J-20 versus F-35

[gta4]

J-10C operationalized AESA radar before any European fighter jet was able to do so.

Rafale with AESA entered service (about mid 2013) earlier than J-10C, about 3 years earlier than J-10C.

Chinese weapons are always hyped by their fanbase. They can't distinguish "testing" from "operational". Whenever a photo of J-10C with radar under maintenance appears they will claim it's operational.

Worse still, U.S. media tend to cite Chinese internet forum threads instead of reliable sources such as research papers that passed peer review, test report, patents, etc.

[tphuang]

Rafale with AESA entered service (about mid 2010) earlier than J-10C, about 4 years earlier than J-10C.

Chinese weapons are always hyped by their fanbase. They can't distinguish "testing" from "operational". Whenever a photo of J-10C with radar under maintenance appears they will claim it's operational.

Worse still, U.S. media tend to cite Chinese internet forum threads instead of reliable sources such as research papers that passed peer review, test report, patents, etc.

Looks like I underestimated French progress on RBE2, but according to this article http://www.defense-aerospace.com/articl ... 8696/.html, the first productions only joined service with RBE2 in late 2012 and with other sensor upgrades in later 2013. Not that much earlier than J-10C.

Every nation's fanbase hype their weapons. That's normal. in terms of sourcing, US media does have a bad habit of picking up lower quality sources, but the people that really follow Chinese military like Andres, myself and several others have a lot of experience separating the higher quality and lower quality sources. And of course there is people like Ken Allen, who knows far more about the subject than these so called research papers. And there is a lot of really quality stuff out there that people dismiss because it's not in English. If you are stuck waiting on research paper to come out on something regarding China, it will be really outdated.

[sferrin]

China is pouring more money, manpower, and effort into defense (where it matters. Most of our defense spending is on wages, pensions, and the VA.)

Are you kidding?
1) How come you have the illussion that China is pouring more money into defense than US?

I gather reading comprehension is not your strong suit.

U.S has made gliders with L/D greater than 50 in 1970s, while china can't make it until now.

That would matter if it were the 70s. It isn't though, is it?

[China has the greatest quantity of mathmaticians, but never won the Feilds Medal.
No inventions that changed human history were made by China P.R..

You mean like gun powder and rockets?

[sferrin]

Again, because China still lags behind. I'm believe (or I want to believe) that once China gets really close to the US that we'll see the US pouring even more money on defense (where "it matters").

More than likely what will happen is the Republicans will f--k up colossally, the Democrats will be back in power, and we'll see Obama-like (or worse) treatment of the military.

[ricnunes]

There was a time (Early 2000's to around 2014) when China really looked like it was going to overtake the US.
they said that the Chinese GDP (nominal) would be bigger by 2012, then it was pushed to 2015, then they said its gona be 2018, 2023, now I see figures like 2030.

This kinda reminds me of Japan in the 1980's.
"Everyone" (note the quotes) at that time claimed that Japan would surpass the USA but then the 1990's came up...

[ricnunes]

Again, because China still lags behind. I'm believe (or I want to believe) that once China gets really close to the US that we'll see the US pouring even more money on defense (where "it matters").

More than likely what will happen is the Republicans will f--k up colossally, the Democrats will be back in power, and we'll see Obama-like (or worse) treatment of the military.

I guess you missed the excellent point made by zero-one which I quoted in my previous post.

And guess what? China is not growing (now) nearly as fast as it was during the past decade.

[China has the greatest quantity of mathmaticians, but never won the Feilds Medal.
No inventions that changed human history were made by China P.R..

You mean like gun powder and rockets?

I believe that gta4 meant China's People Republic (a.k.a. Communist China) although the correct name would be People's Republic of China (PRC).
Powder and "rockets" were invented by Imperial China centuries ago. Whatever it's interesting that you mentioned China's invention of powder. What they did with it? They invented fireworks and self-propelled spears.
Once the west invented the power (quite later than China granted), the west invented mobile field artillery (real artillery guns), naval guns, rifles, handguns, etc...

