by Kris Osborn, President, Center for Military Modernization
(Washington DC) While rival nation destroyers may not directly face one-another in an all-out, blue-water maritime warfare scenario, both US Navy Flight III DDG 51 destroyers and the People’s Liberation Army – Navy’s new class of Type 055 destroyers each operate as a defining and foundational war platform for their respect fleets.
In a simple, clear sense, range, guidance precision and volume of on-board weapons would prove decisive as a measure of difference, yet the real margin of superiority would like pertain to the extent to which each platform were able to truly network and coordinate with other assets across a multi-domain maritime warfare environment. For example, the destroyer which best integrates with aerial surveillance and attack systems, unmanned platforms and submarines is likely to close the “sensor-to-shooter” curve faster and therefore prevail. How “networked” are the aerial surveillance nodes and to what extent can layered ship defenses see and intercept, jam or destroy incoming missiles? Another critical question, does the PLAN operate any equivalent to the US Navy’s now-operational Tactical Tomahawk which can track and destroy moving targets and change course in flight from hundreds of miles away? Which Navy can operate attack submarines with sufficient stealth, quieting technologies and precision weapons to destroy the other’s fleet of surface warships.
Given these variables, a direct one-for-one, destroyer against destroyer comparison might not accurately address the question of superiority but rather an integrated look at how each platform can operate synergystically with air and undersea platforms, integrate command and control, operate impactful layered ship defenses and more efficiently link surveillance nodes with weapons and fire control for precision targeting and rapid attack.
A true comparison of the US DDG 51s and China’s Type 055 would likely need to also incorporate the US Navy’s Zumwalt-class warships, given that China’s new quasi-stealthy destroyers reveal distinct similarities to both DDG 51 Flight III and Zumwalt destroyers.
US Navy DDG 51 Arleigh Burke-class Destroyers
The U.S. Navy put as many as 10 Arleigh Burke DDG 51 Flight III Destroyers on contract to help catapult the service into a new dimension of maritime attack capability, as the greatly upgraded ships have improved weapons, better computing, and a much longer-range and far more sensitive radar system.
Arleigh Burke Flight III on the Seas
The U.S. Navy’s Arleigh Burke Flight III destroyers, in development now for many years, are engineered to ensure the U.S. Navy fleet stays in front of the competition as the world threat equation evolves and China continues to quickly build a new fleet of high-tech Type 055 semi-stealthy destroyers.
While the Navy is currently experimenting with concepts for its next-generation DDG X destroyer, the Flight III destroyers are intended to sail for decades into the future, given the sophistication of the weapons and technology now being built into the ships.
In fact, early conceptual thinking regarding the new DDG X is that its technological systems, weapons, and radar will likely be based upon those now integrating into the Flight III, a plan that offers a window into Navy thinking and more sophisticated Flight III technologies.
The cornerstone or foundation of the Flight III upgrade is the addition of a paradigm-changing AN/SPY-6 (V)1 Air and Missile Defense Radar system. This radar is reported by Navy and Raytheon developers to be 30 times more sensitive than its predecessor and helps ship commanders detect enemy objects and threats half the size and twice the distance as previous radars can. This is quite a leap forward, given that the ranges of enemy weapons and sensors, coupled with multi-domain connectivity and networking, have dramatically increased the threat equation for surface warships.
Radar Array
The SPY-6 family moves beyond existing AN/SPY-1 ship-integrated radar systems and, according to an interesting article in Microwave Journal ”… handles 30 times more targets and has 30-times greater sensitivity than the SPY-1D(V).” (“Radar and Phased Array Breakthroughs,” Eli Booker)
Raytheon’s SPY-6 radar transmitter uses a material known as military-grade Gallium Nitride (GaN), a substance explained by Raytheon developers as up to 1,000 times more efficient than the existing Gallium Arsenide used today.
When it comes to application, the SPY-6 radar systems streamline otherwise disparate fire-control and detection technologies; the SPY-6 can cue short-range, closer-in interceptors as well as longer-range ballistic missile interceptors such as an SM-3. This shortens the sensor-to-shooter time and offers war commanders a longer window with which to make decisions about which countermeasure is needed. This integration is precisely the kind of defense needed to counter a multi-pronged, coordinated enemy attack potentially combining ballistic missiles with cruise missiles, and drone attacks.
