US plans massive upgrade of Guam's air defence to deter potential attack by China

A significant upgrade to Guam’s missile defences is planned, strengthening US military installations there against potential Chinese and North Korean strikes.

According to USNI News, the Pentagon is starting the process of supplying Guam with a persistent missile defence system that offers 360-degree coverage against Chinese and North Korean missile threats.

The road-mobile AN/TPY-6 four-sided phased array radar for integrated air and missile defence, connected to a disassembled Aegis Ashore on the periphery, is mentioned in the USNI study.

Vice Admiral Jon Hill, director of the US Missile Defence Agency, told the Senate Armed Forces Committee that environmental reviews for more missile defence sites are in progress, according to the report. According to Hill, the buildings will be built to offer many layers of defence against simultaneous cruise, ballistic, manoeuvring, and hypersonic attack.

In a July 2021 article for The Warzone, Joseph Trevithick mentions that it could be feasible to add some of the Aegis Ashore system to the expansive Anderson Air Force Base. Trevithick also makes reference to the possibility of constructing an underground bunker near the southernmost point of Guam, with interceptor missiles being launched from openings in the hillside.

The Terminal High Altitude Air Defence (THAAD) system and neighbouring warships that are outfitted with Aegis will be complemented by the future Aegis Ashore site.

The sheer number of systems, though, could be problematic, according to researchers.

Guam has a perfect air and missile defence problem, writes Chris Gordon in a March 2023 article for Air & Space Forces Magazine. He cautions that integrating fragmented missile defence systems might not be successful against adversaries using a variety of cutting-edge weapons to exploit Guam’s defences, such as drones, cruise missiles, ballistic missiles, and hypersonic weapons.

Guam’s missile defence is problematic, according to Harry Harris, who points out in a July 2021 piece for Breaking Defence that unlinked systems and fixed sensor-to-shooter combinations threaten failure at first contact with an adversary carrying sophisticated missiles.

Harris adds that in order to resist hypersonic threats, tremendous sensor integration across multiple domains, including cyber and space, is required due to the sheer volume of missiles fired in a saturation attack.

Additionally, he claims that Aegis Ashore has very modest defences against low-flying cruise missiles, though an upgraded model has a cutting-edge command and control system to engage other platforms.

The DF-26, China’s first ballistic missile with a 4,000-kilometer range to target Guam, and the Hwasong 14 and 15, both of which have a 4,500-kilometer range when shot at a normal trajectory, are examples of so-called “Guam killer” missiles used by China and North Korea.

China may now be able to place Guam within hypersonic attack range of its navy and air forces, in addition to hitting Guam with ballistic missiles.

The Shandong carrier battlegroup of China, which might have threatened US forces with air and ship-launched hypersonic missile attacks, was said to have come within 600 to 700 km of Guam by The Warzone last month.

The Shandong battlegroup may have been sent out to demonstrate China’s ability to flank Taiwan from the south and prevent US forces stationed in the Philippines from receiving resupply and reinforcement from Guam in addition to posing a danger to Guam.

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