China’s “Antiaccess” Ballistic Missiles and U.S. Active Defense
Relations between Taiwan and China have improved recently. At the same time, U.S.-Japanese relations have worsened, partly as the result of disagreements over Futenma Marine Air Station on Okinawa. As a result, the prospects of fighting between the United States and China over Taiwan and of U.S. reliance on Okinawa bases to supplement carrier airpower in the course of such a fight appear far-fetched, disastrous for the states concerned. Of course, military professionals and the defense analytic community need to think through unlikely and unwelcome scenarios. To that end, various analysts have contributed to a lively discussion of Chinese “antiaccess” systems designed to keep the United States at bay in the event of conflict. These systems include C4ISR (command, control, communications, computers, intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance) assets like over-the-horizon (OTH) radar and increasing numbers of satellites, a more modern air force, more submarines with better weapons, and both cruise and ballistic missiles to hold at risk our ships at sea and our air bases ashore. This article examines ballistic missile threats to carriers and air bases and the adequacy of U.S. active defenses. China seeks the capacity to find U.S. aircraft carriers roughly a thousand miles from the mainland and to attack them with homing ASBMs (antiship ballistic missiles). China must overcome serious technological challenges to field the systems needed to do these things. The United States faces the prospect that Marshall Hoyler, now retired, was a professor at the Naval War College from 2001 through 2008. Before becoming a teacher, he worked as a defense analyst at the Congressional Budget Office, the Center for Naval Analyses, and the Institute for Defense Analyses. Prior to that, he was a rifle platoon leader in the 3rd Battalion, 9th Marines.