DH-10 - Cruise Missile Guidance

Cruise Missile Guidance

The guidance system represents the most significant challenge for a long-range cruise missile programme. The proposed Chinese cruise missile is likely going to be equipped with a multiple guidance system with an inertial navigation system (INS), global positioning system (GPS), and terrain comparison (TERCOM).

China would require an extensive database of accurate topographic information to use terrain comparison (TERCOM) guidance. But TERCOM would probably be relatively ineffective in areas such as the South China Sea, which present few navigational reference points. Published reports suggest that GPS would initially be used as the primary guidance system, possibly to be supplemented subsequently with TERCOM.

The potential use of the American GPS system would render this system vulnerable to jamming of the unencrypted civil signal (CA code) from GPS satellites within view of the Chinese area of operations, or to local jamming and spoofing in the target area. Chinese cruise missiles could still find their targets using inertial navigation system (INS) technology, but without GPS updates they would be significantly less accurate.

It is likely that even if the US tried to deny GPS signals to China, the PLA's cruise missiles could still function via the Russian GLONASS, or in the future the European GALILEO navigation signals. China could also use its own “Compass Satellite Navigation System”, which would comprise five Geostationary Earth Orbit (GEO) satellites and 30 medium Earth orbit satellites to provide a global cover, but the compass navigation system only covers Asia, and part of the Pacific region right now. It will take approximately another five years to complete the whole system to have global coverage and compete with GPS.

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