C-701
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The C-701 is a Chinese missile that is roughly comparable to the American AGM-65 A/B/D/H Maverick air-to-surface missile, but it's smaller and weighs less than half of that of American AGM-65 A/B/D/H Maverick.
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[edit] Design
Although originally designed as an anti-ship missile, the missile was eventually developed into a air-to-surface missile that can engage various targets. When used as an anti-ship missile, its intended targets are boats with 180 ton displacement or less, such as missile or torpedo armed FAC, patrol boats, and gunboats.
There are two types of guidance: the Fire-and-forget mode and the command mode. The first type of guidance enables the aircraft/boats/vehicles to get out after launching, providing greater safety while the second type enables the operator to change targets after launching, or to terminate the attack if needed. The television seeker of the missile can be replacing by either an imaging infrared seeker or a millimetre-wave radar seeker.
[edit] History
The air-launched television guided version was the first to appear, while the surface launched version followed. The third version to appear was version with the imagining infrared seeker and after that, the version after that was the one with millimetre-wave radar seeker. Although the existence of the last two versions has been reported for a long time, it was not until the six Zhuhai Airshow held near the end of 2006 did these report have been officially confirmed by the Chinese government in public. All of the versions are offered for export.
[edit] Deployment
Unlike the American AGM-65 Maverick air-to-surface missile which is only launched from air, C-701 can be launched from various platforms from air (both fixed wing and rotary wing aircraft) and surface (which includes both land/vehicles and ships/boats), but the missile cannot by launched from submarines yet. When the missile is deployed on land and ships, the standard ground launcher is consisted of 4 rectangular box launching/storage containers with two atop the other two, and the entire 4-round launcher is fixed at 15 degrees evlevation. Two of such launchers form the backbone of the missile battery with a total of 8 missiles, with a total weight less than 2 tons.
