America's fleet--despite its problems--is probably still superior to the Chinese navy despite its new car smell. But America relies on reinforcing its outnumbered and outgunned ships and allied navies in the western Pacific with American ships from around the globe. What if conventional hypersonic space weapons are China's method of crippling those reinforcements?
After we won the Cold War, we got used to fighting enemies that we had to go around the globe to fight, but who really couldn't wage war on us here. Terror, sure. But nothing that could really dent our military superiority.
But now we have entered a world of great power competition. We should no longer assume our home ports are safe harbors.
Right now the worry over China's partially orbiting nuclear-capable hypersonic weapons has focused on a potential counter-force nuclear first strike against our land-based missiles.
I'm skeptical that China would risk such a strike on the assumption that America could not or would not retaliate with nukes against Chinese cities.
What if China wants hypersonic orbital weapons for a more practical warfighting mission? What if China needs a small number to hit our major ships in port where they are stationary, visible, and most vulnerable? Wouldn't that prevent America from mobilizing and sending reinforcements to defeat China in the western Pacific?
Isn't this scenario just a step up from what China could do with their "carrier killer" ballistic missiles at shorter ranges?
Might not a rain of anti-ship ballistic missiles nullify India's carrier fleet and smash up even their larger surface combatants, keeping China's line of supply largely unmolested?
We may be nervous about the potential of the DF-21 to be a carrier killer, but the Indians should be sweating bullets over this prospect. For India, it could be a fleet killer.
Those missiles are a threat to our forward-based ships, but I observed that they put all of India's fleet in danger even in home waters or home ports. Don't globe-circling hypersonics do the same to America?
Some already recognize that Chinese hypersonic weapons pose a threat to Guam:
Guam “would absolutely need” the Navy’s SM-6 missile for its defense against a hypersonic missile attack, the program executive for Aegis ballistic missile defense said Thursday.
Rear Adm. Tom Druggan called the SM-6 “our leading defense capability for hypersonic missile defense.” It is “a fantastic missile, just absolutely great missile” because of its versatility.
Think bigger. Globe-circling Chinese hypersonic weapons mean that at least for our major warships there is no safe harbor.
Our allies need to think about this threat, too, including the British with their one-ship fleet and the Indian navy, as noted.
Although I doubt China would reveal this capability for striking Russia.
But I digress.
And how many hypersonic weapons would be needed if they actually release multiple anti-ship projectiles?
A July test of a Chinese hypersonic weapon included one weird trick: as it streaked through the atmosphere after a planet-spanning flight, the weapon, traveling at faster than Mach 5, released an unknown projectile somewhere above the South China Sea. The release of a projectile, according to the Financial Times, has U.S. officials scratching their heads wondering exactly what was tested and what it released.
Would even a chunk of metal going at such high speeds be enough to cripple even our large carriers? I'm thinking yes it is. Remember, a mission kill is as good as a sinking for any but the longest war.
Can you imagine the effect on American morale if our TV stations all go 24/7 with multiple burning carriers in our own ports? I worry enough about losing one given the mythology surrounding their invulnerabilty. Would that scale of loss galvanize Americans to fight or would it demoralize Americans?
Luckily, the unknown Chinese projectile missed its apparent target by 24 miles.
But if China improves its accuracy (and do we know it wasn't designed to appear as a miss to fool us?), isn't this global Pearl Harbor the real threat of Chinese fractional orbit hypersonic weapons?
And what else would China target? The Panama Canal? The Pentagon? Our few shipyards able to repair ships? Factories that make the high tech weapons we'll need to fight a longer war?
How many would be needed to inflict crippling harm? A dozen? Two dozen?
The commander of America's 7th Fleet wants more carriers if China goes to war. His odds of getting them could shrink to zero if a conventional strike hypersonic orbital weapon enters China's arsenal.
I redlined my own pucker factor just thinking about this.
UPDATE: Thank you for the Instapundit link.
UPDATE: And welcome Facebook readers. I don't do Facebook. Or any social media, for that matter.
