If you put MRBMs into the picture, the Pershing with its radar terminal homing would also be in the list with a est. CEP of around 30m!

Could the Chinese be using a standard commercial trick? Talk to one potential supplier and use that to pressure the other to get a better price? After all, there are widespread reports of the Chinese negotiating over the IL-76/78 and haggling over the price tag.

Irregardless whether this deal over the Anontov goes through, it does strengthen their hand in negotiations with the Russians now. I know the IL-76/78 Midas represents a different class all together but they could threaten to buy less units of the 76.

Mriya is one of my favourite aircraft because of its sheer size. But I wonder about the utility of such a aircraft in military use because it is putting alot of eggs in one basket in a single airlift.

Ok, time to get some facts straight.

UNREP operations at sea right now is limited to stores, munitions and missiles. Missiles in this case are small ones, like AAMs for aircraft carriers and so on and is supplemented by VERTREP.

Fast Combat Support Ship

VLS loading at sea is next to impossible especially for something the size of a HHQ-9. The USN only has a prototype systemUSN and current does not have a capability to reload at sea.

Having been to naval bases and watching their maintenance activities, you will notice that most bases world wide have a mobile crane and a cherry picker. The purpose of this two equipment is to allow the removal of equippment, notably radars/antennas from the top mast of the ship. My guess is, the equipment on the chinese ships/russian ships are just to facilitate the job.

I had another look at those pics of the loading sequence, and I remain convinced that they could indeed be reloaded at sea. The addtional loading equipment needed may already be aboard and stowed away. If they were intended to be reloaded purely in port, then what would be the point of installing seperate cranes for each VLS bank?

You can’t reload at sea even with the cranes and reloader installed. I had studied the issue with the Russian Varyag CG and its battery of SA-N-6. Have a look at these photos. According to information i have obtained from indirect Russian sources, the cranes are indeed used to handle the missile canisters, but it is never done at sea due to risk involved. Having them on board means there is little worry about resupplying at a port which does not have the necessary facilities.

See attached. Photos taken at IFR 2002 at Tokyo bay by japanese (unfortunately, his website is down now)

Si MMICs: Google around. SiCi MMICs are being research now by all major countries as a replacement for GaAs type MMICs. That is why I think PLAN shouldn’t waste the money for an GaAs active array system and use a existing passive system on the 052C. Use a good enough system, spend the savings on research on something even better.

CLC-2: Suspected that you are refering the the wrong thing 🙂 I was wondering how the radar for the Type 95 could be a phased array :)YLC-8 should also be a phased array system.

Fregat:
http://www.milparade.com/security/23/094.htm
http://aa.1asphost.com/tonyart/tonyt/Applets/ArrayScanning/shape.html

The Fregat is actually a frequency scanned radar(see p1 milparade) with an array antenna. So if you want to say it has a phased array, you ain wrong. But it is neither passive nor active one.

Do you have anymore chinese websites to share?

And comparing MESAR with the Fregat-MA is comparing apples to oranges. It’s like comparing a SPS-52 to a SPY-1A.

Fregat-MA is normal, mechnically steered 3D search radar using frescan with a planar array element, not even close to a PPAR like SPY-1A.

WWII: Gotta be those IJN destroyers/cruisers Tone/Mogami. Extremely underated and extremely overarmed for their size. Generally overshadowed by the BBs.