China baffles world with mystery bomber?

I think some people are missing the point. I did say in my first post, the H-8 is a real project. It is China's new strategic bomber. This is known.

BUT.......it is not stealthy AT ALL, it is a much modified H-6, as the article itself states. The H-6 was a copy of the Tu-16, all that about stealth, A-12's and B-2's is nothing more than mere propaganda.

Look at the FC-1 also on the video, it is technological equal to the Jaguar and Jurom Orao (which it resembles but has no relation to, being much bigger).

This is not 'underestimating' China, it is taking a realistic view of known technical capability and applying a reasonable to how far they can have realistically advanced beyond that.

Their MD-80 based regional jet, the ARJ-21, is a major achievement for their industry and has taken a long to reach fruition, Their major transport and AEW types under development are based upon the An-12. The L-15 trainer which is comparable to the M-346 is a high risk and long term development programme. The most advanced technology programme they have ever undertaken is the J-10 which is operationally at a similar stage in its life to the Typhoon and Raptor while its capability is only approaching that of the F-16A.

This is all good stuff and they have made massive strides because in the 1980's their most advanced plane was the MiG 19 based A-5 Fantan, today it is the J-10 which compares with early model F-16's, but they still have a very long way to go before they are capable of fielding a large and stealthy strategic bomber in the B-2 class.


[edit on 17-3-2008 by waynos]

Oh boy.

The Chinese and a new Stealth Bomber? I highly doubt that, but I suppose anything is possible right? I'm not sure how good Chinese espionage is, but at the moment we have no flipping idea what the US it self has as far as current stealth technology is concerned.

What we do know is, the B-2(designed in the 1980's) and the F-22A(designed in the late 1980's, vastly undergone design changes through the 90's to early millennium). Past that, we'd be going into UAV arenas and they probably have a competition for a new stealthy something, be it a transport, tanker, AWACs, whatever, we don't know, it's possible.

Whatever the Chinese get that's stealth at the moment, I'm sure we can all agree they're still behind the US, however they are making great stride in this industry and will eventually catch up, I don't think anyone should downplay the significance of that.

The Su-47 has been operational since 2004(I believe, when the S-37 designation changed to Su-47). No orders have been placed for mass production. It's about in the same situation as the Su-35. It's operational, but I don't think it exists in numbers past... 1 or 2 units.

Shattered OUT...

Then the Su-47 isn't operational. There are three recognised states for military aircraft, ISD (In Service Date, or the time that the aircraft is deployed to an operational squadron), IOC (Initial Operational Capability, or the time that the aircraft can fight at a basic level), and then FOC (Full Operational Capability, or the time that the aircraft realises its full potential, including weapon integration, tactics development, sensor connectivity etc).

Given that there hasn't been a single customer for the aircraft (including the Russians!), then you can't claim the aircraft to be operational.

I can claim all I want, I don't work for the industry!!

I'm only kidding, alright I didn't know that. I figured because Sukhoi considers the aircraft ready for export/sale to clients, that it would be operational, as far as a production line goes. By that I mean, if I put in an order tomorrow, they'd be able to fill it by the end of the year, or whatever time it takes to bring the line up to full speed.

Shattered OUT...

Operational has specific meaning to those in the business. I could jump in an Su-27 tomorrow, but wouldn't be operational. If Australia bought 2000 Su-30s, but no weapons, then the airframe would not be considered operational (for Australia). "Available for purchase" is the best you can say about the Su-47. It certainly isn't operational anywhere. Sorry if I'm being pedantic!

I think I'm applying a different context to the term as operational, which is where the confusion lies for me.

Shattered OUT...

the video is ridiculous, i don't doubt that the chinese are developing stealth... to say their not would be absurd, however the plane in the video looks like the bastard child of a B-2 and some drawings of the ever-elusive Aurora... to say this plane would be better than the B-2 is pretty insane even with the fact that its technology from 25 years ago.

raptor1

[edit on 3/18/08 by raptor1]

"An Indian born American citizen is alleged to have sold details of the B-2 bomber engine exhaust system to China."

"The Indian spy has also allegedly helped the Chinese to apply the technology."

"The Indian spy learned his secrets from working on the bomber 1968-1986 and is said to have made six secret trips to China since 1999 from Hawaii."

I think that pretty-much explains how China got the technology gentlemen. It's not good as the Chinese are working hard and fast to displace the USA in Asia starting with an attempt to takeover of Taiwan. This man gave them alot of info over several years about US Stealth technology.

[edit on 18-3-2008 by jetxnet]

Do you guys even read the thread? Or just flick through propaganda and base your conclusions on that?

www.youtube.com...

Yeah, a CG image, MUST be real. Wonder if the Aurora out of C&C: Generals is real, or for that matter, VTOLS from Crysis ???


This 'Stealth bomber', is nothing more than a modified Tu-16.





Waynos, is the ARJ-21 really that big of a deal? From what I hear, it was made from tooling left over from the tuckliner program. .. doesn't sound that great?

[edit on 18/3/2008 by C0bzz]

[edit on 18/3/2008 by C0bzz]

[edit on 18/3/2008 by C0bzz]

You can tell it is fake by the clouds in the background etc .. think most would agree.

It doesn't mean though that China doesn't have access to Stealth technology, which indeed they do (see my post above).

The bottom line is, our B2 Stealth is twenty+ year old technology, you know we have something much better now.

The Chinese are catching up fast though, because that huge trade imbalance with ChinaMart as the primary catalyst fueling that economy. Much like the US building Japan before WWII (everything made in Japan), we are making the same mistakes over again.

