The Dongfeng (East wind) 21D "carrier-killer" missile, which threatens to reshape the balance of power in the western Pacific, has been the subject of much speculation after a stray mention last week in a Communist party newspaper ignited excitement among China defence watchers.
 

The defence ministry in Beijing has been notably silent on the missile, other than to confirm in 2011 that it was in development. Western defence experts estimate that it has a range of 1,550km and that it may be able to travel at up to 10 times the speed of sound — faster than anything that could intercept it.

Like an intercontinental ballistic missile, the DF-21D goes into orbit, but after re-entering the atmosphere it manoeuvres on to a target, making it theoretically capable of landing a large warhead on or near a moving ship. China can also make about 1,200 of them for the price of a single aircraft carrier, meaning the missiles could easily overwhelm defensive countermeasures.

Some analysts say such missiles threaten to consign aircraft carriers — which form the basis of current US naval strategy — to the dustbin, just as aircraft carriers themselves did to battleships with Japan's 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor.