You’ve probably heard the news on FoxNews or read online about the successful flight test of China’s stealth fighter, the J-20, which is a fighter meant to compete with the F-22.
It’s a little surprising that China is being so open about the J-20’s development considering how secretive they are about just about anything else, but then again, why not keep it secret?
One possible reason could be as a propaganda tool. Back in the days of the Cold War, the Soviet MiG-25 was developed as a Mach 3 fighter and touted as being superior to just about anything America had in the air. We developed the F-15 in response to this supposed threat and although the F-15 wasn’t quite as fast, it was a better dogfighter.
(A Russian defector handed us a Mig-25 later on and we discovered that although it could go Mach 3, it couldn’t do much of anything else.)
However, the Chinese are known to have better aircraft developers than the Soviets did, and the J-20, being larger than the F-22 and having a lot of the same capabilities, may really be a match.
Another possibility is as a war deterrent. Not necessarily that the J-20 is so much more superior to the F-22 that we wouldn’t dare go against them, but the fact that China is actually willing to disclose information about its development could be a show of good faith that they are not developing this fighter for sneak attacks against us.
Another possibility to consider is that things are still pretty hot politically in the Koreas, and if the North and the South actually start to butt heads there, the U.S. and China could wind up at opposite ends of the conflict. Could an F-22 actually see action against a J-20? I tend to doubt it.
But crazier things have happened.
We’ll be talking even more about the J-20 as more information becomes available. We’ll also be talking more about the latest developments of the F-35 and how YOU can get into the cockpit of one.
If you’re not already on the Afterburner Club, click here to get started on this exciting road onto the world of stealth fighters.
What do you think of the J-20? Do you think it’s a match for the F-22 or is China just blowing smoke? Why would China want to develop a stealth fighter?
Dave Eberhardt says
As you sugggest Ed, the quality of the J-20 may not be up to F22 standards … we know how difficult it is to produce a high quality fighter such as our own. But, it is a significant development as far as hardware goes.
One area in which we still excel at is in producing fighter PILOTS. No doubt there will be some Chinese pilots who are pretty capable, but I would dare say the vast majority of our pilots are of tremendous quality. I know this from having trained many student pilots during their pre-fighter pilot training phases.
I am confident that our men and women will have the upper hand vs other armed forces because of our superior training, systems, tactics, people, etc. I wonder if there is a Chinese version of the Afterburner Club? I doubt it!
Let the Chinese disclosure of the J-20 (and other disclosures) be a WAKE UP CALL to our Congress and President – DO NOT CUT BACK ON F-22 and F-35 production!
Bob Stambovsky says
If they were smart, they’d reverse engineer the F-23(the loser, but better than F-22).It’s hulk sat out here at Edwards for awhile. We-and good allies- need a cheaper F-35, but would have been well advised to develope a more capable F-20 Tiger shark (My friend was one of the test pilots who crashed in Korea) and buy 200 of them.
Truth is-most everything from now on will be remote controlled-safer than exposing a human to harm’s way.
I’ll see ya’ll at the El Centro airshow March 12th, and Yuma a week later.
Bob Stambovsky, USMC (ret.)
R&D Jet Warbirds
Semper Fi
google : N4XW for sites w/photo of Jet Provost T5
Anonymous says
If we did go to war with China for some reason you are right that our pilots would be better then theirs but they outnumber us 10 to 1 and they could produce more planes faster then we could.
Anonymous says
Honestly, can someone explain war between the US and China without MAD???
Dave Eberhardt says
war between China and US? yes, it’s happened before; google “Korean War” …
Maxwell says
According to the some of the articles I have read on the internet as well as other sources in hardcopies, the airframe of J-20 was a blend between the russian made Mig 1.44 and that of T-50, inaddition the forward fuselage, from the tip of the nose to the aft part of the cockpit, was influenced by F-22. The stealth material that’s been used on the airframe is the re-versed engineering of F-117 that was shotdown over Kosvo in 1999.