During the 93rd military parade, China's Changjian-1000 hypersonic cruise missile immediately became a focal point of global military attention. This missile is no ordinary weapon; it retains the traditional advantages of Chinese cruise missiles in striking land and sea targets, but more notably, the official statement directly indicated its capability to attack critical airborne target nodes. This feature breaks the traditional division of labor in missile operations, sparking widespread discussion: Is the Changjian-1000 truly capable of shooting down an early warning aircraft at a distance of 5,000 kilometers?

Traditionally, cruise missiles such as the U.S. "Tomahawk" or China's Changjian-10 mainly rely on inertial navigation, satellite guidance, and terrain matching technology to strike fixed ground targets or slow-moving ships at sea. Air defense tasks, however, are typically handled by dedicated air defense missile systems such as the Hongqi-9B or S-400. The emergence of the Changjian-1000 blurs this distinction, making it the world's first hypersonic cruise missile with the ability to conduct three types of strikes: on land, at sea, and in the air.

This raises the question: How exactly does the Changjian-1000 achieve the capability to strike airborne targets?

The Changjian-1000's ability to perform air-target missions relies on two major technological breakthroughs: a scramjet engine and a multi-mode composite guidance system.

Its naturally aspirated scramjet engine enables the missile to fly at speeds exceeding Mach 5 within the atmosphere for extended periods, covering a range of thousands of kilometers. For large airborne platforms such as early warning aircraft, refueling aircraft, and bombers that have limited maneuverability, once they fall within its attack radius, they are almost impossible to evade.

In terms of guidance, the active radar seeker plays a key role. Due to the interference from aerodynamic heating under hypersonic flight conditions, active radar not only serves for terminal search of airborne targets but also supports anti-ship and anti-ground strikes. Combined with inertial navigation, satellite navigation, and data link mid-course correction, the Changjian-1000 achieves operational flexibility with a single missile for three purposes.

Although the concept is advanced, using a cruise missile to strike high-speed airborne targets at long ranges still faces several technical challenges:

To hunt airborne targets over 3,000 kilometers away, the first challenge is to solve the problem of target detection and tracking. Ground radars, constrained by the curvature of the Earth, struggle to detect remote low-altitude targets. China must rely on the "staring" capability of high-orbit radar satellites to build a wide-area space-based early warning system, achieving continuous surveillance and target designation over the Western Pacific airspace.

The second challenge is the missile's high maneuverability and overload capability.

Although airborne targets like early warning aircraft have limited maneuverability, they still possess some evasion capabilities. The missile must be capable of over 10G of high maneuverability overload to make trajectory adjustments and achieve precise interception during the terminal phase.

The third challenge is the full-range data link and flight attitude control.

Striking remote mobile targets requires the missile to continuously receive updated target information during flight. This necessitates the establishment of a data link system covering the entire range, using space-based and air-based platforms for relay communication, enabling course corrections and attitude adjustments during flight.

The fourth challenge is strong terminal guidance technology.

The missile's terminal stage must rely on an active phased array radar seeker to acquire and track the target. In the face of electronic interference and complex electromagnetic environments, the radar must have strong anti-interference and high-resolution capabilities. At the same time, it should be equipped with a proximity fuze to ensure effective detonation near the target, maximizing the damage effect.

The Changjian-1000's air-target capability is not just a technological breakthrough but also has far-reaching strategic significance. Modern warfare is a system confrontation, where early warning aircraft serve as the aerial command center, refueling aircraft extend the combat radius of fighter jets, and electronic warfare aircraft ensure electromagnetic superiority. If these high-value nodes can be destroyed at thousands of kilometers away, the enemy's entire operational system would be paralyzed.

For China, the Changjian-1000 further enhances the effectiveness of its "anti-access/area denial" strategy, forcing adversaries to remain highly vigilant even when operating far from Chinese coastlines.

In summary, the Changjian-1000 theoretically has the capability to strike early warning aircraft, but this capability is not achieved independently by the missile itself. Instead, it relies on China's increasingly powerful space-based reconnaissance, data link communication, and command and control systems. Rather than being merely a missile, it represents China's integrated operational capability.

The Changjian-1000 is not assigned to the air defense forces but is instead under the Rocket Force, and the airborne node targets it strikes should be understood as airports. Therefore, the current capabilities of this system still need further observation. With the emergence of future improved models, the Changjian-1000 is likely to develop specialized variants focused on anti-early warning aircraft, anti-ship, or land attacks, further expanding its operational boundaries. For any adversary relying on an aerial system, the Changjian-1000 undoubtedly represents a "Sword of Damocles" hanging overhead.

Original article: https://www.toutiao.com/article/7556899495972323890/

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