Whether it is the development of a new generation of naval surface combat platforms, the procurement of large-scale platform aircraft for the Air Force, or the hypersonic missile gap that Americans discuss every day;

Since the Americans shifted their national strategy to great power competition in the Asia-Pacific region in the past two years, the U.S. military’s insufficient capabilities and backward equipment performance have always been a headache for the U.S. military; whether it is the development of a new generation of naval surface combat platforms or the large-scale air force The procurement of platform aircraft, or the gap between hypersonic missile that Americans discuss every day; the US military is feeling the conflict all the time between its current limited military investment capacity and its endless need to win.

In the past two days, the Assistant Secretary of the Air Force in charge of equipment procurement of the US Air Force has also begun to come forward to criticize the current very unreliable equipment research and development and procurement system of the US military, as well as the increasingly outrageous project development of defense contractors and the military-industrial complex . cost; according to him, the U.S. military now lags far behind the People's Liberation Army in the speed of new equipment development and procurement because of these problems in the U.S. military. Now our military's development speed of new equipment is almost five times faster than that of the Americans, and The equipment procurement cost is only one-twentieth of the U.S. military's projects with the same performance; according to his estimate, the U.S. military will quickly catch up with our country in all areas where it currently has inventory advantages, and will be comprehensively eliminated in high-tech weapons. Get rid of the gap.

Of course, judging from the full text of the comments made by the Assistant Secretary of the Air Force, the main purpose is to criticize the U.S. Congress, the department responsible for funding, for the current funding model that is quite unscientific and does not require a lot of funding for projects. In the early stages of R&D, Congress often procedurally grants too much funding. Although these fundings make early R&D faster, after the early R&D stage is successfully passed, they will fall into R&D difficulties due to lack of continued funding. ; In the end, because the research and development timeline was stretched, more funds had to be invested, and the project was even canceled after a large budget was spent. What he is talking about is actually a concrete manifestation that the entire military industry sector in the United States has lost its project R&D and management capabilities. However, this collapse of the R&D procurement system is enough to have a huge impact on the replacement of the US military. .

As the head of Air Force equipment procurement, he cited several examples himself. The Air Force's KC-46 tanker procurement is a bad project that the Air Force has faced in the past many years. In 2011, Boeing failed to pass Since winning the project bidding through unscrupulous means, it has already exceeded the budget by billions of dollars. The formation of combat effectiveness has been delayed for several years, but it has not yet been able to enter a fully usable state. There are also a number of equipment including the oil transmission system. The series of defects have not been resolved; you must know that this is a modernized tanker that uses a mature platform and mature technology, and is not developed from scratch; in comparison, our Yun-20 refueling machine started later and has a lower starting point. Several aircraft have been delivered and put into service, and they have also been deployed on many combat readiness missions.

As for the ARRW hypersonic missile that the U.S. Air Force has repeatedly tested and failed, either the engine cannot ignite or the missile cannot even detach from the pylon, then there is no need to complain. The money is not wasted. It has been delayed year after year, and the only one that has been successfully tested so far is the booster. It is still unclear whether it can slide. This can be regarded as a complete disgrace to the so-called military power status of the United States. Taking this as an example, a rough calculation of the current speed of equipment replacement by Americans will reveal that the complaints of the US military's own commanders are not exaggerated at all.

In the past few years, the U.S. Army has basically not had any particularly large or particularly successful replacement projects, so I will skip them for now. The Navy has basically been completely abandoned in the last ten years, and the new generation of ship projects are comprehensive. was cut off, and finally had to spend a lot of money to restart the mass production of the Burke-class destroyer, which was already quite backward in terms of technical performance and lacked room for improvement. As a result, it has not been built very smoothly to this day. It is hard for you to imagine that this is a The navy's military expenditure is about the same as that of our entire military. As for the air force, the Air Force Minister himself has complained a lot, so no further explanation is needed.

In comparison, what have we built in the past 10 years? Basically all the new generation platforms of sea, land and air fire are in service. The Navy's 052D, the Air Force's J-10C, 16 and 20 and various platform aircraft. The army's many main battle equipment have caught up with or even surpassed the level of the US military. More Representatives of the Navy's Type 055 and the Rocket Force's series of missiles are leading the U.S. military. It is no exaggeration to say that in the past period of time, our speed in developing and equipping new weapons was faster than that of the U.S. military last month.

The only thing worth mentioning is the Air Force's tactical aircraft fleet. The US military has indeed received more new-generation stealth fighters than us in the past few years; but that's it, but with our J-20 new With the completion of the production line establishment work and the old production line basically ending the ramp-up of production capacity and entering the stage of full-speed mass production, we also have the replacement speed of the fifth-generation machine that is no less than the US military's own F-35; and next year the US military will have Because of the supply chain problems Lockheed Martin is currently facing, it is preparing to reduce the scale of its aircraft procurement. For example, the Navy is only planning to purchase 9 F-35s next year, and the Air Force will also reduce the planned number. In the next few years, we will also reduce the speed of the installation of fighter jets. Achieving go-ahead is not an unrealistic idea.

Not to mention purchasing power. For the dock landing ship of the same size and similar performance, the US military’s cost is 10 times that of ours. If you look for such cases, you can find many cases; such as the US military’s new light tank. The cost of one vehicle is US$12 million, which is even more shocking. The U.S. military expenditure is several times that of our military. Whether it is the scale of equipment replacement procurement or the research and development of new technologies, our military has been left behind. This is actually a reflection of the serious lack of purchasing power of the U.S. military budget.

Every time it is mentioned that the purchasing power of the US military is insufficient, and the equipment purchase price is several times that of our military, there are always people who say that the US dollar can be as hard as it wants, and that the US military cannot be short of money. This is a common sense statement. Then the US military’s military expenditures will increase in the new year, and the Navy will We are still complaining that the equipment that can be purchased with much more military expenditure has become much less. Isn't it the result of printing money? Isn’t what the U.S. military is facing now is that it prints money until military expenditures rise, but the price of equipment rises faster, and the purchasing power of one year’s military expenditures is lower than the previous year?