China Secretly Sold Qatar Short-Range Ballistic Missiles
China secretly sold Qatar short-range ballistic missiles
(SRBMs). Qatar revealed the missiles and accompanying launch systems during its
2017 National Day parade on
Zachary
Keck - Dec 22, 9:40 PM
China secretly sold Qatar short-range ballistic missiles
(SRBMs).
Qatar revealed the missiles and accompanying launch
systems during its 2017 National Day parade on December 18. During the parade,
Qatari forces showed what appeared to be two Chinese-made SY-400 SRBMs, carried
on eight-axle transporter-erector-launchers. Qatar didn’t draw attention to the
missiles during the parade, and the first person to point them out [3]on social media
seems to have been Joseph Dempsey, a research associate at the International
Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS).
Although each pod can carry four SY-400 missiles, images
suggested that Qatar’s had been configured to hold a single BP-12A
missile, according to analysts [4], including Dempsey [5]. Since unveiling the system in
2008, China has consistently marketed the SY-400 system for export markets,
comparing it to Russia’s Iskander-E. During a 2012 international arms show,
officials from the China National Precision Machinery Import and Export
Corporation (CPMIEC) said the BP-12A [6] is capable of carrying a
480-kilogram warhead to ranges up to 280 kilometers. This is notable because
the Missile Technology Control Regime (MTCR) places its strongest restrictions
on exports of missiles that can carry a five-hundred-kilogram warhead for three
hundred kilometers.
Qatar’s new ballistic missiles did not go unnoticed in Saudi
Arabia, which is currently embroiled in a dispute with Doha. Al
Arabiya, a Saudi media outlet, promptly ran an article [10]denouncing the deal and
Qatar’s intentions. The article claimed, incorrectly, that the systems have
ranges of four hundred kilometers, “meaning that they are capable of striking
targets in Manama, Abu Dhabi, Dubai and Riyadh.” It also quoted Matthew Hedges,
a PhD candidate at Durham University, who also serves as an advisor to Gulf
State Analytics, a DC-based risk consultancy firm, as saying, “The official
unveiling of the offensively modified SY400 system with the longer range BP-12A
launchers illustrates a highly aggressive move on behalf of Doha.”
Theodore Karasik, who is also an advisor at Gulf State
Analytics, says in the Al Arabiya article that Qatar and China
began negotiating the deal for the SY-400 missile in 2014, after a number of
Gulf states withdrew their ambassadors from Doha. As with the current dispute
between the Qatar and other Arab states led by Saudi Arabia, the 2014 rift [11] was over claims that Qatar’s
foreign policy was too supportive of Iran and nonstate actors like the Muslim
Brotherhood. Karasik is also quoted in the article as saying that “Qatar’s
under the table dealings with China illustrates again that Doha is not to be
trusted.”
Of course, this is hardly the first time that China has
secretly sold ballistic missiles to a Middle Eastern country. In fact, Saudi
Arabia has been the recipient of a number of previous covert missile deals with
the Chinese. In the late 1980s, for instance, Saudi Arabia clandestinely
purchased DF-3 missiles from China, which the United States harshly criticized
because of fears that Saudi Arabia would use the missiles as a nuclear weapon
delivery system. Then, in 2014, Newsweek reported that [12] in 2007 China had secretly
sold Saudi Arabia the more powerful DF-21 ballistic missile. The DF-21 has a shorter
range than the DF-3s that Riyadh purchased in the 1980s, but it is believed to
have greater accuracy, making it far more useful for conventional strikes.
Regardless, the DF-21’s range of around 1,500 kilometers places it well above
the category 1 restrictions of the MTCR. In contrast to the DF-3 deal, the CIA
secretly sanctioned Saudi Arabia’s purchase of DF-21s.
For the most part, China has tried to straddle the fence
on Qatar’s dispute with the Gulf Cooperation Council. As a major energy
importer, Beijing has important interests in the Gulf. In fact, since 2004 it
has been engaged in negotiations for a free-trade agreement with the entire
GCC, which includes Qatar. The current dispute has reportedly put those talks
on hold.
Beijing also has important and growing ties with Qatar in
particular. News reports have said [13] that bilateral trade between
Beijing and Doha tripled to $11.5 billion between 2008 and 2013. Notably, last
year Qatar accounted for 19 percent of China’s liquefied-natural-gas imports.
That made Doha China’s second largest LNG supplier behind Australia.
Furthermore, the CIA estimates that in 2015 China was Qatar’s single largest
trade partner, although other organizations like the European Union say other countries [14] like Japan and South
Korea engage in more trade with Qatar than China.
Still, China’s interest in selling Qatar ballistic
missiles is probably less about any strategic ties and more about Beijing’s
broader desire to increase its arms exports. From 2012 to 2016, China grew its
share of global arms sales to 6.2 percent from 3.8 percent during 2007 to
2011, according to data [15] compiled by the Stockholm
International Peace Research Institute. While this still puts China far behind
the United States and Russia in total volume, it was by far the largest
increase of any of the top fifteen arms exporters.
Nonetheless, the sale of the SY-400 missiles underscores
the necessity of including China in any multilateral effort to slow the
proliferation of ballistic missiles in the Middle East, as Henry Sokolski and
Will Tobey recently proposed [16] in an article on the National
Interest.
Zachary Keck (@ZacharyKeck [17])
is a former managing editor of the National Interest.
Author
Qatar National Day Parade 2017: Full Military Assets
Segment
Published on Dec 15, 2017
SY-400 Short-range ballistic missile
The SY-400 is a short-range precision-attack ballistic
missile system. It was revealed in 2008. It might use technology of the Raytheon
RGM-165 or SM-4. This weapon system is intended for the export market. It is
proposed as an alternative to the Russian Iskander-E. China is calling it as a
guided artillery rocket system, hence it is not limited by 300 km range export
restrictions set by Missile Technology Control Regime.
SY-400 system has 8 containers
The SY-400 system has 8 containers with solid fuel ballistic missiles. Missiles are factory-fitted into these containers and can be stored for years and do not require additional maintenance. Missiles are launched vertically and have a range of about 400 km. The SY-400 can use different types of warheads.
SY-400 missile
Furthermore The SY-400 system can be configured to carry
2 pods with heavier DF-12A missiles (formerly known as M20). The DF-12A missile
has a range of 280 km and carries a 480 kg warhead. It is a downgraded export
version of the DF-12 ballistic missile, used by the Chinese military. The
DF-12A was specially designed to be just short of the 300 km range and 500 kg
payload in order to overcome export
restrictions set by the Missile Technology Control Regime (MTCR).
DF-12A missile
The launcher can be configured to carry one pod with four
SY-400 missiles and one pod with BP-12A missile.
One pod with four SY-400 missiles and one pod with BP-12A missile
The missiles are fitted with GPS/INS guidance system.
They are steered to the intended target in the initial flight phase by four
control surfaces and stabilizing fins. Missile uses low lowering rate to extend
the range. Multiple missiles can be aimed at different targets.
This weapon system is mounted on Wanshan 8x8
high-mobility wheeled launcher. The launcher vehicle has good cross-country
mobility and can go over all kinds of rough terrain.
The SY-400 is supported by a reloading vehicle, fitted
with a crane, which carries a full set of reload containers.
Source: military-today.com
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