Recently, CCTV media exposed the scene of the elite "Wang Hai Brigade" equipped with J-20. However, the J-20 is already commonplace for us, and what is even more novel is the fort-type constant temperature hangar located behind the right side of the screen and occupying a lot of screens. For the troops equipped with the J-20, such a thick aircraft fort is indeed novel: When did the J-20 also use such aircraft fortress?
In fact, this machine castle has a big background. According to public information, the height of the J-20 is 4.69 meters, the thick gate of the hangar is at least 5.5 meters or even more. Note: Unlike other countries, the vertical tail windows specially set up to reduce the opening area and increase the strength of the hangar door, this door directly adopts a two-piece side-opening design. This shows that this aircraft fort was specially prepared for twin-engine heavy fighter jets like the J-20. But at this moment, this door seemed so small to us: in fact, it was because the dome of the Machine Castle was too high!
CCTV report
According to the proportion, the dome of this machine castle is at least 4 meters thick. Considering that it is also mixed with other materials besides reinforced concrete, it is basically equivalent to immunizing most vertical strikes. Although it is not required to withstand the precise navigation bomb of " gem road ", at least it cannot be penetrated by other ordinary navigation bombs and ground strikes missiles . The concept of
Machine Fort was born in 1967 The Third Middle East War . The Israeli Air Force raided Egyptian Air Force Base during the war, but the latter's fighter was neatly placed on the open-air apron without any protection. In just one morning, the Israeli Air Force started a massacre, and the Egyptian Air Force basically lost its combat effectiveness on the ground.
After this battle, many people realized the importance of the machine castle. Unlike large underground hangars built along the mountain, ordinary hangars only have a thin layer of metal skin on the top to protect themselves from wind and rain, which can be penetrated by aerial cannons and shells. However, under normal circumstances, there will be no very large mountains near military airport . The exposed aircraft fortress on the top has gradually become the standard configuration for front-line air force base fighters.
In order to prepare for the battle, these machine castles generally adopt a nearly semicircular design, which can evenly disperse the top stress. In addition to considering conventional ground strikes, the design of the fortress also takes into account the survival of nuclear war conditions: for this reason, the fortress generally has three defense capabilities. Although it does not directly withstand the strikes of nuclear bombs, it can also ensure that the hidden personnel and fighter jets inside are not affected by nuclear radiation and dust.
At the same time, the machine castle is generally equipped with charging, oxygen refueling, fueling devices and simple debugging devices to ensure that the fighter can be put into combat immediately after the internal preparation is fully prepared. When all countries equipped the fifth-generation fighter , a problem was discovered: the maintenance time of the fifth-generation fighter is obviously longer than that of the traditional fourth- and a half-generation fighter. The delicate stealth coating or film of
fifth-generation machine is the fundamental reason for its long maintenance time. Fighters must basically stay at the base except for overhauling the factory, and the aircraft castle must have a constant temperature system. Judging from the fact that Wang Hai Brigade has equipped the J-20 and upgraded the aircraft castle at the same time, the aircraft castle should have constant temperature facilities, so the daily maintenance of the J-20 can be fully realized in the aircraft castle.
And the equipment of the machine is indeed of great significance to the current Chinese Air Force . The J-20 stealth coating is also famous for its strong and durability. Fifth-generation aircraft around the world must set up constant temperature hangars, which seems "dispensable" to the J-20: Most of the J-20s exposed previously used grid hangars rather than constant temperature hangars, and as for the exposure of the Chinese Air Force Base, the Chinese Air Force Base, there are only a handful of exposures. In the J-10 Fort exposed in 2016, we did not find such a thick top layer of the J-20 Fort.
Considering the characteristics of the machine castle layout, it is generally 2 to 4 machine castles are deployed in one place, and so on. There is also a taxiway connection between the fort and the main taxiway, which is quite dispersed and concealed.This is completely different from the long striped hangars that can be seen on satellite , and it is much more resistant to strikes. However, because of these, the cost of building a machine box is not the same as that of a hangar: the burial of ventilation ducts, , circuits, oxygen supply pipes, oil pipes and other equipment all require extremely high prices.
