Cruise Missile Proliferation
Meeting a growing threat
As international debate rages over US plans to deploy defences to protect not only the US homeland but also US forces, allies and friends around the globe against ballistic missile attack, it is becoming clear that such attacks are not the only kind of missile threat with which policy-makers must contend.
Proliferation of land-attack cruise missiles (LACMs), which pose enormous challenges to air defence systems and can be used to great effect in a variety of conflict conditions, is occurring through diverse means. The problem could increase significantly unless current export controls are tightened. Indeed, as US ballistic-missile defences become more operationally viable, adversaries will have even stronger incentives to acquire LACMs. Currently, insufficient resources are being devoted to efforts to respond to this challenge.
Proliferation sources
Concern over the proliferation of LACMs is driven by two realities: the quantum leap in dual-use technologies supporting LACM development (including satellite navigation and guidance, high-resolution satellite imagery and digital mapping technologies for mission planning); and the fact that the 33-nation Missile Technology Control Regime (MTCR) is much less effective at controlling proliferation of cruise missiles and unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) than ballistic missiles.
Perhaps the easiest way to acquire highly sophisticated LACMs is to buy them from a growing list of industrial-world manufacturers. Without improved controls by MTCR member states, many missiles could be exported to non-MTCR states. The cheapest way to acquire LACMs is to transform small kit aircraft into weapons-carrying, fully autonomous attack vehicles. Unregulated and widely available, slow-flying kit aircraft present challenges to many air defence systems, which eliminate slow-flying objects on or near the ground to improve signal processing. A more worrying proliferation source is the conversion of unarmed UAVs, including reconnaissance and target drones, into LACMs. Of the 40 nations producing UAVs indigenously, just 22 are MTCR members. Meanwhile, there is a large number of short-range anti-ship cruise missiles (ASCMs) in the world's military arsenals, although only a small proportion could be converted into LACMs with ranges over 300km. Indigenous development is the longest route to acquiring militarily significant LACM capabilities; it is also unlikely to lead to anything beyond low-technology designs.
Strategic threats
LACM capability could bolster an adversary's willingness to oppose US-led military coalitions in strategically significant ways. Compared with ballistic missiles, LACMs are expected to be more accurate (by a factor of at least ten), less costly (by at least half) and, because of their aerodynamic stability, substantially more effective in delivering chemical or biological payloads (conservatively, enlarging the lethal area for biological attacks by at least ten times). Precise LACM attacks against key fixed points – ports, airfields and other logistical sites - could be used to harass adversaries and achieve strategic leverage in the early phase of a theatre campaign.
Regional campaigns are not the only context within which the cruise-missile threat is relevant. As the US considers options to deploy defences against ballistic-missile threats, it must confront the alternative ways in which enemies might wish to attack the US homeland. Conceivably, an adversary lacking the resources or technical skill to build and deploy intercontinental-range ballistic missiles could instead covertly deploy an LACM on a commercial vessel. Even a bulky cruise missile like the Chinese Silkworm – converted for land attack - could readily fit inside a standard 12-metre shipping container equipped with a small internal erector for launching. Fired from outside territorial waters, such an LACM could strike most population and industry centres of North America and Europe.
LACMs confront air defence systems with enormous challenges. The effectiveness of both airborne and ground-based surveillance radars is being undermined by missile designs that are increasingly sleek and aerodynamic, and have lower radar signatures. Reduced radar observability means that the defence has less time to react. Also, many missiles have very low flight profiles and employ terrain features to avoid detection. Low flight impedes airborne surveillance, owing to radar 'clutter' from ground objects other than the target – this makes an LACM more difficult to detect.
Some existing air defences – consisting of fighter-based air-to-air missiles, airborne surveillance aircraft, surface-to-air missiles and battle-management command, control and communications (BMC3) – have substantial capability against large LACMs flying relatively high flight profiles. However, once cruise missiles fly low or, worse, add stealth features or employ endgame countermeasures (decoys or jammers), severe difficulties arise. Indeed, even defending against easily observable LACMs flying relatively high is problematic. Radars could mistake friendly aircraft returning to their bases for these targets and inadvertently shoot them down. Saturation attacks by cheap, converted UAVs or kit aircraft would simply overwhelm comparatively expensive air-defence missiles.
Addressing the threat
Most projections suggest that the cruise-missile threat will evolve gradually, from relatively few highly observable missiles in the short-term (1-5 years), via the emergence of higher numbers of less-observable, terrain-hugging missiles in the medium-term (5-15 years), to larger numbers of stealthy missiles with sophisticated countermeasures in the long-term (15+ years). However, major features of the long-term threat could materialise much sooner if the MTCR's handling of cruise-missile transfers does not improve, or if US-Russian and US-Chinese relations worsen to the extent that Moscow and Beijing increase missile sales. In either case, it is conceivable that modest numbers of stealthy cruise missiles with countermeasures, along with large numbers of converted kit aircraft or UAVs, could emerge in 5-10 years.
