China & Russia close the tech gap vs USA in weapons race

max steel wrote:http://www.defenseone.com/threats/2014/11/how-powerful-russias-military/99062/?oref=DefenseOneTCO

Read the article and some comments.

" Russia is the only nation having nuclear weapons at par with usa " . LoL. Its above par actually.

higurashihougi wrote:

max steel wrote:http://www.defenseone.com/threats/2014/11/how-powerful-russias-military/99062/?oref=DefenseOneTCO

Read the article and some comments.

" Russia is the only nation having nuclear weapons at par with usa " . LoL. Its above par actually.

In 1955, Russia successfully tested its first non-tritium H-bomb. In 1961, Russia tested the Tsar Bomba. Shockwave caused by explosion moved 7 circle around the Earth.

Meanwhile. U.S. H-bomb today stills need tritium. And tritium means expensive to maintain and replenish, short half life.

flamming_python wrote:What's a woman doing commanding the US Air Force in the Pacific anyway?

I'm pretty sure that out of all the US Air Force officers with at least a passing level of experience necessary for the position; 99% would be men - but a woman gets the job just because.
Hope my own country never has to suffer from this politically-correct crap.

Anyway, I really don't know what technological gap she's referring to.
If talking about an operational experience gap, organizational gap, network-centricity gap - then sure, those all exist.

But speaking about a 'technology' gap is just a way to propagate more propaganda BS about how Russian technology is inferior; despite such assertions not actually being backed up by anyone with any knowledge in the field include most likely the US Air Force's own experts.

We can safely disregard these statements as being political BS then.

max steel wrote:Here’s Proof We’re Losing the Arms Race to Russia and China

Experts warn weapons gap is shrinking between US, Russia and China

By Kristina Wong - 04/30/16 02:03 PM EDT

Competitors like Russia and China are closing the advanced weapons gap with the United States, aiming to push the U.S. out of areas on their front doorstep.

Experts say they're improving their ability to target U.S. aircraft and ships, pushing the U.S. military farther away from potential conflict zones and constraining its ability to use force in regions such as the Baltic Sea and the South China Sea.

"Since the end of the Cold War, the U.S. military has never really had to fight an enemy that had its own arsenal of precision-guided weapons," said Mark Gunzinger, senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments.

"It was able to use air bases and other bases located fairly close to the borders of an enemy because there wasn't that much of an air and missile threat to those bases,” he said. “That’s changing.”

Experts say Russia and China are improving their ballistic and cruise missile technologies and hoping to create what they call “anti-access area-denial bubbles” where they can threaten U.S. air and ground operations.

Russia is in particular presenting a challenge to the U.S. in the Baltics region, where it has recently been harassing U.S. aircraft and ships.

”You’ve seen some advanced air-to-air technologies that the Chinese and Russians are developing, not just in stealth technology, but in terms of the advanced aerodynamics, advanced air-to-air radars, advanced air-to-air weapons, advanced air-to-ground weapons," said Chris Harmer, senior naval analyst at the Institute for the Study of War.

Experts say Russia and China are also making inroads into the U.S.’ undersea dominance.

"Chinese nuclear attack submarines are just in absolute overdrive, how quick they're building and how fast the technology is developing,” Harmer said. "And we've seen a significant increase in Russian naval activity, Russian long-range naval activity, Russian ships conducting port calls to Bandar Abbas in Iran.”

Iran, too, is making progress, experts say.

“They still lack a precision in their offensive weapons, and they're still trying to obtain and develop more effective air missile defenses, but they're making progress and their weapons are getting more accurate and their capabilities are increasing in their range, as well as in their numbers,” Harmer said. “The Iranian navy is getting a lot bigger a lot quicker than anybody expected.”

To keep ahead of those advances, the Pentagon is focusing on developing high-end weapons systems that can avoid detection even in close quarters, like the B-21 long-range stealth bomber.

It is also seeking to develop the high-end capabilities of allies like the United Kingdom in order to extend its reach.

Deputy Defense Secretary Bob Work and British Defense Procurement Minister Philip Dunne earlier this month toured U.S. military bases where the two nations are working closely together on advanced weapons systems.

That includes the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, a fifth-generation stealth fighter; the P-8 Poseidon, a maritime patrol aircraft designed to detect foreign submarines and ships; and the Trident Class II D5 missile, which deploy from U.S. and Royal Navy ballistic missile submarines.

"I wouldn't say that these are specific towards any countries, but they're against high-end capabilities," Work said. "Countries like Iran are buying the most advanced air defense systems in the world … Advanced air defense systems are proliferating around the world. Submarine technology is proliferating around the world. They're becoming quieter, hard to find."

