This is a new correspondent (Jiang Jintao). Please note that 99% plus of all reporters get their Russian designations mixed up simply because they don’t know which is what and what is which. These designations are confusing for most people. and not the least the press. You can go through the history of arms trade reporting and see how frequently designations are all mixed up. I remember how Jane’s typoed “N109” for the N019, and guess how many websites added that to their information about the MiG-29.

Kh-59ME is not an antiship missile. It is a land attack missile primarily with only a secondary antiship function. Even then it’s relatively inefficient for that role, since you will need the WSO and a datalink pod to lock on to a target, whereas antiship missiles, using active radar guidance, lock on to ships on water like ARH missiles lock on to planes in the air, using a single pilot.

TV guidance for antiship missiles is good for one thing—coastal use. Here you must verify if you are locking on to a valid ship target, not some rock outcropping. Towards the coast, you have increasing ground clatter from the land, rocks, reefs and shallow sediment, which makes radar less and less efficient. You must also be able to lock on to hostile ships, not friendly ships. Hence the C-701, a small antiship missile intended for naval helicopters, is a TV guided missile.

However, Kh-59ME is overkill for targets near the coast, when smaller missiles can do the job more efficiently like your good old Kh-29T or -TE Kedge. For this kind of job, you don’t need sea skimmers or cruise missiles with jet engines, just a missile with a simple rocket booster, a TV head and a big warhead.

Kh-59ME has long completed its trials, even before the first ever MKKs were delivered. We have a photo of the Kh-59ME with a PLAAF MKK; CCT has shown a picture of an MKK firing a Kh-59ME; and years ago, Janes also reported their delivered to China as part of the first batch of planes. The -ME itself ia mod of the Kh-59M which is in Russian service. The only difference is the increased range of the -ME over the -M (115/120km vs. 90km). And it is the PLAAF that is using them, whose responsibility covers only ground targets. Any antishipping target is the responsibility of the PLANAF.

I don’t know of any new Kh-59 type in development except for the antiship -MK version. I gather that with a new datalink, the Kh-59MK’s airframe can be the basis of a new Kh-59ME mod that allows the missile to extend as far as 285km.

So this is either 24 SU-30MK3 with Zhuk MSE plus an order of Kh-59MK, or you have 24 SU-30MK2 with an order of new block mod of Kh-59ME. However, the release of the news on the success of the Zhuk MSE testing is clearly meant to say something, and my bet is that it is the first alternative. Reinforcing this is that the new SU-30 units are for the PLANAF, and as Richard Fisher once estimated, as part of a longer term order for at least 60-80 planes.

Thanks Harry. Quite odd to see the Kopyo-F having a shorter detection range for some reason. Different parameters for testing perhaps.

Note the radars being marketed for the Chinese has two things—mention of the Kh-31A, and the ranges for sea targets.

” Hahahahahaha… sorry, but this is funny. Get into an aeroplane and fly at about few kms up. Get a very good pair of binoculars and tell me how far can you see? Can you see a major concrete bridge that is 30km away? Can you see major buildings and factories more than 30km away? “

Yeah right.

You can only see 30km away if your weather is clear, not when it’s foggy, not when there are clouds around, not when there is mist and haze around, not when you have frequent monsoons. TV and visual identification is so dependent on weather factors you are literally depending on luck and mother nature to deliver the right conditions for a successful strike.

If you have seen the air over East Asia, I can tell you it won’t be clear like in New Zealand. You have seen enough pics of Chinese aircraft to see that the background weather is so often not cooperative enough for clear visibility.

“The Soviets had INS systems that could deliver ICBM warheads within 250m of their intended target after travelling 16,000km over a 30 minute period of flight… without course updates. The accuracy required to get the missile to a particular place to begin its attack is pathetic and they could achieve it with WWII technology if they wanted.”

Something flying ballistic near outer space and something flying just 100 feet over the ground are well two different things when it comes to inertial navigation. BTW, the Kh-59ME isn’t intended to fly 10km, 20km or 30km over the target area, then eyeball the target area from a height. It’s a cruise missile flying about 300 feet to 500 feet from the ground. It does not loiter over the area looking for a target like a UCAV. Once it reaches the area, you better be close enough for the TV seeker to make that identification from a low height.

“The long range AS-18 KAZOO is TV guided and is used against fixed targets at long range. There is no reason why a Mig-29SM could not be fitted to use such a weapon… max weights allowing. “

There is some reason why it IS_NOT using that weapon unless you have a backseat WSO.

Why it COULD not does not cut it. The only valid explanation we need to look for is why it DOES not.

