The senior management of the US Air Force recently spoke out on the development of Chinese Air Force , exaggerating the "China Air Force threat theory". This week, Admiral Wellsbach, commander of the U.S. Pacific Air Force Command, said that the expansion of the Chinese Air Force fighter fleet surprised him, clearly surpassing the U.S. military's previous forecast for the development of the People's Liberation Army's military strength. According to the intelligence assessment of the Chinese Air Force by the US Department of Defense, the Chinese Navy and Air Force is actively accelerating the equipment of stealth fighter , especially the new generation of stealth fighters represented by J20 and J35, which will significantly enhance the strength of the fourth-generation aircraft fleet of the Chinese Air Force. For the Chinese Air Force, combat power will show a surge. The stealth aircraft developed by China has high maneuverability, stealth characteristics and built-in bomb bay, as well as advanced avionics and sensors. It can provide enhanced situational awareness, advanced radar tracking and target positioning capabilities in air combat, and the threat cannot be underestimated.
Now the J-20 fighter jets have complete combat power in all units of the PLA Air Force . The J-20 fighter jets have now begun regular combat readiness cruises over the East China Sea and South China Sea . This represents the combat readiness capabilities of China's stealth fighter jet troops, and the J-35 fighter jets will also be immediately equipped with the PLA's naval aviation troops.
U.S. Air Force top leader and Chief of Staff General Brown also publicly stated that the speed of modernization of the Chinese Air Force is worth paying attention to. Brown said that although the development of the Chinese Air Force is not a big fuss, it is worrying that the development speed of the Chinese Air Force is unimaginable, and it even leads the U.S. Air Force. This is a big problem. If the U.S. Air Force does not continue to make the speed of modernization of Air Force continue to exceed the Chinese Air Force and maintains its lead, then I will suffer from insomnia every day. In terms of conventional fighter jets, it is obvious that the Chinese Air Force's speed of receiving and installing more than that of the US military. After all, large factories such as 112 and 132 have fully opened fire. In recent years, the production of new fighter jets has increased year by year, and the Air Force has received new aircraft. The update speed of conventional fighter jets in the United States has basically stagnated. At present, no other conventional fighter jets have been put into service except for the F-15EX project. The US Air Force will basically only accept F-35 fighter jets in the future. The replacement of conventional fighter jets has actually come to an end.
However, in terms of stealth aircraft, the Chinese Air Force is much worse than the US military in total. Now the Chinese Air Force has hundreds of J-20 fighter jets, most of which are new aircraft produced within one year. Although it is less than the nearly 500 F-22/F-35 fighter jets of the US military, the expansion speed of China's stealth fighter jet force cannot be underestimated. Now the US military has stagnated due to the failure of F-35 and the production of China's parts problems. Large batches of F-22 fighter will also be retired, and the high cost will make the US military unable to support it. The US military intends to use the cost of the F-22 fighter after its retirement to develop the sixth-generation fighter jet. The US military will popularize the comprehensive installation of new sixth-generation aircraft in the 2030s.
General Mike Kelly, head of the US Air Combat Command, said that China began to build sixth-generation aircraft as early as 2019, and research and development has begun. In the future, China's fifth- and sixth-generation aircraft will be the biggest opponents of the US military. Chinese fighter jet designers have adopted an iterative approach that allows them to bridge the technological gap between generations of aircraft, from the old Sukhoi jets that rely on Russian design to more advanced domestic self-developed models.
For example, China has evolved into a domestic J11B, and finally developed to an J16, which is more advanced than the original Russian fighter jet. That is, to use the introduction-imitation-innovation method to enhance the technical indicators of the country's fighter jets, so as to achieve a model that completely surpasses imitation. On this basis, the technology of China's advanced fighter jets has reached one of the most advanced levels in the world in a short period of time.
However, although senior U.S. Air Force leaders have expressed concerns about the update and iteration of the Chinese Air Force and air force, one thing to understand is that the focus of the US military's development has shifted from conventional fighter jets to stealth fighter jets. Some conventional fighter jets such as F-16 and F-15 early models have long been discontinued. The most important thing now is to ensure the production of stealth aircraft, such as the F-35 and subsequent sixth-generation aircraft projects.
The Chinese Air Force has not yet made this progress. Although the Chinese Air Force's stealth aircraft replacement speed is not slow, the main thing that occupies the majority is the update and iteration of conventional fighter jets within the Air Force. After all, the Air Force is large in scale, and the technical differences between fighter units are large in span. For example, some air force brigades are equipped with J7 fighter , while some air force brigades are equipped with J20 stealth fighter . Therefore, the PLA is currently using more conventional advanced fighters to replace the PLA's old conventional fighter jets, such as new fighters such as J10Ch, J16, and J11BG. The comprehensive modernization of the conventional fighter fleet of the US Air Force was earlier than that of the Chinese Air Force, and it was basically equipped with advanced fourth-generation aircraft, so they are now mainly replacing more advanced stealth aircraft and upgrading some fourth-generation aircraft at the same time.
Therefore, from this perspective, although the Chinese army has a faster modernization speed than the US military, it is on conventional fighter jets. In terms of the number and speed of stealth fighter aircraft, there is still a big gap between the People's Liberation Army and the US military. From this perspective, it is not realistic for us to surpass the United States in the short term, and we still need to redouble our efforts in the field of national defense construction.
