China’s new missile may create a ‘no-go zone’ for U.S. fleet

China's military is close to fielding the world's first anti-ship ballistic missile, according to U.S. Navy intelligence.

The missile, with a range of almost 900 miles (1,500 kilometers), would be fired from mobile, land-based launchers and is “specifically designed to defeat U.S. carrier strike groups,” the Office of Naval Intelligence reported.

Five of the U.S. Navy's 11 carriers are based in the Pacific and operate freely in international waters near China. Their mission includes defending Taiwan should China seek to exercise by force its claim to the island democracy, which it considers a breakaway province.

The missile could turn this region into a “no-go zone” for U.S. carriers, said Andrew Krepinevich, president of the Center for Strategic and Budget Assessments in Washington.

Scott Bray, who wrote the ONI report on China's Navy, said China has made “remarkable progress” on the missile. “In little over a decade, China has taken the program from the conceptual phase” to “near fielding a combat-ready missile,” he said. Bray's report, issued in July, was provided to Bloomberg News on request.

China also is developing an over-the-horizon radar network to spot U.S. ships at great distances from its mainland, and its navy since 2000 has tripled to 36 from 12 the number of vessels carrying anti-ship weapons, Bray, the ONI's senior officer for intelligence on China, said in an e-mail.

China's Strategy

The new missile would support China's “anti-access” strategy to detect and if necessary attack U.S. warships “at progressively greater distances” from its mainland, Krepinevich said.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates, in a Sept. 16 speech, said China's “investments in anti-ship weaponry and ballistic missiles could threaten America's primary way to project power and help allies in the Pacific -- particularly our forward bases and carrier strike groups.”

Admiral Gary Roughead, chief of U.S. naval operations, says the new Chinese missile was one factor in his 2008 decision to cut the DDG-1000 destroyer program from eight ships to three because the vessels lack a missile-defense capability.

The Navy instead plans to build up to seven more Lockheed Martin Corp. Aegis-class DDG-51 destroyers and equip them with the newest radar and missiles.

China's ballistic missile “portends the sophistication of the threats that we're going to see,” Roughead said in an interview earlier this year.

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