Aims and Motives of China's Recent Missile Defense Test

Jamestown Foundation ^ | 1/21/2010 | Russell Hsiao

[ErnstStavroBlofeld]

The U.S. government announced on January 6 that it awarded the defense manufacturer, Lockheed Martin, a contract to build the Patriot Advanced Capability-3 (PAC-3) missiles for Taiwan. The agreement is part of an arms package that the United States agreed to sell to Taiwan in 2008 (eTaiwan news, January 7). The Indian government also recently declared that it was expanding its anti-ballistic missile system to include an anti-satellite program (ASM) (Space News, January 4). Following these announcements the People's Republic of China (PRC) announced on January 11 that it had successfully tested a "ground-based, midcourse missile interception technology." The Chinese government made the announcement via a short news report featured in the official Xinhua News Agency, which stated that a missile defense test was carried out "within its [Chinese] territory." Xinhua noted that "the test has achieved the expected objective," adding that it was "defensive in nature and is not targeted at any country." No further details of the test were released through official channels, except for a statement made by Chinese Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Jiang Yu. Jiang said that "the test would neither produce space debris in orbit nor pose a threat to the safety of orbiting spacecraft" (Xinhua News Agency, January 11; January 14; January 19; China Review News, January 15).

While the announcement by the Chinese government is a welcome improvement to Beijing's muted response following the anti-satellite (ASAT) test in January 2007,