Work said the U.S. and the U.K.’s 25-year defense plan released last year would allow the two nations to be "interoperable in these high-end fights."

"If we ever projected power around the globe and the U.K. government said, 'We're with you,' we'd be interoperable from the top to the bottom," he said.

Some experts say the U.S. is not spending enough on weapons research and development.

"At the same time, the Russians and the Chinese — the Chinese more so than the Russians — are spending an awful lot of money on research and development,” Harmer said.

And cyber theft, particularly by the Chinese, is a problem, they add.

“Today, we're capable of losing in 10 seconds via cybercrime 10 years worth of research and development,” Harmer said. "And especially for the Chinese that's been a big help to them in closing the gap.”

But they agree the main solution is fixing a wasteful and burdensome weapons buying system that can take decades to field a platform.

"The main issue for us is overcoming a very sclerotic system of acquisition," said defense analyst Norman Friedman. "It's not fast enough, and it's extremely poor judgment about the costs of programs, how much they should run, lack of ruthlessness ... an ability for someone at the top for many years to stand back and say, this is stupid."

Experts warn that in the meantime, competitors can make up in numbers what they can't make up in technology.

"As the Russians used to say during the Cold War, quantity has a quality all of its own," Harmer said. "Because the Chinese can put so much quantity into the water in a relatively small space and small time, they can more than overwhelm our technological advantage.”

Experts say they don't see any fixes to the shrinking technological gap anytime soon.

Defense Secretary Ash Carter, House Armed Services Committee Chairman Mac Thornberry (R-Texas) and Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman John McCain (R-Ariz.) have introduced reforms to fix the acquisition system, but experts say it’s too early to tell if their reforms are working.

“I find it worrisome that we can't seem to fix the procurement system but many very hard working people have tried,” Friedman said. “I mourn for what I see.”

Harmer added: “The Department of Defense would like to move faster. Of course, change is hard. Change is slow.”

CNN: Russia contests US Navy supremacy

The American military is deeply concerned that new Russian submarines will challenge the US Navy supremacy.

"We're back to the point now where we have to consider there is an adversary ready to challenge us in the undersea domain and that undersea superiority is not guaranteed," U.S. Navy Commodore Ollie Lewis told CNN.

New American Virginia-class submarines are able to carry out a wide range of tasks, gather intelligence and launch torpedoes at ground targets. But they will face a new challenge quite soon, that is the Russian Yasen class submarine.

As Michael Kofman, an expert at the Washington Wilson Center, explained, among all the submarines that the US adversaries possess, the Yasen is the quietest one, and the US "Navy is not really sure it can track it".

The Russian submarines' increased activity is also noted to be in the triangle Greenland-Iceland-Great Britain, and that is the key naval corridor for the US military reinforcement in Europe.

Beside that, according to the USS Missouri's commander Fraser Hudson, Russia does not intend to just make a "political statement", but rather to gain a practical experience.

max steel wrote:Russia, China Missiles Overcome All Defenses

Last month, Russia and China each demonstrated hypersonic vehicles capable of rapidly delivering nuclear warheads to any locations in the world, with no present or near-term interception defense. Russian Deputy Prime Minister Dmitri Rogozin compared the importance of these new weapons as on par with nuclear arms development.

He declared, “Whoever is first to achieve” mastery of hypersonic weapons will “overturn the principles” of how wars are waged.

China conducted its seventh successful hypersonic vehicle test just three days after Russia demonstrated its second . . . a 3M22 Zircon hypersonic glider launched atop a SS-19 ballistic missile from a base near the Kazakhstan border.

An armed version is scheduled to go into operation by 2018 aboard a new Pak DA stealth bomber now under development. Jane’s Intelligence Review reports that Russia may be able to deploy up to 24 hypersonic nuclear delivery vehicles from their Dombarovsky air force base between 2020 and 2025,

Beijing’s DF-ZF hypersonic glide vehicle fired from the Shanxi Province Wuzhai launch center in central China has reportedly reached speeds over 7,000 miles per hour. The Congressional Sino-U.S. Economic and Security Review Commission reports that the program is “progressing rapidly," and that a new strike weapon could be deployed by 2020.

A powered version (rather than glider) under development may be fielded by 2025.

The commission reported that “The very high speeds of these weapons, combined with their maneuverability and ability to travel at lower, radar-evading altitudes, would make them far less vulnerable than existing missiles to current missile defenses.” A capacity to transport nuclear warheads at 10 times the speed of sound exceeds the ability of conventional ballistic missile defenses to prevent them from reaching U.S. homeland.

