What We Can Tell From China's ICBM Test

China’s decision to test an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) into the Pacific Ocean on 25 September 25 was unusual—but not very unusual, because the country has similarly tested shorter-range ballistic missiles over a variety of geographies.

Some possible explanations are geopolitical; another is simply that the armed services needed to demonstrate operational readiness.

The weapon deployed a dummy warhead that landed near French Polynesia in the Pacific Ocean.

Images from the test, first shared on the official WeChat account of the People’s Liberation Army, suggest there was no fixed launch pad on which the launch vehicle was placed. China’s newest ballistic missiles are carried in vehicles that transport them, erect them for firing and launch them (and are therefore called TELs).

The TELs also have an adaptive launch tube with an extendable rubber base that absorbs the force from the launch—again, substituting for a fixed launch pad.

Most advanced Chinese ICBMs would be designed for cold launch, so the tested missile need not have been a DF-41, even though most commentary assumes that it was of that type, which is China’s most modern. The missile could have been of the DF-31A type or the more advanced DF-31AG version.

Open-source research suggests the range of the missile was between 11,500km and 11,700km and that its landing site was about 800km from the French Polynesian city of Bora Bora. Since the range of the DF-31A and DF-31AG is estimated at 11,000-plus km and the DF-41’s between 12,000km and 15,000km, the tested missile could have been of any of those designs.

The test cannot have been exactly routine, since the last Chinese ICBM that flew into the Pacific, a DF-5, was launched 44 years ago. But China has often tested smaller missiles over long ranges. The key difference was that the latest test was announced as part of the training plan of the People’s Liberation Army Rocket Force, the service that operates ground-launched strike missiles.

That means the test was supposed to be a combat preparedness exercise. The rocket force’s performance was part of that; this was not just an equipment test by technicians from scientific departments of the Central Military Commission.

If reports of slackness and corruption in the rocket force are true, the service may be under unusual pressure to prove its competence.

Test-firing the ICBM could also have been intended to express China’s resolution in the face of worsening relations with other countries.

Meeting Philippine Foreign Secretary Enrique Manalo in Laos in August, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi expressed strong concerns over the placement of a US Typhon non-nuclear missile battery in the Philippines. US and Philippine officials confirmed on the day of the test that the Typhon battery would stay.

Another possible motivation for the test was US affirmation in July of its nuclear backing for the defence of Japan.

Could it be that a US ICBM test failure prompted China to do a test, just so it could show that, unlike the US, it could? Last year, the US had to abort a test over the Pacific of a Minuteman III ICBM due to ‘anomalies’ in the launch. In April 2020 the Chinese navy ostentatiously sailed an aircraft carrier past Taiwan while a US carrier was kept at Guam due to a Covid-19 outbreak.

With regional tensions simmering, demonstrations of Chinese missile capability may become more frequent.

Anushka Saxena is a staff research analyst covering China at the Indo-Pacific Studies Programme at the Takshashila Institution, Bengaluru.

This article appeared originally at The Strategist (ASPI).