At the Zhuhai Air Show in 2016, my country exhibited the Hongqi-22 air defense missile system for the first time. However, this air defense missile uses radio commands and semi-active radar guidance, and cannot be launched vertically. Therefore, it not only could not satisfy the appetite of the majority of military fans, but also questioned why our army had already equipped the Hongqi-16 with more advanced performance, but also created a low-end air defense missile like the Hongqi-22. In fact, the answer to this question is very simple, because the tasks undertaken by Hongqi-22 and Hongqi-16 are completely different, so there are also differences in design ideas and indicators.
Hongqi-22 is a mobile medium-high-altitude and medium-range surface-to-air missile weapon system. Its mission is to replace the Hongqi-2 and Hongqi-12 currently in service in my country, and to undertake the important air defense tasks, so the Hongqi-22 is mainly used by the Air Force Air Defense Force. The Hongqi-16 was originally a medium- and short-range regional air defense missile developed for the Navy, so it was first equipped with a Navy 054A missile frigate. At the same time, the Hongqi-16 took into account the design ideas of common sea and land during the development process, and its actual combat performance was also very excellent, so the Army also favored it very much. Its land-based model, Hongqi-16A, was assigned to the Army Group Air Defense Brigade for use as a companion air defense. In terms of the tasks undertaken, the Hongqi-22 undertakes air defense tasks at important locations, while the Hongqi-16A undertakes air defense tasks with maneuverability. In terms of military services, Hongqi-22 is mainly used by the Air Force, while Hongqi-16A is mainly used by the Army.
In my country's air defense system, the Hongqi-22 is a cost-effective air defense missile that forms a high and low combination with the Hongqi-9. In fact, the predecessor of the Hongqi-22 can be traced back to the famous Sam-2 air defense missile . Our army developed the Hongqi-12 based on Sam-2, which is later the Hongqi-2 air defense missile , and also developed the Hongqi-22 based on the Hongqi-12. The biggest feature of Hongqi-22 is that it uses a mobile military truck transportation and launch platform, and uses a four-unit vehicle-mounted launch cylinder. However, Hongqi-22 does not use the very popular vertical launch technology at present, and still uses an inclined launch method, which makes Hongqi-22 not only reduce the design difficulty and save manufacturing costs in both design and elastic body manufacturing. The Hongqi-22 uses a multi-function three-coordinate phased array radar, which undertakes the search and guidance tasks of the air defense system . At the same time, this radar also has the ability to backward compatible with Hongqi-12 and Hongqi-2.
Hongqi-22 adopts a guide method of radio command and semi-active radar. However, as a modern air defense missile, the Hongqi-22 adopts a command dual-mode guidance system throughout the process, and has the ability to operate all-weather and combat under complex electromagnetic environment . The range of the Hongqi-22 can reach 80 to 100 kilometers and the shooting height is 50 to 27,000 meters. It can form an air defense system with high and low range relay with the Hongqi-9 equipped by my country. And because it uses tilt launch, radio command and semi-active radar guidance, the missile is very low-cost. This year, our army dispatched 18 air-20 flights to Serbia to deliver the FK-3 (Hongqi-22 Foreign Trade Edition) air defense system. At the reception ceremony, Serbian President Vucic publicly stated that the FK-3 air defense system is several times cheaper than the same type of air defense system in other countries.
Since Hongqi-22 is responsible for air defense tasks at the important site, it is mainly deployed on fixed air defense positions. The design does not emphasize the ability to quickly expand, which is very different from the Hongqi-16A equipped by the Army. Hongqi-16A is equipped with the air defense brigade directly under the Group Army, and undertakes mobile air defense tasks. Although it also needs to be deployed in certain required air defense positions, due to its maneuvering combat attributes, Hongqi-16A emphasizes the rapid expansion ability in design, with the deployment time of about 12 minutes and the withdrawal time of about 6 minutes.
Hongqi-16A adopts a vertical generation method, has omnidirectional emission capabilities, is more flexible to use and has a shorter reaction time.Moreover, the layout of the Hongqi-16A's launch vehicle is very interesting. Unlike traditional missiles installed in the storage and transportation launch cylinders, every three storage and transportation launch cylinders of the Hongqi-16A are fixed on one unit frame. A launch vehicle is equipped with two unit frames, that is, 6 rounds of ammunition. When the launch is completed, the launch unit frame only needs to be disassembled and replaced as a whole. In other words, the Hongqi-16A can replace 3 rounds of bullets at one time, which is very different from the traditional launch vehicle that can only replace one round at a time. This design can greatly improve the replacement speed, which is a very important performance in the Army's accompanying air defense.
Although the guidance method of Hongqi-16A is roughly the same as that of Hongqi-22, both adopting guidance methods of instruction guidance plus semi-active radar guidance, since Hongqi-16A emphasizes the ability to resist saturation attack , Hongqi-16A uses a semi-active search interruption system, and our army has also upgraded and launched Hongqi-16B equipped with active seekers, further improving the multi-target interception capability. Since the Army version of Hongqi-16A\B is equipped with the Group Army Air Defense Brigade and performs maneuvering and air defense tasks, according to the fact that the Group Army's deployment range does not exceed 20 to 40 kilometers, the range of Hongqi-16A\B is only 50 to 70 kilometers, which is far smaller than the 100 kilometers of Hongqi-22. However, the minimum range and shooting height of Hongqi-16 are better than that of Hongqi-22. And due to the nature of the mobile phone with air defense tasks, the reliability requirements for Hongqi-16A\B are higher.
Obviously, while my country is equipped with the Hongqi-16, it also has the Hongqi-22. There is no problem, because the two equipment undertakes different tasks. The Hongqi-22 is mainly equipped with the Air Force Air Defense Force, which undertakes air defense tasks at important locations, while the Hongqi-16A\B is equipped with the Army Air Defense Force, which undertakes mobile air defense tasks. In fact, these two missiles can also be connected in range, so there is no situation where these two missiles affect each other and overlap each other.
