7 ms·

Pretty much. 25% interception rate on shit tier Kinzhals last year, which allegedly required salvoing all 32 interceptors from patriot battery, a patriot pac3

• r00f 10mo ago
  I don't think that taking interception rate as the only metric is fair. RU missiles have shown pretty low precision - and hitting a moving ship is much harder than hitting a stationary building, at least in my imagination.
  • maxglute 10mo ago
    Yes, hence RU missile shit tier, they can hit point targets at least, which is step above IR missile that is dog shit tier, area spam. Maybe IR high end stuff RU tier if we can disambiguate the recent UAE hit that is statistically suggest low CEP point target capability. For PRC missiles, see tandem missile demonstration a few years ago, two missiles launched from different launch sites coordinated to hit moving ship at sea. AKA PRC already have the ISR / kill chain to hit moving ships synced to time and space. Something basically no one else has demonstrated. Now extrapolate that out 10 years, while they (and US) are proliferating spaced based C4ISR = basically any surface fleet anywhere is dead, and even if we downgrade to only static targets, that means all US logistics, i.e. unrep are dead which leaves surface fleet single deployment assets. DDG barely has enough endurance for a few days of high tempo operations (fuel and weapons), carriers has endurance but without replenishment, no ammo, and without DDG escorts no protection.
• ericmay 10mo ago
  > TLDR USN can't do anything against PRC, but doesn't have to do anything VS everyone else. Eh the USN can still maintain superiority outside of the South China Sea which means control of global trade. It’s not like it’s useless or anything even if the Taiwan straight turns into a dead zone or if the USN has to worry about missiles from the Chinese mainland. China also has to worry about missiles hitting their mainland industrial centers and naval facilities too.
  • maxglute 10mo ago
    Look at DoDs China report last few years, specifically PRC fielded conventional strike. PRC DF26, H6xCJ20s already can hit every essential SLOC from Malacca to MENA at volume, DF27 reaches west coast and Europe. There isn't really anywhere except Atlantic (and south America) where USN can operate permissively, i.e. every shipping lane PRC needs (for energy in next 10 years) is already covered. As for missiles hitting mainland, we're really talking about attritional game, PRC A2D2 works as advertised and they can potentially blunt much of the fires from being deliverable to mainland, and there's also sheer scale asymmetry, i.e. PRC pouring more concrete in 10 years than US in past 100. That's just a stupendous amount of infra to break. Meanwhile DF27 can hit west coast, in a few years they'll have DF27+ that reach most of CONUS. The real question then is who can deliver more fires, can win attrition game, can reconstitute faster. And vs PRC, it may not be US considering they put so much fires generation on carriers that may not be able to deliver any munitions under PRC A2D2 and the 30-40 B21 replacement (we're talking 10 years out) barely replaces one carrier in fire power. Meanwhile PRC has global strike eggs is mostly in mainland based ICBMs that skips entire delivery vehicle middle man and can potentially hit CONUS and everything in between with high survivability. And ample surplus industry/construction sector to rebuild. The TLDR is once hemispheric hypersonic proliferates more, USN can't operate permissively in any of the theatres PRC really cares about. But again that doesn't mean USN can't operate permissively vs literally anyone else, even on legacy platforms that still grossly overmatches every other adversary regardless of acquisition malpractice.
    • ericmay 10mo ago
      > Meanwhile DF27 can hit west coast, in a few years they'll have DF27+ that reach most of CONUS. > Meanwhile PRC has global strike eggs is mostly in mainland based ICBMs that skips entire delivery vehicle middle man and can potentially hit CONUS and everything in between with high survivability. You are just describing nuclear war here, which seems unrealistic to me. China knows they’ll lose ocean access and trade will be stoped, which means no oil, hence why they’ve gone all-in in EVs and “green” technology. Piping in oil from Russia or whatever is a fantasy - pipelines will just get blown up. Chinese missiles flying all over the world to sink blue water naval ships also seems unrealistic to me. They have to find the ships, for starters. This is a feat much more sensible in and around the Taiwan Straight or the South China Sea. But in your excitement you are forgetting that while certainly China can rain down missiles on enemy forces in the region, those same enemies can strike back too. Or are these hypersonic missiles so scary and advanced and all allied forces will just have to sit quietly while their military and industrial equipment is bombed? If that’s the case, what’s China waiting for? > Look at DoDs China report last few years, specifically PRC fielded conventional strike. Could you link to a specific paper or report that you are referring to? I read these from time to time.
• nullhole 10mo ago
  As I understand it, hypersonics only got the focus they did in russia and china because US missile defence had evolved to the point where it was too much of a threat to existing ballistic missiles. No fundamental reason to think hypersonics won't in turn suffer the same fate.
  • maxglute 10mo ago
    They transitioned to hypersonic development after US withdrew from ABM treaty in early 2000s, historically moving to hypersonic was not reaction to US having a working shield (it didn't), it was more proactive move demonstrate US pursuing missile shield is likely not ever going to be viable. It took another 15+ years for US ABM tests to consistently intercept ballistics, and even then under very favourable (scripted), not operational conditions, i.e. FTM44 in 2020 was first time US intercepted an "ICBM representative" target. Current US ABM defense #s is not remotely credible threat vs salvo medium/high end ballistics, i.e. current US has ~50 GMDs, it functionally doesn't matter for strategic level exchanges. For theatre/tactical performance, again early Kinzhal was functionally ballistic and interception rate was ~25%, dropped to 6% when RU added some terminal maneuvering. So US has not only not caught up to ABM defense outside of North Korea tier threats, ABM defense currently on trend to lose the physics race (against capable adversaries). There are fundamental physical reason high end hypersonics will likely only extend the interception gap. The TLDR is terminal speed past mach 6+, the intercept window compresses so much it becomes almost mechanically impossible for interceptors, i.e. g-load on interceptors will physically break them apart. Kinzhal (which US/PRC categorize as ballistic tier) terminal is ~mach4, PRC DFs (US categorize as proper hypersonic) are estimated to sustain mach 5-10, i.e. high machs until final seconds, basically physically impossible engagement envelopes. DEW doesn't have dwell time vs hypersonic already shielded against plasma sheath. Current golden shield bet is on glide phase interceptors, which doesn't really answer magazine math, i.e. multiple expensive interceptors (especially midcourse) is going to lose the attrition game regardless, maybe not vs smaller adversaries, but vs PRC. Extra lopsided in context of naval defense with limited magazine depth where it's not even about $$$ but inability to defend against saturation.