With SPY-1, as it’s called, Commanders can see threats from much safer standoff distances and operate with a larger time window with which to respond and decide upon a defensive measure or counterattack. The AN/SPY-6 radar is also integrated into the Navy’s Aegis Combat System, an integrated suite of technologies combining Air-and-Cruise Missile Defense with Ballistic Missile Defense, onboard computing, and fire control systems. With more precise threat data arriving at a faster pace from greater distances with greater fidelity, Aegis can incorporate and analyze new streams of precise threat track data with sufficient time to develop a counterattack plan and determine fire-control coordinates.
The DDG 51 Arleigh Burke Flight III upgrade is centered on the AN/SPY-6(V)1 Air and Missile Defense Radar. It incorporates upgrades to the electrical power and cooling capacity plus additional associated changes to provide greatly enhanced warfighting capability to the fleet. Flight III is the latest Flight upgrade in the more than 30-year history of the class, building on the proud legacy of Flight I, II, and IIA ships before it.
China’s Stealthy Type 055 Destroyer
A critical question for the emerging Flight III Destroyers is whether the range of its sensors, multi-domain networking and deck-launched weapons can hold China’s most cutting edge, quasi-stealthy Type 055 destroyers at risk. It would seem so, yet specific performance parameters for the Type 055 are likely difficult to discern, yet Chinese state-back newspapers say the new ships are engineered with long-range missiles, missile defense systems and a high-tech submarine-hunting ability.
At least three Chinese Type 055 ships are operational and China is quickly building a large fleet for its Navy.
China and US: Ships & Shipbuilding
While the weapons, technologies and stealthy characteristics of these ships are likely to be of interest to Pentagon officials, the sheer pace of Chinese shipbuilding continues to be a cause of likely concern. China’s industrial apparatus, and ability to rapidly build ships, creates a circumstance which can enable the PRC to continue its large-scale Naval expansion at a pace tough for the US to match.
Multiple reports say China is on pace to double its fleet of destroyers within just the next five years. The concern, however, is by no means restricted to pure numbers but also grounded in uncertainties related to the relative sophistication and capa
bility of China’s new destroyers. Having more destroyers does not necessarily equate to any kind of maritime superiority if they cannot compete with the range, precision, networking and overall capability of US destroyers.
Furthermore, the US Navy does have as many as 10 DDG Flight III destroyers under contract and is moving quickly to modernize its sensors, radar systems, computing and ship-integrated weapons.
A Chinese Communist party backed newspaper says the Type 055 destroyers are engineered for multi-mission operations to include land-attack, open water maritime warfare and anti-submarine missions. The new Chinese ships are armed with rocket-propelled torpedoes, operate sub-hunting helicopters and advanced sonar systems.
The first Type 055 Chinese destroyer, the Nanching, looks a bit like a hybrid between the US Zumwalt and Arleigh Burke DDG 51 class destroyers. It does have what appear to be some stealthy attributes such as a rounded front hull and smooth exterior with fewer protruding structures, yet there are mounted antennas and what look like masts on the back end as well. The helicopter landing area on the back of the Nanchang does look like a US DDG 51.
The Chinese already have three operational Type 055 destroyers, a number which interestingly matches the US Navy’s plan for three Zumwalt-class destroyers. What seems key is the question as to what kind of weapons range, radar, fire control and computing is aboard the Nanchang, as that will most likely determine the margin of difference regarding its ability to rival its US equivalents.
Perhaps of greatest consequence is the question of whether these Type 055 destroyers have any kind of Aegis-radar-like ballistic missile defense technology linking fire-control, air and cruise missile defense, ballistic missile defense and interceptor missiles able to fire from deck-mounted Vertical Launch Systems.
Ballistic Missile Defense System Type-055 Destroyer
The Pentagon’s 2021 China report says the country plans to deploy a mobile, maritime ballistic missile defense system on board its new Type-055 stealthy destroyer.
