We Are Watching China Become an Air Force Superpower

Key Points and Summary – China’s airpower has entered a startling new era, moving beyond its history of copying Russian designs and stealing U.S. technology to producing a flurry of unique, indigenous combat aircraft.

-In the last year, several new variants and at least three truly new, tailless fighter concepts have appeared.

China J-20 Fighters. Image Credit: Weibo.

-While the exact purpose of these secret programs remains a mystery, two facts are clear: China is now innovating independently, and it currently has more new aircraft types in development than the rest of the world combined, raising a critical question about whether the West can keep pace.

China’s Air Force Is Rising Fast 

WARSAW, POLAND – Beginning in December 2024, the world has been introduced to several new combat aircraft that were manufactured, as well as designed, in the People’s Republic of China (PRC).

The latter point is important because since the 1990s, PRC fighters and other military aircraft have been either copies of Russian designs, or there were major sections of the aircraft having not been designed in the PRC (as in the wings of the Y-20 transport/C-17 lookalike that were designed by Antonov in Ukraine), or were otherwise inspired by Russian designs.

Then there is the J-35A/B model fighter aircraft. Both the land-based “A” model and the carrier-capable “B” configuration bear a remarkable resemblance to the US F-35 design. The most significant difference is that this Chinese aircraft is powered by two engines in the class of the US GE F414 engine rather than a single, higher thrust engine with GE F110 performance, as in the case of the F-35.

In 2016, a Chinese national named Su Bin, who was living in Canada, was convicted of stealing classified data on the F-22 and F-35 programs, translating the material into Chinese, and then selling it to entities in the PRC to support their military R&D programs. He had also made numerous trips to the US to interact with hackers and other sources.

“Su assisted the Chinese military hackers in their efforts to illegally access and steal designs for cutting-edge military aircraft that are indispensable to our national defence,” said John Carlin, assistant attorney general for national security, who spoke to the media after the conviction.

What Do The New-Generation Chinese Fighters Tell Us

But the new designs we have seen from Chengdu Aerospace (CAC) and the adjoining Aircraft Plant No. 132, or the Shenyang Aircraft Works (SAC), are distinctly unique design concepts. The configurations of these aircraft appear to be a first in that they have been developed by engineering teams working without any foreign “inspiration.”

J-20 Stealth Fighter. Image Credit: PLAAF.

In a recent long report published by Shephard Media, one analyst looks at the new PRC designs and asks if Western analysts are drawing the correct conclusions. Is there an accurate interpretation of what the latest technologies demonstrated by these new fighters reveal about their industry, and why they were created in the first place?

There is more than one angle to the topic of what may or may not be happening with the Chinese aerospace sector. One fact that the report highlights is that “someone in Beijing is releasing money,” which may be the largest tranche of funding allocated to the PRC’s military programs in recent years.

Keeping the major defense enterprises busy and financially solvent has always been a major objective of the central planners in the PRC system, but this is not the only reason for the sudden appearance of so many new design types. Most of the Chinese defense industrial companies I have interacted with over the years have consistently described the same situation.

They say that they are frequently under pressure to develop more foreign markets so that they are not entirely dependent on procurements from the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) and become more self-supporting. So why is the PLA now turning around and spending more money on them instead of less?

There are also debates within the PLA as to which type of aircraft is more needed than others, and the different defense enterprises are also usually competing with one another for funding. But almost none of these arguments ever see the light of day in the pathologically secretive PRC.

The Major New Arrivals

Some of the “new” aircraft we have seen in the past nine months are more like “new and improved” versions of older models rather than something that has never been flown before. The J-20, which first flew in 2011, finally flew a two-seat operational variant.

The J-15, which was copied from the Russian Sukhoi Su-33, was modified this year with a new forward fuselage and nose gear to enable catapult launch capability. This fighter is now designated J-15T, and in parallel, there is another new variant that is the J-15DT – an electronic warfare version that would be the PLAN’s answer to the US EA-18G Growler.

China J-20 Mighty Dragon Fighter. Image Credit: Creative Commons.

But the real curiosities are the Chengdu J-36 and Shenyang J-50/J-XDS that both flew on Mao Zedong’s birthday on 24 December 2024 – both tailless designs with no vertical control surfaces. A third variant of the latter that flew in August of this year may be powered by two engines and also features a new, variable geometry wing.

The question remains if these aircraft are final configurations that will then enter serial production once their design is validated. Or are they competing concepts for the same mission, and only one of them will end up being built in large numbers? Or is one or more of them an “X-plane” platform that is designed to validate a specific design concept or technology?

None of this is knowable now, but two facts are clear. One is that the PRC is no longer copying other nations’ designs. The other is that no matter what class or category of aircraft you mention, the PRC has more of that type in development than the rest of the world combined. Will the West be able to keep pace is another – and that is the biggest unknown of all.

About the Author: Reuben F. Johnson 

Reuben F. Johnson has thirty-six years of experience analyzing and reporting on foreign weapons systems, defense technologies, and international arms export policy. Johnson is the Director of Research at the Casimir Pulaski Foundation. He is also a survivor of the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. He worked for years in the American defense industry as a foreign technology analyst and later as a consultant for the US Department of Defense, the Departments of the Navy and Air Force, and the governments of the United Kingdom and Australia. In 2022-2023, he won two awards in a row for his defense reporting. He holds a bachelor’s degree from DePauw University and a master’s degree from Miami University in Ohio, specializing in Soviet and Russian studies. He lives in Warsaw.

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