The Chinese language Individuals’s Liberation Army has offered new info on and a uncommon have a look at the secretive DF-100 cruise missile, as a part of the providers’ 98th anniversary celebrations. First unveiled in 2019, the DF-100 is broadly thought of probably the most succesful land assault cruise missile class on the earth, and pairs an estimated 3,000–4,000-kilometre vary with a really excessive a Mach 4-5 cruising pace and excessive strike accuracy. The missile is one among a variety of recent Chinese language property able to placing American army services throughout the Pacific, together with important services on Guam and Hawaii, with its pace posing a major problem to layered air defences. Though cruise missiles with comparable ranges are fielded by plenty of nations together with Russia and United States, missiles combining such ranges with supersonic pace are very uncommon, whereas these attaining such ranges with a Mach 4-5 pace are unheard of outdoor China. This not solely permits targets to be struck way more quickly, but additionally make them far harder to intercept.
The DF-100 was proven working throughout workout routines simulating full spectrum jamming, with the footage highlighting its sharp conical warhead and outsized tail fins. This urged manoeuvre authority, which additional issues potential adversary interception efforts. The missiles had been proven being launched from automobiles in cluttered city terrain, demonstrating their means to stay cell to extend survivability. Alongside ground-based launch automobile, the missiles can be launched from H-6 bombers, which permits them to be launched from far over the Pacific to strike targets in Alaska and on the US mainland. The H-6 is by far probably the most broadly fielded bomber class on the earth, with over 270 considered in service, offering choices for big scale assaults utilizing a variety of cruise and ballistic missile sorts. The DF-100’s significantly lengthy vary closely compensates for the bomber’s shorter vary than rival courses such because the American B-2 and Russian Tu-160.
The DF-100’s capabilities are extremely complimentary to these of China’s rising arsenals of drones, warships, and ballistic missiles able to delivering very giant scale assaults in opposition to targets on Guam and Hawaii, which have the potential to significantly disrupt the U.S. Armed Forces’ means to function within the Pacific. A 12 months after the missile class was first unveiled, the China Aerospace Research Institute revealed a report in November 2020 observing that it enabled simultaneous time-on-target salvos alongside DF-21 or DF-26 intermediate vary ballistic missiles, forcing American air defences to counter assaults in a number of planes concurrently. It has been speculated that Chinese language destroyers and assaults submarines might subject a missile class with comparable capabilities to the DF-100 in future, and {that a} miniaturised variant is also developed for fighter-sized plane working from Chinese language plane carriers, which might enable the Individuals’s Liberation Army Navy to launch precision strikes in opposition to targets throughout a lot of the American mainland from the mid-Pacific.