The Pentagon's Defense Planning Guidance states that capabilities are needed to defend against difficult-to-detect cruise missiles by 2010, and the services should be prepared to respond to an even earlier emergence of the threat. Yet US military services have made little progress in preparing defences. Each service is pursuing its own under-funded piecemeal efforts, which do not add up to an effective wide-area defence. Nevertheless, given enough funding and interservice cooperation, a fairly straightforward path to improved cruise-missile-defence readiness is discernible. The following challenges need to be addressed:
- Providing a single integrated air picture with a greatly improved capacity to distinguish friendly aircraft from enemy cruise missiles This requires the merging of various service BMC3 programmes to achieve interconnectivity among a disparate array of sensors and shooters. Key allies must be brought into such a common air picture.
- Improving the performance of airborne surveillance radars and missile seekers to restore the battlespace lost by virtue of low-observable, terrain-hugging LACMs New surveillance and fire-control sensors must eventually be deployed on airborne platforms, linked to surface-to-air and air-to-air missiles to create wide-area defence. Placing such sensors on elevated platforms – possibly including a mix of fixed-wing aircraft and cheaper but less capable aerostats (blimp-like balloons) – would permit surface-to-air missiles like the US Army's Patriot and US Navy's Standard to perform to their full potential range (100-150km), unhampered by the 25-35km limit imposed by their horizon-limited ground-based radars.
- Lowering the cost of air-defence interceptors needed to cope with large raids of low-cost cruise missilesModern interceptors like the Patriot cost several million dollars each, making for small inventories which must cope with not only ballistic- but cruise-missile threats. The best solutions lie with driving the cost of missile seekers down through new technologies and greater use of commercial parts.
- Acquiring warning-of-attack information and exploiting progress made in theatre air defences to facilitate homeland defence against cruise missiles The warning challenge is driven by the need to monitor ships embarking from ports of concern around the globe – a task that probably calls for a large constellation of spaced-based radars, which is unlikely to be available for some years. The national defence kill chain would not be qualitatively unlike that for theatre air defence, but because it would not depend on legacy surveillance platforms, its cost would be significant. One concept involving high-flying stratospheric airships for detection and target identification, and unmanned combat aerial vehicles (UCAVs) for basing interceptors, would probably cost around $30-40 billion to protect the entire US homeland. To appreciate the true potential costs of global missile defences, these outlays must be added to several billion dollars of additional investment in technological development that would be required before improved theatre cruise-missile defences become deployable.
Non-proliferation policy
Missile non-proliferation policy, as embodied in the MTCR, focuses almost entirely on controlling ballistic missiles. Insufficient is being done to correct deficiencies in the way in which MTCR member-states handle transfers of cruise-missile systems and technology.
Cruise missiles have several features that make it difficult to control their export under the provisions of the MTCR. Depending on payload and the amount and type of fuel used, a cruise missile's range can frequently be improved by a factor of five or more without altering its airframe and engine. Moreover, variations in cruise-missile flight profiles – especially taking advantage of more fuel-efficient flight at higher altitudes – can lead to substantially longer ranges than the cruise-missile manufacturers advertise. Confusion over determining the range and payload capability of cruise missiles threatens the MTCR's basis for controlling direct transfers of highly advanced cruise missiles that clearly possess range and payload capabilities exceeding MTCR guidelines.
Prospects for controlling the spread of LACMs hinge above all on strengthening the MTCR's provisions in the following ways:
- Establishing and implementing a uniform set of ground rules for determining the range and payload of cruise missiles and UAVs.
- Imposing tighter controls on stealthy cruise missiles and countermeasure technologies designed to enhance cruise-missile penetration.
- Undertaking a review of the impact on existing MTCR provisions of unarmed UAVs and armed UCAVs, whose numbers are expected to grow dramatically over the next two decades.
- Examining flight-control systems for very light kit aircraft and jet engines just exceeding current MTCR thrust limits to determine whether they should be subjected to case-by-case reviews.
Without significantly greater consensus between MTCR members on the dangers of cruise-missile proliferation, the cruise-missile threat is likely to emerge not only to jeopardise US and allied security but also to increase greatly the true costs of global missile defences.
Characteristics of selected LACMs |
System | Country | Range | Payload | Status |
| | (km) | (kg) | |
Hong Niao-1 | China | 400-600 | 400+ | In service |
Apache | France | 140+ | 530 | Dev |
Storm Shadow | France/UK | 350+ | 400+ | Dev |
L-29 | Iraq | 600 | 200 | In service1 |
Kh-55 (AS-15) | Russia | 3,000 | 450 | In service |
Kh-65 | Russia | 500 | 410 | Dev |
Tomahawk | US | 1,000-2,500 | 450 | In service |
1 converted manned aircraft
Missile Technology Control Regime Established 1987 by G-7 states Membership 33, with several 'adherents' Aim Seeks to limit proliferation of rockets, UAVs and related technologies capable of carrying a 500kg warhead for at least 300km. In 1993, guidelines extended to include missile delivery systems capable of carrying biological and chemical warheads Legal force The regime is politically binding only and not part of a legal treaty regime. Members unilaterally implement the agreed export control standards |
