China's Missile Threat
By RICHARD D. FISHER JR.
Wall Street Journal 30 Dec 1997
China's defense minister, Gen. Chi Haotian, deserved a proper scolding instead of the red-carpet treatment he received this month from the Clinton administration, because China's missile demonstration near Taiwan between March 8 and 15 could have been a very destabilizing act. This, combined with the advances China is making in missile technology, make it imperative that the U.S. and its Asian allies join to build a regionwide anti-ballistic missile defense system.
Military sources in both Washington and Taipei say China was ready to launch between 20 and 30 DF-15/M-9 short-range ballistic missiles against two target areas scant miles outside Kaohsiung and Keelung, Taiwan's two largest ports. As it happened, China launched only four DF-15s, most likely due to poor weather. Had China followed through with its plans to rain down missiles around Taiwan, the region today might still be catching its breath. Without even hitting Taipei, Beijing would have challenged insurance underwriters to consider Taiwan a potential war zone. A subsequent increase in insurance rates would have at the very least deterred some investors and potentially damaged confidence in an economy highly dependent on foreign commerce.
Ready Launch Area
Nevertheless, China could easily repeat this exercise, or worse. It has turned Fujian Province opposite Taiwan into a ready launch area for the very mobile, DF-15 missile, which has a range of 360 miles. Staging out of larger bases in neighboring Anhui Province, DF-15s can be moved by road or rail to what military observers say are scores of presurveyed launch areas throughout Fujian Province. These preparations enable China to carry out more secure DF-15 attacks against Taiwan. The multiplicity of prepared launch areas complicates interdiction of these missiles. And, as the targeting solutions have been precalculated, there is a reduction in the period that the missile must remain stationary for its launch sequence, further reducing its vulnerability to attack.
As if this were not worrisome enough, China is working hard to improve the accuracy of its missiles. At November air show in Zhuhai, China, an engineer from the Beijing Research Institute for Telemetry, an organization working on advanced guidance systems, told this analyst that China is enhancing the accuracy of the DF-15 with global positioning satellite technology. The U.S. already relies heavily on such technology to convey pinpoint accuracy to aircraft, missiles and bombs. Published estimates give the DF-15 an accuracy measured in a "circular error probability" of 300 meters, or within a circle with a 300-meter radius. This figure is already fairly accurate by current standards for this class of missile. With global positioning satellite inputs, the DF-15 could perhaps become the most accurate battlefield missile in the world.
The same Chinese engineer, a surprisingly glib fellow, also stated essentially that China was working on a terminal-guidance system for its DF-21 intermediate-range ballistic missile, whose range is 1,125 miles. Sources in Taipei also note the new guidance system will be radar-based. As such it will be similar to the U.S. Pershing II missiles, all of which were destroyed as part of the 1987 Intermediate Nuclear Forces agreement with the former Soviet Union. This missile's radar digital area guidance system would match pictures obtained by the missile's radar to digital map pictures in the missile's computer resulting in a less than 50-meter circular error probability. This means the difference between hitting an airfield or destroying specific aircraft hangers on the airfield. Thus modified, the DF-21 concievably could do almost as well.
It is not known when China will complete and deploy its modified DF-21s, but it is a looming threat. "China's building a terminally guided missile is to be expected, and that kind of enhanced accuracy could vastly increase the danger to American and allied forces in Asia," says Ambassador David J. Smith, who served as President Bush's chief negotiator for defense and space.
China's missile pressure also risks nuclear escalation in Asia. One Taiwanese legislator expert in military matters said his country essentially has three options: (1) purchase advanced missile-defense systems from the U.S., (2) begin to build an offensive capability to attack missile sites on the mainland or (3) consider nuclear weapons as a last resort.
It behooves Washington to help Taipei with the first and perhaps the second options as a means of forestalling the third. Today Taipei correctly rejects any suggestion that it obtain nuclear weapons. Taiwan's President Lee Teng-hui did just that in July 1995. After China's first provocative missile demonstration about 90 miles north of Taiwan, he rejected a suggestion by opposition
legislators that Taiwan consider a nuclear option. If Taipei were ever to reach the point where it felt so unsure of Washington's protective umbrella that it felt forced to proceed down the nuclear path, then Tokyo and Seoul would not be far behind.
The unexpected advances China is making in offensive missile technology and the resulting increased danger of wider nuclear proliferation in Asia demand more than ever that the U.S. join with its allies to build a better nonnuclear deterrent: an Asia-wide missile defense network.
Surreal Commitment
But the Clinton administration is generally averse to robust missile defenses. Current region-level missile-defense programs are underfunded. The administration's surreal commitment to the limitations imposed by the obsolete U.S.-Soviet Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty prevent the development of an effective national missile defense system that would better enable the U.S. to counter regional threats like that posed by China. And President Clinton is unlikely will not sell advanced theater-level systems like the Theater High-Altitude Area Defense system to Taiwan.
Instead, the Clinton Administration in recent weeks has quietly proposed to Beijing that China and the U.S. agree to "detarget" the other with nuclear missiles. Such paper agreements with Beijing are unimpressive given China's quickly developing ability to better target U.S. forces in Asia with modified DF-21s. Unless Asians and Americans demand better from Washington, the U.S. deterrent will be increasingly discounted by Beijing. When that happens Asians can either bend to Beijing's wishes or proceed with "other" deterrence options. Both courses can only increase regional instability.
Mr. Fisher is a senior policy analyst with the Asian Studies Center of the Heritage Foundation, a Washington think tank.
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