September 5, 2019

Existing US Missile Becoming Intermediate Anti-Ship Missile like DF-21D

Josh made some valid points here and here on September 4, 2019 (in response to my article) regarding the unlikelihood of the US developing new land launched intermediate range missile systems. 

Reasons for unlikelihood include missile development costs, nuclear warhead redevelopment and production costs, pre-existence of US cruise missiles, guided bomb and ballistic missile dropping airpower and lack of allies willing to host land launched intermediate range missile systems.

On the assumption existing weapons are cheaper to further develop, hence "sell" to the US taxpayer and US government budgeters one exception might be extending the short (160 km) range of the US MGM-140 Army Tactical Missile System (ATacMS) to the now irrelevant 499 km intermediate treaty range.

The US has been studying intercontinental-global strike hypersonic weapons but they require much mere time and funds to develop than 2 intermediate range weapons that China has already developed. The US has been impressed with the hypersonic (with suspected but not yet fully demonstrated) anti-ship ballistic missile (ASBM) capabilities of land launched Chinese DF-21Ds and DF-26s.

These represent new types of anti-ship weapon systems that US airpower and cruise missiles cannot match for speed-range.

A Possible US (DF-21D and DF-26 like) Anti-Ship Ballistic Missile  

The most likely candidate may be a future anti-ship version of an extended range MGM-140 (ATacMS). 


Helpfully the writers of Wikipedia have already broached the subject but, significantly they did this before the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty expired on February 1, 2019. Hence their reservations about limiting ATacMS range below the treaty limit of 500 km is no longer limiting. 

Wiki reports:

"In October 2016, it was revealed that the ATacMS would be upgraded with an existing seeker to enable it to strike moving targets on land and at sea.[18]
In March 2016, Lockheed Martin, Boeing, and Raytheon announced they would offer a missile to meet the U.S. Army's Long Range Precision Fires (LRPF) requirement to replace the ATACMS. 
The missile will use advanced propulsion to fly faster and further, out to 310 miles (500 km) ([no longer] limited by the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty),[19] while also being thinner and sleeker, increasing loadout to two per pod, doubling the number able to be carried by M270 MLRS and M142 HIMARS launchers.[20][21]
Lockheed and Raytheon will test-fire their submissions for the renamed Precision Strike Missile (PRSM) program in 2019, with the selected weapon planned to achieve Initial Operational Capability in 2023; the initial PRSM will only be able to hit stationary targets on land, but later versions will track moving targets on land and sea.[22] 
If the United States withdraws from the INF Treaty [as it now has], the range of the PRSM could be increased beyond the '499 km' limitation placed upon it by the treaty.[23]

As well as ships an ATacMS with a nuclear warhead could be used as a rapid intermediate range defense against enemy submarines and against Russia's Poseidon (Status-6)(NATO Kanyon) nuclear armed, nuclear propelled torpedo/AUV.

There are many points on US territory that a conventional or nuclear warhead, land based 500+ km range, anti-ship, ATacMS could be placed including:

-  east and west coast continental US
-  Alaska to block the Bering Strait and against Russia's Rybachiy SSBN and SSN Base
-  Hawaii (particularly if its range were boosted out to 5,500 km (like China's DF-26)
-  Guam to hit Chinese ships and submarines in the Yellow, East and South China Seas and Chinese
    coastal bases. 

-  Also acting as a second strike against Chinese nuclear tipped DF-21D and DF-26 use.

---

Pete

4 comments:

Josh said...

@Pete:

Your posts got me to thinking and googling. It turns out that the US has been testing and researching hypersonics much more than I imagined with much less fanfare than Russia or China. There are no less than six known programs running right now - two by DARPA (Tactical Boost Glide, Hybersonic Air Breathing Weapon), two by the USAF (ARRW/AGM-183, HCSW), one by the USN (Conventional Prompt Strike), and most interestingly for our current discussion one Army program: Long Range Hypersonic Weapon. The latter program intends to field a functional four launch vehicle, eight missile battery by late 2023. The booster and glide vehicle is apparently a design shared by the USN around 34" x 20+ feet, ~8000 lbs from what I can tell (basically the dimensions of ARRW, which probably also shares the same booster and glider in an air launched configuration). Its is likely such a weapon would have a range out to a couple thousand km, as per the test carried out by the USN of their system in 2017 (it was done very quietly with almost no details released).

The 2023 test deployment seems very optimistic, but the Army does seem to be leveraging as much existing equipment as it can - the entire All Up Round from the USN, HEMETT trucks, and their existing mobile artillery control system. Such a system would probably put China's SCS islands at risk of hypersonic attacks from Guam, if not the coastal mainland itself. It clearly would violate the INF treaty and it only in the last month became a program of record - whether this was the impetus for leaving INF or just a consequence, I can't say, but probably the former.

Most of my info came from or was referenced here, along with some side google searches:

https://www.secretprojects.co.uk/threads/us-hypersonic-weapons-projects-general.30673/


Cheers,
Josh

Pete said...

Hi Josh

The US is indeed throwing vast amounts of money at several hypersonic glide missile programs.

The intermediate range ballistic missile projects may be less developed as they:

A. needed the February 1, 2019 (end of INF Treaty) kickoff surety, and

B. one or two (may be identicle to those in A.) may have been sensitive in terms of being progressed before February, therefore in Breach of the INF Treaty.

Regards

Pete

GhalibKabir said...

Hi Josh and Pete,

very informative comments. I always felt that trump was rather being 'cute' when he blamed everyone else including Charlie's aunt for the US pulling out of the INF. Now it looks as if all along the US was obviously doing the same thing the Russkies and Chinese were doing, i.e. developing intermediate range hypersonic missiles.

their hypocrisy was already beyond stale....now it is simply becoming laughably silly to make 'lofty claims' about the 'moral high ground', an irritating fantasy that the US indulges itself in on a regular basis.

Pete said...

Hi GhalibKabir

No I think compared to China and North Korea not being covered by the INF Treaty therefore happily developing land based intermediate range ballistic missiles, the US steps are minor.

China's intermediate range DF-21 and DF-26 ballistic missiles when (or already are?) deployed in Tibet can threaten India with about 3 minutes (?) to impact - particularly against Delhi.

Regards

Pete