During the 1990s, China had field day raping the US of technology under the watchful vigilant eye of the Clinton administration (*coughs*). Good ole Bill really bent over for China, and the US is about to see some of the long-term national security damages caused by that administration.

well if true good on them but there still 50yrs behind

i really struggle to understand why anyone would want to show there hand in a dog eat dog world, anything in the public eye is in there because it has been counterd i.e its not as good as the hardware you dont know about, when thay release the so called new aircraft to be developed, there working on the counter for the releasd counter, so incase a war/world war comes along thay would go straight into development with the no1 more advanced aircraft, and let the enemy play catch up on 5 times more advanced craft,

nothing to worry about here moving on,

reply to post by jetxnet

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Links? Sources? Books? Anything?

Advanced Bomber program started in the sixties?

Shattered OUT...

[edit on 18-3-2008 by ShatteredSkies]

reply to post by C0bzz

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For China, yes. Their only similar domestic jet transport was the 707-derived Y-10 and only one of those was ever built with no hope of ever reaching service.

This time China actually hopes to market the plane commercially which would be a major first for them. Although the ARJ-21 is quite obviously a decendant of the DC-9 there has actually been quite a lot of development which means it is a new type, to all intents and purposes. Its not so much the plane itself that is the big deal, it is the move towards modernising the industry that it represents and China ambition to be competitive in future.

Shattered - ATB began in 1979.

Why is this "Chinese Propaganda"?. It wasn't even released or reported by China

Here is the proposed design



Why isn't it possible for China to build a stealth aircraft if America built one using 1980s technology

[edit on 18-3-2008 by chinawhite]

Personally i wouldn't bet against china, the way i see it is that they are in a similar position to the Japanese motorcycle industry in the mid/late 50's when every one said they couldn't compete with the British factories, and yet 15 or so years later they were the ones with the most advanced technology and the British were struggling to play catch up. And yes aircraft are more technologically advanced than motorcycles, but if you take into account that china has a far cheaper workforce than the US, the fact that the US is heading for a pretty major economic downturn that will take a long time to recover from, whilst china is still doing pretty well, and finally the fact that china potentially has gained access to US technology via espionage (given the recent stories of Chinese hacking attempts on western government sites) all of these could give china the chance to at least catch up with the US within a decade or so?

Do not forget China is a Communist nation simulating Western capitalism to build the economy. They still keep tabs on 96% of their population and everything is censored through the 'Great firewall of China' going in and out of the country.

Their strategic moderization objective is to compete with America economically and militarily. Thanks in part mainly to ChinaMart in America, they are building up like a Snowball going down a melting hill.

Thanks to Bill Gates for allowing rampid software piracy of MS products in China, and having the wherewithall to have the Chinese President over for dinner to ask him to crack down on this (lol, yeah, China is dong just that a year later).

Thanks to Dodge for setting up shop so that China can learn how to assemble cars. Chinese companies have already replicated several US products and put a different label on them selling them cheaper to other nations and their own people.

China also places large tariffs on our exports to China making them mor expensive while we do not and have not.

All of these things decrease the US dollar. Not to mention, the booming Chinese economy is placing a large demand on Oil, thus increasing demand and favorable marketing by Arab countries.

China is also buying up many companies in Canada and Mexico. The US asked Canada not to sell 80% of the Canadian airline corps. shares (Canada Air) to China. In Canada, the companies have much greater influence in that government's decisions.

So to say China is twenty years behind is ignorant, if not stupid or one in the same. They are 5 or so, but no more. They can shoot satellites of the sky from the ground thanks to US technology given to them by the Clinton administration.

If you consider PPP accounts, China probably spends more than America on research

They usually deflate the numbers as to not warrant any concern by Western countries. Last year, they spent around 160 billion on the military, usually 30% of their GDP, more than any other country.

The whole idea is to bide their time while building up and then go after Taiwan. They must not feel quite ready yet, but rest assured, they are going to try (as they stated publicly several times as well).

What can you expect? Alot of purchasing of Russian weapon systems and Agesis-like destroyers. Their domestic programs are for long-range warfare. The short-range are mostly Russian based weapons like the SU fighter planes, tanks and battleships. Amphibious short-range shallow water vehicles for taking Taiwan by beachhead. Several submarines, and AWACS capability.

In terms of C4 command and control operations, not there yet by any stretch, but don't need it for Taiwan. They believe that by sinking a US aircraft carrier, the US people will urge the President to back out of the conflict in defending Taiwan.

For this reason, they have the Sunburn nuclear missles on that come with the Russian Soveremenny destoyers. The counter for this missle by the US was stopped by the Clinton administration in the 1990s.

As much as I hate to admit being wrong...

The more I sniff around at it , I feel that this is very unlikely to be a modernisation program on the H-6/TU-16. It appears they had the opporutnity to do that back in the 70s with some Spey Mk-512s, a la HS Trident, however decided against it as the performance was comparable with the B-47, by then a bit too old school.

This then leads one to look at China's other projects at the moment, and the amount they are spending on defence. Is it not possible that they are capable to deliver a '4th generation bomber' (b-1b, tu-22m)

Jensy

I would say yes, they are. The H-6 update is not because its the best they can do, its because it is quick and cheap and gives an efficient missile launcher that only needs to be subsonic in a stand off mission. A mini B-52 if you like, similar to the frequent 'big fan' B-52 conversions that have been regularly proposed.

I did not wish to give the impression that this was the best China could achieve, only that it is what they will do first before moving on.

Even this of course might only remain a test-bed, only time will tell but I am sure they *are* pursuing an advanced bomber, just that this report confuses separate programmes.