.
[3]
There have been other systems built with a terminal guidance radar capability,
but this was a radar designed to fix land positions to provide accuracy – i.e.
where the surface wasn’t flat an essentially featureless, the difference in
radar return between an Ultra Large Crude Carrier (ULCC) and an aircraft
carrier is not that much.
[6]
This is why the Battlestar Gallactica article is worth reading, it makes some
good points about the problems of network centric warfare and over-reliance.
[7] For
more information about the Prompt Global Strike Program; http://www.nti.org/gsn/article/us-brass-reviews-prompt-global-strike-mulling-submarine-fired-arms/,
www.fas.org/sgp/crs/nuke/R41464.pdf, www.fas.org/sgp/crs/nuke/RL33067.pdf and
http://breakingdefense.com/2012/12/17/pentagons-global-strike-weapon-stuck-in-limbo-congress-fears-a/
[9]
This could even be arranged to happen when the UCAVs are over the target, by
the simple expedient of a carrier battle group ‘allowing itself’ to be seen
within the strike range, under those circumstances the Chinese government would
either have to order a firing of the weapons or accept a damaging loss of face
when images of the carrier conducting operations from within their ‘no-go zone’
get beamed around the world.
[10] For
more information check out www.fas.org/sgp/crs/weapons/R41526.pdf, http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn23379-dronewrecking-laser-gun-to-sail-on-us-warship.html,
http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/04/08/17658147-navy-unveils-powerful-ship-mounted-laser-weapon?lite
and http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newsvideo/9980726/US-Navy-laser-cannon-shoots-down-drone-in-latest-test.html.
it’s not just the USN though looking into these systems, http://www.foxnews.com/tech/2013/01/14/germans-build-successfully-test-laser-weapon/.
[11]
Its Wikipedia but it’s source list is a good place to start looking for
information about this system http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SM-3_missiles,
interestingly enough the RN’s Daring class
AADs have an excellent radar for this role (the Sampson System) and are fitted
for the large VLS (the MK41) necessary for them to be able to carry the SM-3
(or Tomahawk cruise missiles, should that be wished) but are instead fitted
with the smaller A50 Sylver VLS, which is what limits them to the Air Defence
role rather than a more general purpose role – for more info please read http://amphibiousnecessity.blogspot.co.uk/2009/06/whatever-happened-to-type-45.html,
http://amphibiousnecessity.blogspot.co.uk/2009/02/type-45-paamssea-viper.html
& http://amphibiousnecessity.blogspot.co.uk/2008/12/destroyers.html
.
[13] (Mitchell 1925, xvi)
[14]
To read further on this idea please go to http://www.phoenixthinktank.org/2012/03/options-for-future-amphibious-aviation/,
http://www.phoenixthinktank.org/2011/05/is-there-a-possibility-for-amphibiosity-in-coversion/
& http://amphibiousnecessity.blogspot.co.uk/2013/05/april-may-2013-notes-relocating.html
[16] This
will be the subject of another notes in future.
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