Even when interviewing Wang Hai Brigade in 2021, Wang Hai Brigade still used a garage of the garage. As mentioned above, the defense ability cannot withstand the penetration of artillery shells. In just one year, we can see that the unit was upgraded from the hangar to the fort during two short TV exposures. The significant upgrade occurred in such a short period of time, which fully proved the urgency of preparation.
In the comprehensive exercise and training in the Taiwan Strait in August, both the J-20 and J-16 equipped by the Wang Hai Brigade and Du Fengrui Brigade were launched. The main combat direction of Wang Hai’s brigade is clearly pointing to the Taiwan Strait, and to the point of view, the troops on the southeast coast of the Chinese Air Force have made sufficient preparations for the military reunification operation. In the future, not only will more aircraft fortresses appear, but the strong combat effectiveness of the Chinese Air Force will also be demonstrated in front of the masses.
In military unification operations, the Taiwanese puppet army naturally could not have weapons that could smash through the top of the machine fort. According to the current equipment of the Taiwan puppet army, they have at most 1,000 pounds of unmanned navigation missiles or "Xiongsheng missiles", but these two basically do not have the ability to drill and strike, so they cannot threaten the J-20 fighter jets in the fort. What's more, Wuhu, Anhui is at least 400 kilometers away from the coastline of Fujian, China, and it has been considered a "second-tier airport".
Referring to the "Taiwan Lock Military Exercise" in August, the Chinese Navy and Air Force is fully confident that it would seize complete air supremacy at the beginning of the military reunification operation. It is impossible for fighter jets to go deep into the inland to drop bombs; even the possibility of ground cruise missile forces being able to launch missiles is slim. If there is an cruise missile that can be launched first, then cruise missiles flying deep into the inland also need to break through several layers of defense circles composed of air defense missiles, etc. If the construction of these aircraft forts is directly interpreted as "prepared for any trouble", it would be too far-fetched.
However, the reason why Wang Hai's brigade's machine fortress left such a great amount of redundancy is probably that in addition to dealing with the "Xiongsheng missile" of the Taiwan puppet army, its real purpose is to deal with the intervention of US and Japan long-range strike forces. After all, the airport faces not only the Taiwan Strait, but also East China Sea , or the East China Sea is their real main battlefield. Generally speaking, when a war breaks out, your own airport is also an important target of the enemy's primary strike.
Taiwan and Japan may not have such powerful ground strike weapons, but this does not mean that the United States does not. However, what the aircraft castle really faces is not a ground-based bomb like GBU-28. Although this type of ground-based bomb has a maximum drilling depth of 7.2 meters, its range is only 22 kilometers. Just think about it, it is unlikely that any fighter can project such missiles into the territory for more than 300 kilometers. However, the key is that the Taiwan puppet army has placed an order for the "Haimas" rocket launcher , and will purchase "Army Precision Missile" with a maximum range of more than 500 kilometers in the future; the US military's "Tomahawk" cruise missile must not be underestimated in terms of equipment quantity and performance, which is the fundamental reason for upgrading the aircraft fort in just one year.
The main equipment of the Taiwan Army's "Haimas" rocket launcher is more than 800 "Army Precision Missiles", supplemented by 29 launch vehicles, which have short preparation time and are extremely flexible in combat. Although the "Tomahawk" cruise missile is not directly launched from the US military's warship and military aircraft to China, the US AGM-88 anti-radiation missile has appeared on the battlefield of Russia and Ukraine. There are many things that the US military can do to "show the lower limit". We cannot rule out the possibility that the US military will provide information and intelligence support, technology, engine and other components required for the long-range missile to the Taiwan military in the future.
Overall, if you only need to face the front line of the Taiwan Strait, the design of the fortress may not be so thick, or the fortress will only be seen in a small number of military bases . But the southeast coast is not only considering military unification operations, but also potential risks of US-Japan intervention. So the protection of the Fortress at this time must be quite solid. Ukraine can still launch a strike on Russia through various means, so we naturally should not be careless and underestimate the enemy. After all, the cost of the J-20 is also quite high and it is impossible to afford it.