Former Pentagon strategic forces policymaker, Mark Schneider, observes: “U.S. programs involving hypersonic vehicles are modest by comparison.” He added, “I would be surprised if we actually deploy one. If we do, it will likely be conventional. Russian hypersonic vehicles will likely either be nuclear armed or nuclear-capable since this is the norm for Russia.”

A U.S. Army hypersonic test vehicle exploded about a year and a half ago. The Pentagon has stressed that the U.S. hypersonic program will not carry nuclear weapons.

Washington Free Beacon national security reporter and senior editor Bill Gertz warns about America’s vulnerability to high speed hypersonic attacks. Quoting China National Security Policy Committee researcher, Li Bingyan: “Only by matching real-time information with zero-time firepower [lasers] can one achieve the operational result of destruction upon detection.”

Yet out of DOD’s $7.5 billion 2017 budget, only $23 million is provided for a low-power laser capable of targeting hypersonic weapons. No tests of that capability are planned until 2021 . . . years after Russia and China are expected to deploy operational capabilities.

According to A U.S. Department of Defense report, from 2005 through 2014 China’s annual defense spending adjusted for inflation rose an average 9.5 percent annually, while U.S. outlays averaged just under 0.4 percent. Included are advanced Chinese naval developments such as “supercavitation” technology which allows torpedoes to travel at the speed of sound (which is 3,320 miles per hour under water).

It reduces water drag by creating a bubble of gas for the missile to travel through, enabling those launched from Shanghai to reach San Francisco in less than two hours.

Rep. Mike Rogers, R-Ala., chairman of the House Armed Services Strategic Forces Subcommittee, told the Washington Times: “I’m troubled that Russia and China continue to outpace the U.S. in development of these prompt global strike capabilities, complain about our tepid development programs, and the Obama administration’s ideological reductions to the Missile Defense Agency budget have denied that agency resources to do anything to develop defenses.”

Responding to China’s most recent DF-ZF vehicle test, retired former U.S. Navy Pacific Fleet intelligence director Captain Jim Fanell observes that: “The threat of hypersonic missile attack not only impacts conventional warfare scenarios like we are seeing develop in the South and East China Sea, but it also puts U.S. nuclear defense strategies at risk.”

Also reported in the Washington Free Beacon, House Armed Services subcommittee on sea power Chairman Randy Forbes, R-Va. said: “Beijing is committed to up-ending both the conventional military and nuclear balance, with grave implications for the stability of Asia.”

President Obama has clearly followed through on his pledge made during a 2009 Prague speech that “To put an end to Cold War thinking, we will reduce the role of nuclear weapons in our national security strategy.” There should be little wonder then, why Vladimir Putin saw no good reason to attend the nuclear summit photo-op event he hosted last month in Washington.

As Mikhail Ulyanov of the Russian foreign ministry explained at the time, “We don’t really know what the point of this summit is.” It seems that the Russians and Chinese never read that White House memo.

Military Analysts concerned about the lost of the US conventional military technology advantages

The US Navy now believes it has a railgun design that soon will be able to fire 10 times a minute through a barrel capable of lasting 1,000 rounds.

Besides speed, the railgun also has a capacity advantage. A typical U.S. Navy destroyer can carry as many as 96 missiles—either offensive cruise missiles or defensive interceptors. A ship armed with a railgun could potentially carry a thousand rounds, allowing the vessel to shoot incoming missiles or attack enemy forces for longer periods and at a faster rate of fire.

The U.S. has kept its military dominance over the past quarter-century largely through such precision weaponry as guided missiles and munitions. It also has spent billions of dollars on interceptor-missile based defense systems to shoot down ballistic missiles fired at the U.S. or its allies.

That monopoly is about over. China is perfecting a ship-killing ballistic missile. Russia mostly impressed U.S. military planners with the power and precision of its cruise missiles deployed in Syria, and its improved artillery precision revealed in Ukraine.

I am very worried about the U.S. conventional advantage. The loss of that advantage is terribly destabilizing, said Elbridge Colby, a military analyst with the Center of a New American Security.

Defense planners believe the U.S. needs new military advances. Russia, for example, is believed to be developing longer-range surface-to-air missiles and new electronic warfare technology to blunt any forces near its borders.

Hitting a missile with a bullet is still a technical challenge. Railgun research leans heavily on commercial advances in supercomputing to aim and on smartphone technology to steer the railgun’s projectile using the Global Positioning System.

Missile defense by the railgun is at least a decade away, but Pentagon officials believe the weapon’s projectiles can be used much sooner. They are filled with tungsten pellets harder than many kinds of steel, officials said, and will likely cost between $25,000 and $50,000, a bargain compared with a $10-million interceptor missile.

SOURCES- Wall Street Journal, Office of Naval Research