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| Phalanx CIWS WikI Info |
By James R. Holmes
I was taken aback by one of the questions that came my and Toshi Yoshihara’s way last week at the Center for the National Interest: isn’t China’s much-discussed DF-21D anti-ship ballistic missile (ASBM), an “easy” problem for U.S. Navy surface warships, which boast high-tech shipboard defenses like the Close-In Weapons System (CIWS)?
The gentleman who posed the question appeared especially taken with CIWS, a super-fast Gatling gun installed on board American and many allied combatants. And it’s certainly a nifty piece of technology, disgorging radar-guided projectiles at a rate of 4,500 rounds per minute. But impressive technology isn’t always superior. A CIWS magazine only holds enough rounds to sustain that rate of fire for about 20 seconds. More importantly, the system is aptly named. “Close-in” means an effective firing range of “a couple of miles” according to one open-source estimate. This is truly a last-ditch defense considering the hypersonic speed of the threat.
Read the full story at The Diplomat