August 19, 2002 at 6:07 am
I know it is off topic, but I really need some expert opinion.
Here is a brief translation from a Chinese Article in today¡¦s newspaper.
Aug 18, 2002
ZeJai Ribao (World Journal, New York)
(Wired from Hong Kong published version Aug 18)
Recently, China 2nd Artillery has tested/fired missiles frequently. 2 missiles have been fired from land, one new submarine missile has been fired from the sea. They hit the target, 6000km away, in XinJiang Province. Accordingly, the tested missiles were superior to the original evaluation made by the US,
China CCTV reported days ago, one less than 10 year old 2nd Artillery brigade has completed 16 times of firing/testing missiles missions. 2 missiles have been fired and hit the target. At the same time, they moved the troop further from 50km to 100km every month, to make sure the soldier can have training in the real battle environment, and let the troop can move to 1000km distance within 48 hours.
Hong Kong Sun Paper, according to UK Military and Defense News, reported that recently, one PLA Navy nuclear submarine fired a submarine version of ICBM and hit the 6000km target in XinJiang¡¦s Dakalamagan Desert. One US Navy DDG has been watching the missile firing. According to the US, this missile may be getting to the range of 14500km, and believed to be JL-2 Modified version.
In last October, US Department of Defense believed that China only capable to fired the JL-2 Modified version until 2008. Accordingly, this missile maybe superior to the US Delta II ¡V D5 submarine missile. In addition, they believed this modified version is developed by the Russian engineers working in China.
JL-2 is DF-31 submarine version. DF-31 can fired up to the range of 8000km. It used solid fuel propulsion and can carry 3-4 warheads.
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My question is:
Is the nuclear submarine mentioned above Type 094 SSBN?
As of my knowledge that Gulf and Xia can only fired JL-1 which the size is much smaller than JL-2. If it was JL-2, then only type 094 can fire it.
Any idea?