#1 Publicity shot. That's like two decades old. Between '87 and '88 China sold several dozen outmoded DF-3 missiles to Saudi Arabia, without their nuclear warheads of course.
China's DongFeng missile program was copied from the Soviet missile R-12. The first engine for the DF-1 missile was the 5D10, a $900m failure. When they were done knocking their tiny heads on steel, they again copied a russian design, the LA-350 'Burya'. This became the first YF-1. Liquid fuel based obsolete engine. The entire delivery system is outmoded now.
Their real MRBM is the DF-21, a modern solid fuel propelled non-nuclear capability system. US DoD estimates around 60 units in China. In 2014, America allowed the soddy's to go ahead and buy the DF-21 from China. By this time the AEGIS BMD was ready and functional, and the SM-3s had been deployed on all American ships. People think America trusts the Saudis a little too much. They don't. |