“Very simply the Mig-29SM would fly to a point within range of the target area and launch a Kazoo in the appropriate direction with the target location and the launch location in memory. The Mig would then fly around the general area neither getting closer or further away from the target area. Once the Kazoo gets to a certain range from the target area it turns on its TV seeker and transmits the image to the Mig on a coded channel. The Mig Pilot then places the crosshairs on the target in the video image and transmits that information to the missile… he can either loiter and view to impact or he can leave the area.”

And why would you need a Kazoo to do that, when you can do it with a *KEDGE*. Yeah, that all popular Kh-29T, Russia’s fair equivalent to the Maverick missile, which does the same thing. And for that, you don’t need the expense and complexity of a two stage propulsion—a rocket booster and a turbojet. You only need a simple rocket motor. The original Kh-59 Kingbolt is exactly like that.

The long range Kazoo M/ME is a very different animal. It has an INS system with a datalink for flight corrections and updates, as well as WSO involved target identification and lock. It also has an anti ship mode, where it can be used against shipping targets with a cruise height of 10m.

The whole idea of having a stand off missile is that the target area may be heavily defended and an aircraft loitering to hit a target with a short range TV guided PGM can be highly vulnerable. So the aircraft itself cannot afford to be over the target area.

And guess what, this missile is not INTENDED to hit large stationary targets. This is something a big SSM or cruise missile can do. It is intended to hit SMALL and OBSCURE stationary targets like the door to an underground bunker. That’s why these missiles have a precision of only 2M CEP. It’s an explosive scalpel.

China already settled its borders with Russia and Kazakhstan.

I think the Russians did try to finish the Zhuk, but their abilities were hamstrung by a moribund domestic electronics industry. It took them a bit of time to fully master commecial electronics technology from the West, though when that is accomplished, these technologies are easy to obtain. (An example is the new AGAT seeker 9B-1103M which is superior to the R-77’s seeker 9B-1348. The 9B-1103M used a Texas Instruments DSP while the R-77’s seeker used a domestic chip.

Another example is the Baguet computers used by the radars. The old systems used reverse engineered copies of Intel 8080 processors, and they were all programmed in assembly language. The problem is that assembly language is impossible to port to a much faster processor with an incompatible machine language. This makes it very difficult for the systems to be updated. So they took the task of rewriting all the code to C language, then compile them to work on the much faster modern commercial processors. The Baguet 55.4.0.2 computer in the first MKKs were still in assembly language. The MK2 had the 55.4.0.6 computer that had the operating code rewritten into C source code, then compiled to a much faster processor.

Also when you do things in assembly language it’s very difficult to modify and extend the software.

So the Russians were also hamstrung by legacy baggage of their software as well.

I think Phazotron tried their best on the Zhuks but it wasn’t enough, and so the Russians had to activate contingency plans that led to the N001VE (originally called N001M) from the rival concern of NIIP. The Russian version on the SKM is simply called N001V by the way; it is functionally identical to the N001VEP except it has a new detect mode that improves search distance up to 135km (I bet it’s a velocity search mode, since VS is not present on the N001VE/VEP).

Also it can be said that the Russians may have had too many radar projects (count the number of Zhuks, Sokols, N001 variations, Pero, BARS, the radar on the SU-34, etc,.) and so human and cash resources may have been spread too thin. This led to delays in development.

That’s because tanks (metal thingies) tend to show up on radar as they reflect heavily. Soft soil, water, and vegetation tends to let most radar pass through, sometimes as far as until radar hits solid rock. In ground mapping, you just include these reflections; in air search modes, these reflections are disregarded or omitted from the display.

0,4 by 0,4 is pretty darn good, hats off to them if that’s true! I must say that I agree with Phazotron on this, you can push the N001/019’s only so far. By developing countless derivatives for upgrade in numerous stages you will soon reach the point where buying Zhuks off the shelf isn’t that much more expensive and offers a handsome perfomance advantage on top of it all. I mean, if they had immidiately taken the desicion to focus all efforts on N010 the development of the latter would be much further along today. Instead of starting to introduce N001VE(P?) they could well be on the verge of upgrading to Zhuk-M variants by now.

The Chinese did wanted to change to the Zhuk-MS as early as 2001. In fact, they had been looking at the Zhuk-MS predecessor, the Zhuk-27, since 1996. I didn’t think that Jane’s flubbed when they reported back in 1996 that the original Chinese J-11 license was supposed to be the SU-27SMK which had the Zhuk-27 radar. Somewhere along the line, something happened, perhaps the Zhuk-27 didn’t work as it should as well as simultaneous concerns with the pilot’s workload. A Jane’s article happened to mention that a few of the Chinese SU-27s may have fitted this radar for testing purposes. Whatever happened, the results may not have been good. The license went back to the SK and the MKK program was initiated—with the N001VE. If the Zhuk-27 did work, why not just use the Zhuk-27 from the start with the first MKKs?

