Battle from Larry Bond's book Shattered Trident

[DWReese]

Larry Bond's book, Shattered Trident, describes a South China Sea Battle at Spratly Island (yes, there is one island actually named Spratly) in which the Vietnamese attack an amphibious force protected by a rather potent TF centered around the Lanzhou Type 54 C Destroyer. It is armed with 48 HQ 9A SAMs. There are six other warships protecting the two amphibious ships, but each only has the HQ-7B or the SA-N-12 SAMs. Those aren't nearly as good, nor do they have the distance. In the book, the Vietnamese fire 64 Yakhont and 8 Switchblades at the TF. All three of the main targets, the two amphibious ships, and the Lanzhou are all destroyed. Other ships are also destroyed, but Bond doesn't really elaborate. So, I wanted to see exactly how close the results would turn out if I set everything up the same way. I painstakingly read, and positioned each of the units, and then allowed my Vietnamese units to fire their missiles on the Chinese TF.

In the book, the Chinese have their radar units off, relying in an airborne helicopter to provide early warning. Without the radar units on, the missiles don't start to be observed until like 12 miles away. The reaction time, of course is poor, and the incoming 72 missiles do quite a number on the Chinese ships.

I then tried it a few more times, but with the radar units on. The Chinese pick up the incoming missiles at 17 miles out, and still lose all of their targeted ships, but some of the others do survive on some occasions. Obviously, the Vietnamese are going to win this battle.

Finally, a subtracted one of the other Chinese Destroyers whose SAM units weren't as good, and replaced it with another Lanzhou Type 54 C, just to see what would happen. The number of SAM units was still the same, but the quality was better. This time, the TWO Lanzhou Destroyers did fire off all of their missiles, but none of the Chinese ships were destroyed, or even damaged.

I guess the point that I am trying to make is that these battles are often won and lost by the existence, or absence, of one specific ship. I found it to be amazing that by changing one ship, the entire results shifted from total disaster to total victory.

In any case, it was a very fun battle to recreate.

Doug

[ultradave]

I just read "Fatal Thunder" without realizing it was at the end of the series of books (I'm assuming it was a series because it referred to a lot that had happened). Have to go back to the library and see if they have the rest of them.

[Primarchx]

Potent air defense is a game changer.

[SeaQueen]

ORIGINAL: DWReese
I guess the point that I am trying to make is that these battles are often won and lost by the existence, or absence, of one specific ship. I found it to be amazing that by changing one ship, the entire results shifted from total disaster to total victory.

Yeah... There's several different interpretations of what this means. One is that the scenario is essentially contrived because the task force is insufficiently protected. Another interpretation is that Larry Bond was attempting to portray a PLAN with some impressive hardware, but in insufficient numbers for it to be effective. Another interpretation is that the Chinese commander in charge of allocating ships to the task for made a fatal mistake.

It sounds like you've got a good scenario for playing with, though. I'd make lots of variations on it. Try changing the Vietnamese forces. Try doing something like a US bomber with LRASM or carrier based aviation. Maybe different submarines.

[DWReese]

I started with just the original set up as described in the book. Then, I have swapped out this platform for that, and tried different variations of radar illumination, etc. The 72 missiles launched by the Vietnamese, if you read the book, actually come from land-based launchers which were fastened down to the decks of ships. I went the easy way and just had the regular launchers for other ships just to get the exact missiles into the air. I was only concerned with the Chinese defensive side of the action. It was fun, but I'll move onto to something else now.

Thanks for your response.

Doug

[giantsquid]

Hello Doug,

I have just read the Larry Bond book, I found very interesting.
Thanks for your post but It seems they used 72 Uran from corvette and Tarantul PTM targeting the task force and about 8-12 Yakhont (Bastion battery on container ship) targeting Type-52C in a big sincronized attack. It seems the chinese have radar on. Did you try this set up too?

Regards

Francesco

[DWReese]

Hi Francesco,

If you read closely, the numbers were actually 64 and 8, for a total of 72 missiles. The ones launched by the Frigate were slower traveling ones.

Yes, I tried it both ways, with the Chinese radars on, and off. With it off, they don't see them until about 12 miles out, if I recall correctly. If they are on, they see them at about 17 miles out. I did like the book said and targeted the big Chinese Destroyer, the 52-C, as well as the amphibious ship and a container ship.

Whether the radars were on, or off, didn't seem to matter. The 72 missiles, discovered at such short range, were more than enough to saturate the Chinese defenses. I consistently lost those three ships, and sometimes almost all of them. 72 missiles is just too much.

When I was satisfied that the outcome (radars off or on) always resulted in a Vietnamese victory, I subtracted one of the second best destroyers that they have, and gave them another Type 52-C Destroyer. With the addition of the second good SAM ship, I really didn't lose anything as the Chinese were able to destroy all of the missiles, although it was close.

This was my point. I subtracted an average ship and replaced it with another good ship, and that was enough to completely change the entire battle around in favor of the Chinese.

At this point, I still play around with the battle by adding and subtracting various platforms to see if there is any difference.

Thanks for taking the time to get involved with this one.

Doug

[AlexGGGG]

The 52C has 48x SAMs and 24x datalink channels (if I read the DB correctly); it is not nearly enough for 72 incoming. Even if it has time to fire two salvos (24x SAMs each with datalinks saturated at all times), and assuming the best case 100% pK, there are still 24 missiles inbound against point defence. Point defence is not nearly good enough for 24x inbounds, 8x per ship.

Second 52C will add 48x more SAMs, bringing the total to 96, which is larger than the number of inbounds. As your test suggests, what comes through is small enough for chaff and point defence.

This seems to me to be the simple case of whoever has more missiles wins.

What can be done if you have some lesser-capable SAM ships, with shorter range SAMs, you can try different formations, that is, putting SAM shooters along the expected axis of the attack, so that lesser ships can have a chance to fire on the inbounds and have head-on aspect. I employ various options who goes closer to the threat, you can either put best ships out or in (close to your high-value ship), depending on the situation.

[giantsquid]

Thanks to both.
I think we can assume 2 engagement against Uran (subsonic) and 1 against Yakhont (supersonic). In this case just one engagement with Type-52C, firing two SAM to each target, with a combined 0.8 Ph, expending all missiles. But there other ships in the formation that can take out some other ASM. Probably you can kill the PLAN formation with less weapons.

I use this formula to calculate how many missiles to fire on each target: tm.asp?m=4214807
I attacked a similar formation centered on USN Burke with this approach: tm.asp?m=4205870

Francesco