The entire growing sense that somehow China has gotten one over on us with this system is baed on this statement and smoke and mirrors.
The Chinese have simply announced this system, but not one operational test has been observed or announced. The Chinese have a huge technological obstacles to overcome to develop and field such a system.
They do not have the satellite system in place to find the carrier, track it, or communicate with long distance assetss that might do so.
They would be launching from great distance and the carrier will have moved miles by the time the missile arrives on target so it will need a acquisition and targeting capability of its own that the chinese have not demonstrated.
Then, and finally, it will be going against the teeth of the US AEGIS System, the very greatest strength of a carrier battle group's defenses. While the Chinese have only talked about their capability and done research on land, the US Navy has demonstrated the exact capability of shooting down just these types of missiles at sea once they get close to and target our vessels.
So, this great threat is more manufactured than real at this point. Repeat something often enough with enough offiandom and people start to believe it, despite the lack of any real evidence.
With such proganda they can change spending and our thinking when it probably does not need to change at all.
The PLAN is a growing threat, make no mistake. And they are developing and fielding a lot of new vessels and systems. but there is no evidence that they have mastered what they need to produce this system..which would be a significant threat, but due to AEGIS, not a game ender.
Good points. Also needs to be mentioned, its only a matter of time before the CG missile defense goes to directed energy, perhaps a decade. Then, it wont matter how fast the missile goes, it’s nothing compared to speed-of-light...
Agree or not, it's worth the read.