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Subject: Some questions about countering an invasion of Taiwan (using missiles)
Born09081983    4/15/2009 7:47:31 PM
Hi, I have a question about countering an invasion of Taiwan. 1 How far do the anti-missile ships fly, how vulnerable are they to electronic countermeasures and AA fire, and would it be feasible to defeat an invading fleet halfway across the channel with a barrage of anti-ship missiles. 2 How high do land-to-air missiles fly, and is it feasible to provide for air superiority by have saturated land-to-air missiles, better than the ones used by North Vietnam in the 1970s. 3 Can torpedoes be fired from vertical tubes in submarines, like firing an ICBM, so that submarines can fire torpedoes while in deep water directly beneath an invasion fleet, without needing to be near the surface at periscope depth? 4 In the case of providing for air superiority, faced with 1000+ incoming aircrafts, and the 1912-Republic of China has few planes, what is the best spending ratio when purchasing fighter aircrafts (air-to-air missile platforms) and land-to-air missiles. This is because, land-to-air missiles are cheaper and you can buy more of them. But if that's all there is, then the batteries can be bombed from the air. Not only that, but the anti-ship missile batteries can also be bombed from the air. So somewhere, you still need fighter aircrafts to drive off some invading planes, so that the defense is not land-based missiles only. But fighter aircrafts are expensive, and easily shot down because they'd be swamped by numbers. Whereas for the price of buying 1 fighter plane you can buy 100+ missiles. 5 Is there a way of detonating a EMP charge, or making a huge EMP wave, in the middle of an invasion fleet without using anything nuclear? EMP - electromagnetic pulse, it fries all electronics I thought it was clear that Taiwan would not be able to have air superiority through aircrafts only, and would need to depend on thousands of surface-to-air missiles, because China has 1000+ aircrafts, and they can easily swamp the air battles by throwing in even the most antique Migs in huge quantity. The overall idea is to have maximum destruction of technological equipment with minimal loss of life, on either side. The invasion can't happen without ships carrying people over. The main idea is to sink ships, from as far away as possible. The anti-air missiles and fighter jets are to protect the anti-ship missiles from being bombed. I thought, that 10000 anti-ship missiles (at least 100km range) and 10000 anti-air missiles (at least 10km range), should be enough. And some subs with torpedoes, or even some remote-controlled torpedo carriers (like UAVs, but in water). (and, at least one allied fleet in the water, so the island doesn't get flanked with a landing happens on the other side, probably with no defenses) And perhaps, if the Republic of China gets these now, it would deter some raving Marxists from even planning the invasion in the first place.
 
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benellim4       4/15/2009 10:14:33 PM
And here I thought the plural of "aircraft" was "aircraft." 
 
ht tp://dictionary.reference.com/browse/aircraft
 
Something in my gut is telling me to avoid the rest of this post like the plague.
 
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YelliChink       4/18/2009 10:08:30 AM
There is no way we can procure that many missiles, find places to store them, and maintain them properly. It's simply prohibitive. Americans don't even ever produced that many Harpoons. Most anti-ship missiles in ROCN and ROCA arsenal are either on mobile platforms or in concrete-harden bunkers in undisclosed locations. Sorry, the number is classified. I don't know how many are there, but certainly much more than what Argentines had in 1982.
 
Commies don't have the air space management capacity to utilize all it's J-6/7/8, and they simply don't have enough J-10/11/Su-27/Su-30 at the moment. ROCAF still have 140+ F-16, 120+ IDF and 50+ M2K in active service. ROC Missile Command have enough SAM systems to cover very large area in Taiwan Strait.
 
PLAN subs and PLA2A missile forces are major problems to defenders of Taiwan.
 
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WarNerd       4/22/2009 9:10:02 PM

1 How far do the anti-missile ships fly, how vulnerable are they to electronic countermeasures and AA fire, and would it be feasible to defeat an invading fleet halfway across the channel with a barrage of anti-ship missiles.

The overall idea is to have maximum destruction of technological equipment with minimal loss of life, on either side. The invasion can't happen without ships carrying people over. The main idea is to sink ships, from as far away as possible. The anti-air missiles and fighter jets are to protect the anti-ship missiles from being bombed.

I thought, that 10000 anti-ship missiles (at least 100km range) and 10000 anti-air missiles (at least 10km range), should be enough. And some subs with torpedoes, or even some remote-controlled torpedo carriers (like UAVs, but in water). (and, at least one allied fleet in the water, so the island doesn't get flanked with a landing happens on the other side, probably with no defenses)

And perhaps, if the Republic of China gets these now, it would deter some raving Marxists from even planning the invasion in the first place.

The question is poorly framed so that the only answers can be "It depends".
 
For starters, pick a missile system(s) to base you assessment on.  Current available anti-ship missiles have ranges between 8km and 1200km and vulnerability to countermeasures that vary from 'clay pigeon' to 'what was that'.
 
The big problems with a missiles only approach is the vulnerability to decoys and the lack of post strike assessment.
 
2 How high do land-to-air missiles fly, and is it feasible to provide for air superiority by have saturated land-to-air missiles, better than the ones used by North Vietnam in the 1970s.

4 In the case of providing for air superiority, faced with 1000+ incoming aircrafts, and the 1912-Republic of China has few planes, what is the best spending ratio when purchasing fighter aircrafts (air-to-air missile platforms) and land-to-air missiles. This is because, land-to-air missiles are cheaper and you can buy more of them. But if that's all there is, then the batteries can be bombed from the air. Not only that, but the anti-ship missile batteries can also be bombed from the air. So somewhere, you still need fighter aircrafts to drive off some invading planes, so that the defense is not land-based missiles only.
But fighter aircrafts are expensive, and easily shot down because they'd be swamped by numbers. Whereas for the price of buying 1 fighter plane you can buy 100+ missiles.

I thought it was clear that Taiwan would not be able to have air superiority through aircrafts only, and would need to depend on thousands of surface-to-air missiles, because China has 1000+ aircrafts, and they can easily swamp the air battles by throwing in even the most antique Migs in huge quantity.  

Again, "It depends".  
 
Pick your systems.  Some work better at high altitudes, some at low, none are perfect.  SAM's can reach altitudes between 3km and 18km+, depending on the system.
 
SAM's (Surface-to-Air Missiles) cannot give you air superiority, they can only deny it to your opponent.
 
Missiles are cheaper than aircraft, but missiles are only a fraction of the cost of a missile battery, which includes various radars, communications, and a control room for each battery.  So while you can get 100 to 1000 missiles for the cost of a single aircraft, you can only get 2 to 4 missile batteries.
 
Due to intercept geometries the area that a system can effectively defend is only a portion of the area covered by the missile's range.  For a first approximation assume you will need at least a 100% overlap between batteries.  You will also need defense in depth to keep the entire defense from collapsing if only a couple batteries are taken out.

3 Can torpedoes be fired fr
 
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Herald12345    He's a data miner.   4/22/2009 9:15:12 PM
Herald
 
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