Brown, Dale - Patrick McLanahan 06 Read Online Free Page B

the kind of military power China needed to succeed in the twenty-first
century—and Admiral Sun Ti Guoming was going to make it his career to see to it
that China developed the technology to meet the challenges of the future.
                 “Sixty
seconds to release! Navigation data transfer in progress. Pilots. maintain
constant heading and airspeed and conform to prelaunch axis limits."
                 The
soldiers backed away from the cargo as the countdown neared an end. Sun did a
count of the men in the cargo bay—six had gone in, and he counted six. plus
himself. Accidents were easy and common in this kind of work, but it wnuld not
look good for an accident to occur with the deputy’ chief of staff aboard.
                 “Stand
by for release! All hands, prepare for cargo release! Five ... four ... three
... txvo ... one ... zero. Release!" Sun heard several loud snap! sounds and a slight burble through
the fuselage: then, slowly, the cargo began to roll backward through the cargo
bay and out through the open clamshell doors.
                 The
“cargo" w’-as a Chinese M-9 rocket, an intermediate-range ballistic
missile. Admiral Sun Ji Guoming. as chief of development for the People s
Liberation Army, was conducting yet another experiment on the possible future
deployment of the M-series tactical ballistic missiles on nonconventional
platforms. For years, other countries had experimented with alternative methods
for deploying missiles to make them less vulnerable to counterattack. The most
common w’as rail-garrison or road-mobile launchers, and China relied heavily on these. But although the
missiles were transportable, they still needed presurveyed launch points to
ensure an accurate position fix for their inertial guidance units, which meant
that the launch points could be known and attacked.
                 The
advent of satellite-based positioning and navigation greatly increased the
accuracy of military weapons—at any moment, even while moving in an aircraft,
it was possible to capture position, speed, and time from the satellites, dump
the information to a missile or rocket, and be assured of previously
unbelievable accuracy. If the weapon could get position updates from the
satellites while in flight—and the M-9 missile Sun had just launched could do
just that—the weapon’s accuracy could be improved even more. And if the missile
contained a TV camera with a datalink back to the launch aircraft so an
operator could lock onto a particular target and steer it right to impact,
pinpoint accuracy was possible.
                 Sun
stepped back through the cargo bay, waving away several soldiers who cautioned
him not to go back there, and walked right to within a few feet of the edge of
the open mouth of the cargo bay. What he saw was absolutely spectacular.
                 The
M-9 missile was suspended vertically below three sixty-foot parachutes, fitted
with strobe lights so he could see where they were in the darkness. He knew
that as the 14,000-pound missile fell, it was receiving yet another position
update from the American Global Positioning System satellite navigation
constellation, and gyros were compensating for winds and missile movement, and
were aligning the missile as vertically as possible. Suns cargo plane was about
two miles away now—the missile could just barely be seen under the three chutes—
when suddenly a long white tongue of fire and smoke appeared from under the
parachutes. The three chutes deflated as the weight was taken off the risers,
then they cut away completely as the M-9 rose up through the sky.
                 A
perfect launch! Sun had proven—again, for this was his seventh or eighth
successful air launch—that it was possible to launch a ballistic missile from a
cargo plane. No special aircraft was necessary. Any cargo plane—military or
civilian—could do it, with the right