China’s DF-26 “Carrier Killer” Missile: Hype vs Reality — How Will The Navy Stop Them?

By Kris Osborn, President, Center for Military Modernization

(Washington DC) The Chinese military and China’s state-backed newspapers regularly hype and test-fire their famous so-called carrier killer anti-ship missiles.

These weapons are ostensibly capable of destroying aircraft carriers with precision-guided firepower from distances as far as 2,000 miles.

Moving Past A2/AD

The existence of these weapons — the DF-21D and DF-26B — played a major role in the development of the anti-access/area-denial strategic framework.

The U.S. wants to ensure that carriers and other platforms can attack and destroy enemy targets from great distance in a very high-threat environment.

Far-reaching, precise anti-ship missiles, however, seem to threaten that mission.

The Pentagon, and certainly the U.S. Navy, have for years now taken this threat quite seriously, even though much is likely still unknown when it comes to the reach, guidance technology, and accuracy of these missiles, let alone their ability to hit moving targets.

In response to China’s A2/AD strategy, the Navy has clearly expressed that it can and will operate anywhere it needs to when conducting combat operations and projecting maritime power.