A big part of the U.S. military — that would be the Navy — is working itself into knots over the “anti-access” challenge, potential enemies possessing large arsenals of long-range, precision guided missiles, stealthy submarines and over-the-horizon radars. In fact, the Navy, with the Air Force in tow, is thinking through a new warfighting doctrine known as AirSea Battle intended to come up with ways to counter enemy missile magazines and allow ships freedom of access in offshore waters (we wrote about it a few weeks back).
The biggest, baddest threat in the anti-access arena is China’s DF-21 anti-ship ballistic missile (ASBM), ominously known as the “carrier killer.” The DF-21 is not fully operational. That China has been working on such a missile for some time is well known. In testimony before (.pdf) the House Armed Services Committee last week, the head of Pacific Command, Adm. Robert Willard, said China is “testing” the weapon. A soft kill terminal guidance warhead is thought to be in the works that would detonate above a carrier and riddle its deck with thousands of steel flechettes.
Yes, the missile is a threat. But one, it is nothing new that ships must be wary of shore-based strike assets--whether artillery, airplanes, or missiles. It is normal to be careful about where we send our carriers. The 1942 Doolittle Raid had such a big effect because we violated that caution to strike Japan. Plenty of carriers were lost in battle during World War II. The problem is, we've gotten used to assuming that our carriers are off limits and can't be lost. We've raised their prestige from being a weapon system to being an objective whose loss can actually defeat us. That is insane.
Two, as the article notes, we can attack the DF-21s before they launch. China may not like that and it could be dangerous, but we'll do it rather than risk sending carriers close to China.
Third, our carriers are not our only strike platforms. We can carry out very effective offensive operations within range of China's DF-21s without exposing our carriers:
As I argue in this post, it has been a long time since our carriers were our nearly sole offensive weapon. And carriers may even become a liability in time--a propaganda loss for losing one without a commensurate gain in capabilities for preserving them. In the 1970s, it made sense for the Soviets to target our carriers; but in the decades since then, anti-ship and land-attack missiles have spread to all of our surface combatants and submarines. And as we network what we have, the ability of our Navy to mass effect on the enemy has become independent of carriers.
We can afford to keep the super carriers back until we make the environment safer for the carriers to enter.
Fourth, if we need naval aviation to attack Chinese naval forces that won't have carrier assets for some time, it seems, we have another option--our "amphibious warfare" platforms:
Designed to project power and maintain presence, LHA-Replacement (LHA-R, aka. LH-X and now the America Class) large deck amphibious assault ships will replace the LHA-1 Tarawa Class. They’re based on the more modern LHD Wasp Class design, but initial ships will remove the LHD’s landing craft and well deck. While its LHA/LHD predecessors were amphibious assault ships with a secondary aviation element, it’s fair to describe the LHA-Rs as escort carriers with a secondary amphibious assault role.
I commented on this development some years ago:
These will outclass anybody else's actual fleet carriers. And we don't even really count them as carriers. Yet they'd do perfectly fine as carriers in a pinch and would be able to carry out various escort and ASW tasks quite well and free up the big decks for offensive action. They will be able to lead expeditionary strike groups.
Another role is that they can enter dangerous areas that we don't want to risk our big decks in, and still get the job done against the level of opposition we'd likely face there. Heck, the LHA-Rs could act as staging bases for the big deck carrier planes that launch from further back, land on the LHA-R to arm and refuel, strike Chinese navy targets, and then stage back to the big deck through the LHA-R. This would supplement the organic air squadron on the mini-carriers.
And finally, as the initial article notes, this Chinese development is far more of a problem for Asian nations than for us. We have the option of keeping our far more numerous large and small deck carriers back until we can strike and degrade the DF-21 (and other) threats to our big carriers. Yes, we'd need to figure out how we help Taiwan with other weapons if our carriers can't charge in like the cavalry to save the day, but that's a mission problem that we could solve rather than just plunge into the area and let the Chinese take shots at our carriers all the way in.
China's neighbors have fewer decks that are smaller and more vulnerable to being hit, and are sitting right there without the option of staying out of range of the DF-21s. India, I think, is probably the main target for these missiles--not the US Navy that is superior to China's navy even with all of our carriers removed from play:
Given the difficulty of projecting conventional Chinese naval power into the Bay of Bengal and points west, couldn't the Chinese use their string of pearls to target India's much smaller (than ours) navy with ship-killing ballistic missiles? The DF-21 would only be of limited value, but if the capability was expanded up the chain of missiles a bit more, the reach of China's anti-ship capabilities would extend to the Persian Gulf.
China would need to either extend the range of the missile or deploy it into Burma (Myanmar) to really pave the way for a Chinese foray into the Indian Ocean, but the potential is there.
China's DF-21 threat will be real. But it is nothing new in the history of naval warfare. It is something to be addressed with new building priorities, revised naval strategies, new weapons, and diplomacy to bolster other nations also threatened by China's new weapon.
