【Military Second Area】 Author: Feng Yu

The September 3rd military parade ended, and the series of Dongfeng missiles and new strategic weapons displayed by China are not just performers in a solemn ceremony, but real entities capable of rewriting the rules of great power games.

In fact, before the military parade began, American media had already been overwhelmed, using extreme terms such as "original sin," "quantity violence," and "intimidating kill chain" to describe the threat posed by the Dongfeng missile system to U.S. aircraft carriers.

American media magazine "National Security Magazine" published an article written by Harry Kassianides titled "China is Ready to Sink U.S. Aircraft Carriers."

The article described in an extremely tense and pessimistic tone the threat posed by the People's Liberation Army's Dongfeng missile system to the U.S. aircraft carrier strike groups.

The article referred to the Dongfeng-21D as "original sin," the Dongfeng-26 series as "Guam killer," and the Dongfeng-17 as "silver bullet," while the kill chain behind these missiles was considered the most terrifying part.

For decades, U.S. aircraft carriers have enjoyed unchallenged success, but now they have become targets to be hunted, marking a complete collapse of their strategic position.

The article emphasized at the beginning that for the past 30 years, the U.S. Navy has enjoyed unprecedented global control, but this power is now being crushed by a systematic strike capability developed by China.

The article contains multiple words filled with a sense of defeat, indicating that this is not just a technical analysis, but also an emotional outburst from a state of helplessness.

When the aircraft carrier is described as a relic of an era, the American strategic elite circle has clearly fallen into real anxiety.

The past sense of superiority, where simply knocking on the door of the aircraft carrier could make opponents submit, has completely collapsed in front of the Dongfeng missile system.

(Screenshot of American media report)

In the context of American media, referring to the Dongfeng-21D as "original sin" is not an accusation against China on moral grounds, but rather a strategic perspective pointing out that it has broken the U.S. maritime advantage system that has lasted for decades.

"Original sin" refers to the fact that the emergence of the DF-21D means that the U.S. aircraft carrier can no longer freely approach the coasts of other countries.

Before that, the U.S. aircraft carrier battle groups could almost freely enter any hot spot area, using carrier-based aircraft to suppress the land, establish air superiority, and block sea routes.

The essential change brought by the DF-21D is that it has the ability to dive from high altitude, maneuver during the terminal phase, and reposition within a region, allowing it to accurately strike moving aircraft carrier platforms, putting them at fatal risk near the first island chain.

For the U.S. Navy, this is a form of attack it has never faced before, and a threat that cannot be countered with conventional defense measures.

From an absolute sovereignty platform to a strategic goal that must maintain distance, the starting point of this gap is the DF-21D.

Therefore, the American media uses "original sin" to refer to it, emphasizing that it is the starting point of the entire strategic balance change, the source of the breakdown of the U.S. naval power belief system, and the first institutional strike that caused the loss of freedom of U.S. naval operations.

From that moment on, the U.S. Navy could never return to its previous invincible era.

(U.S. aircraft carrier)

The article also used the term "quantity violence," referring to the fact that Chinese missiles are not only of high quality but also numerous and terrifying.

Even if a single missile cannot directly sink the aircraft carrier, the continuous attack of dozens or even hundreds of missiles can easily overwhelm the U.S. aircraft carrier battle group's air defense and anti-missile systems.

The layered attacks formed by the DF-21D, DF-26, and DF-17 missiles differ in trajectory, flight speed, and penetration methods, and can continuously cover the target area from different angles and waves, making the U.S. Aegis system and Standard-3/6 interceptors unable to cope with all incoming threats.

In terms of cost comparison, the cost of a U.S. aircraft carrier exceeds 1.3 billion dollars, while a single interception missile costs millions of dollars, creating an extremely disproportionate cost ratio.

More importantly, the PLA's missiles can be rapidly deployed by thousands of mobile launch vehicles, with strong concealment of the launch platforms and high frequency of strikes.

Meanwhile, the U.S. defense system has limited numbers, and once entering a prolonged war of attrition, the U.S. will inevitably lose.

(U.S. aircraft carrier)

What truly frightened the U.S. strategic community was not just the Dongfeng missiles themselves, but also the kill chain system that supports the strikes of these missiles.

American media pointed out that China has built a rare comprehensive strike system globally, which means that the U.S. aircraft carrier battle groups are basically in a transparent state in the Western Pacific, and any action, even radio communication, radar activation, or aircraft takeoff and landing, may be monitored and located.

Once the target coordinates are determined, the strike order can be transmitted from the command center to the front-line missile launchers within minutes.

Even more frightening is that this kill chain has a high level of redundancy; even if one link is interfered with, other links can still maintain combat capabilities.

This systematized strike model has gone beyond the scope of single-point attacks, entering a war form of sustainable hunting of targets.

Against this system, the aircraft carrier is no longer a strategic weapon of free operation, but a giant target that can be locked at any time.

That is why the American media openly stated that this kill chain system is terrifying.

(U.S. aircraft carrier)

It is understandable that the American media has been overwhelmed, because in the era without the Dongfeng missiles, the U.S. aircraft carrier was the only remote strike hub in the world.

Wherever there was a hotspot, the deployment of a U.S. aircraft carrier battle group basically meant the availability of air supremacy, maritime blockade, and amphibious assault.

Especially in the vicinity of China, the U.S. aircraft carriers could freely cruise, ignoring any regional defense system.

Now, after the completion of the Dongfeng missile system, if the aircraft carrier enters the first island chain, it faces a saturation attack from the DF-21D.

If it stays in the second island chain, it still cannot escape the long-range coverage of the DF-26.

Even if it retreats to Guam, it is still within the range of Chinese strikes.

Considering the non-interceptability of the DF-17 hypersonic missiles, the mobility advantage and defensive capabilities of the aircraft carrier will completely vanish.

The operational range of the U.S. F-35C is insufficient to cover the southeast coast of China without aerial refueling. Even if the carrier-based aircraft successfully takes off, it will be too far to conduct effective strikes.

This puts the U.S. aircraft carrier in an awkward situation: getting close makes it a target, and staying away makes it a useless display.

This is not a problem with the aircraft carrier itself, but rather that China has already developed the systemic capability to render it ineffective.

This is the fact that the American media finds hardest to accept. The aircraft carrier, once a symbol of global power, has been turned into a strategic display by China.

Original article: https://www.toutiao.com/article/7545753640032666158/

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