The Chinese did wanted to have the Zhuk-MS early as early as planes within the first order. And it’s possible that a number did have testing purposes—an entire regiment of MKKs are not in any operational division but in the CFTE test center. And its possible it didn’t work as expected, causing the next subsequent order to go back to the N001VE. Originally, the third order that was scheduled to be delivered this year was supposed to have the Zhuk, but guess what, it was deferred to as well.

Now pending results of more tests, this next and fourth order of MKKs may finally be the one to have the Zhuks But again, if the results were not to any satisfaction, the fourth order may revert back to the SU-30MK2 which is the default backup.

The Chinese have been looking at other Zhuks too—Zhuk-8II for the J-8II, Zhemchug/Zhuk-M for the J-10. But something also happened to these deals. It’s very unlikely that the J-8IIs were upgraded except for a small number with the J-8IIs all moving to use the KLJ-1 radar. The J-10 choose a domestic KLJ type radar inevitably much like the J-8IIs, but Kanwa is now saying it was the PLANAF (Navy) that wanted the Zhemchug for their version of the J-10, maybe to use Russian antiship missiles with it, as a complement to the SU-30MK2/MK3.

So Phazotron had tough luck in the Chinese market. It tried to market Kopyo-F when it knew the PLAAF may be interested to acquire a number of FC-1s. Latest news from Kanwa shows the fourth prototype FC-1 may be fitted with a Chinese KLJ type radar instead.

So catching this MK3 deal from the Chinese would be a big coup for Phazotron. If they managed a foothold, they can renew efforts to market other radars for the J-8II, J-10 and FC-1 line in hopes of bagging some sales for specialized attack variants of the three. The PLA has an enormous and still growing inventory of Russian AAMs and PGMs which may be difficult and would take too much time to integrate with Chinese radars (the only Russian missile that appears to be successfully integrated with Chinese fire control systems is the Kh-31P, which may be licensed manufactured in China as the YJ-91.) Phazotron needs to play on this inventory, as well as a new generation of Russian missiles that may interest the PLA, in order to gain sales favors over Chinese counterparts.

It would help especially if Phazotron is willing to integrate Chinese missile systems to their radar. So far Phazotron has shown that willingness—the F-8IIM prototype with the Zhuk-8II radar has been shown branding PL-8 and PL-5 missiles. The PL-8 is the Chinese licensed Israeli Python 3 missile. Although it’s not confirmed, the possibility exists that the Zhuk-8II may have also tested the PL-11 SARH missile. If Phazontron marketed its radars for the J-10 and FC-1, these are signs that Phazotron is willing to integrate other missiles like the SD-10/PL-12 ARH with their radars to gain the Chinese contracts.

I suspect this missile integration issue is a sore one for the PLA. They wanted to integrate the C-801 and C-802 antiship missiles on the MKK but the Russians would not have it. That probably soured a bit what the Chinese think of NIIP Tikhomirov, who is also trying to market the Panda radar (N001VEP+Pero phase array) to the PLA in competition with Phazotron for subsequent MKK contracts and upgrades. For a while there, Panda appears to be getting the upper hand, but recent events tilted this to the Zhuk. In my opinion, the integration issue has a factor here; Phazotron could be willing to integrate Chinese missiles (PL-8s, SD-10s and C-803s) on Zhuk MSE equipped MKKs, and that development process may have been ongoing if indeed a number of MKKs had the Zhuk installed for development and integration purposes.

If it were completely up for the Chinese, they probably just wanted the MKK airframe, put their LETRI JL-10A PD radar on it, then arm it with their C-801/802/803 antiship missiles, PL-8s and PL-12s on it. While I think the Russian made SU-27s in the PLAAF may be getting the SKM upgrade (with the N001VEP radar) eventually if it had not been implemented, I think the Russians were surprised and rebuffed having a hard time selling the same upgrade to the licensed built SU-27s (J-11s), since the Chinese appear to be developing their own radars for their J-11s either a NRIET KLJ type radar or a LETRI JL-1X type radar, so they could dump the N001E off from the plane. You can bet that NIIP had been eyeing this potentially lucrative market also for their Panda proposal, but again without any final and clear decision as of now, the upgrade road map is hanging on a balance.

One can think that Phazotron still has a chance on the J-11 market with its Zhuk MSE, though a lot may have to do with cost (get your costs lower than Panda, match them close with NRIET’s and LETRI’s, and then get Putin to call on the Chinese leaders for a earful…)