Should this come to fruition, the People’s Liberation Army – Navy would take a huge step toward rivaling, challenging or maybe even matching the U.S. ship-based Aegis System for ballistic missile defense.
Ship-based BMD of course introduces new layers and new angles of protection and defensive countermeasures by being mobile at sea. Ship commanders can pick locations of great strategic import which increases the likelihood of intercepting an attacking ballistic missile.
“The PRC is working to develop BMD systems consisting of exo-atmospheric and endoatmospheric kinetic-energy interceptors. PRC state media confirmed the PLA’s intent to move ahead with land- and sea-based midcourse missile defense capabilities,” DoD’s 2021 “Report on Military and Security Developments involving the People’s Republic of China” states.
Type 055 Submarine Hunting
China’s first quasi-stealthy new Type 055 destroyer is preparing for aggressive submarine-hunting missions in water near Taiwan and the South China Sea by testing helicopter-dropped sonar and built-in anti-submarine technologies.
Part of the exercise included cross-domain networking initiatives wherein the surface destroyer networked with helicopters and other aircraft to track threats and transmit target data in real time, according to the Chinese Communist Party-backed Global Times newspaper. The four day exercises included what the paper called “realistic scenario-oriented anti-submarine training courses.”
Type 055 Destroyer: Submarine-Hunting
In a manner apparently quite similar to how US DDG 51 Arleigh Burke class destroyers interoperate with MH-60R helicopters, the new Chinese “Nanchang” destroyer dispatched a Z-9 search helicopter to deploy sonar equipment. The paper praised the Nanching’s ability to discern submarine signals from other sources of undersea noise.
“Despite fishing boat activities in the vicinity of the exercise zone, which disrupted the sonar equipment’s detection of submarines, the Nanchang was able to use its acoustic data analysis and application system to accurately distinguish the noises of the submarine,” the Global Times writes.
The extent of secure or hardened connectivity between the Nanching and its sub-hunting helicopters would be crucial, as it may not parallel the US Navy’s ability to quickly exchange threat data from undersea to helicopter and drones before reaching a host ship destroyer able to perform command and control.
The Nanchang also fires rocket-propelled, submarine-killing torpedoes and has an ability to conduct “joint fire strikes,” according to the Chinese paper.
The Chinese paper did say part of the intent of the anti-submarine drills was to ensure U.S. attack submarines could not operate near Chinese shores. However, it is not clear just how effective these new anti-submarine technologies would be against upgraded, high-tech, Virginia-class attack submarines equipped with new quieting technologies and stealth coating materials.
Virginia-class attack submarines are increasingly being thought of as platforms capable of conducting undersea reconnaissance missions, due to navigational, acoustic and sensing upgrades.
Interestingly, it seems significant that the Chinese paper made no mention of undersea drones as being part of the Nanching’s networked sub-hunting network.
Many US Navy surface ships, such as its Littoral Combat Ships, are able to launch and recover submarine-hunting drones and mine-hunting platforms. Any kind of effective submarine hunting mission would benefit greatly from an ability to gather time-sensitive intelligence information from beneath the surface.
Ultimately, the success of the Nanching’s ability to truly find submarines would not only rest on the range and fidelity of its sonar and acoustic-data collection and analysis, but also upon an ability to securely network that data across domains in real time. Submarines can of course quickly change position, so an anti-submarine mission would need to find a day to move information quickly or develop an extended “continuous track” because an attack submarine on a clandestine surveillance mission is not likely to stay in one place for long.
China has now already built eight new Type 055 stealthy destroyers, a class of next-generation destroyers likely intended to rival the US Navy’s emerging DDG 51 Flight III destroyers or even Zumwalt-class warships.
Kris Osborn is the Military Affairs Editor of 19FortyFive and President of Warrior Maven – Center for Military Modernization. Osborn previously served at the Pentagon as a Highly Qualified Expert with the Office of the Assistant Secretary of the Army—Acquisition, Logistics & Technology. Osborn has also worked as an anchor and on-air military specialist at national TV networks. He has appeared as a guest military expert on Fox News, MSNBC, The Military Channel, and The History Channel. He also has a Masters Degree in Comparative Literature from Columbia University.