[zhangmdev]

In the 17th century, the Ming dynasty had to buy cannons and firearms from the West. Portuguese jesuit helped China making European bronze and cast iron cannons, called "red barbarian cannon". Ming gunsmiths quickly mastered the technology. (Sound familiar?) But too bad once the Manchu empire got hands on some of those siege weapons the Ming dynasty was quickly finished.

[tphuang]

J-10C operationalized AESA radar before any European fighter jet was able to do so.

Rafale with AESA entered service (about mid 2013) earlier than J-10C, about 3 years earlier than J-10C.

Chinese weapons are always hyped by their fanbase. They can't distinguish "testing" from "operational". Whenever a photo of J-10C with radar under maintenance appears they will claim it's operational.

Worse still, U.S. media tend to cite Chinese internet forum threads instead of reliable sources such as research papers that passed peer review, test report, patents, etc.

I underestimated French progress, but they still only entered service just a year before J-16 and J-10C first started entering service PLAAF. Doesn't change my point that this is one area they are doing better than people on this forum have given them credit for. And given how quickly they got to this point, it's folly to dismiss what they are putting on J-20 and the IIR seekers on their latest missiles. None of this is to say they are close to catching America. There are areas where they are really far behind like engine and then there are areas where they are not that far behind.

Every fanbase hype their own weapons. That seems to be pretty standard.

As for US media sourcing, I agree that they are not great on Chinese military. However, there is a lot of amaterus like Andres that have followed these things for a long time and do a decent job of dissecting good and bad sources. If you don't put the effort in, then you will assume everything is bad. And then there is the Ken Allen and Dennis Blasko of this world, who really have good assessment of how things area. If you are waiting for research paper to come, you will always have an outdated view.

[gta4]

China is pouring more money, manpower, and effort into defense (where it matters. Most of our defense spending is on wages, pensions, and the VA.)

Are you kidding?
1) How come you have the illussion that China is pouring more money into defense than US?

I gather reading comprehension is not your strong suit.

U.S has made gliders with L/D greater than 50 in 1970s, while china can't make it until now.

That would matter if it were the 70s. It isn't though, is it?

[China has the greatest quantity of mathmaticians, but never won the Feilds Medal.
No inventions that changed human history were made by China P.R..

You mean like gun powder and rockets?

1) Show me the source please, such as research papers that passed peer review.

2) That matters until now. If your jet has low L/D, your jet suffers from low kinematic performance.

3) Gun powder and rocket were not invented by China.P.R. Read carefully, I mean P.R (after the republic was created in 1949)

4) And you are ignoring this:

When it comes to man power, quality-wise or quantity-wise? Keep in mind: US defense corps have top science / engineering talents in their candidate pool around the globe because they can provide competitive compensation even compared to finance and / or banking, while in china and other asia countries, top talents seldom go to defense companies due to very low salary.
China has the greatest quantity of mathmaticians, but never won the Feilds Medal.

[gta4]

A great part of China's GDP is made up of real-estate trading. That does not translate into high tech R&D does it?

[hornetfinn]

China is pretty seriously lagging behind in some key technological areas:
- Sensor technology. This is tied to domestic IC industry which limits their abilities in making advanced sensors. They can't make truly modern thermal imaging cameras or AESA radar components because of this. Sure they have made some IIR and AESA radar systems, but those systems have been available for USA for about 20-25 years.

They are definitely behind. But saying they can't achieve anything because of their weak engine industry is a stretch. Engine is their weakest field. And their platforms will always be hampered due to subpar engine solutions. But in other areas, they are less behind due to combination of getting more help abroad or more investment. Missiles is one area they actually do pretty well in. So it's kind of laughable to say they haven't tested against supersonic missiles, when they publicly advertise that an export system like FL-3000N can counter multiple supersonic targets.

And you significantly underestimate how well they do in IIR and AESA radar systems. In military field, they received tremendous help 15 years ago in these areas from Israel. And that has really fast tracked their deployment on platforms. Both KJ-2000 and 052C operationalized larger AESA platform 12 years ago. And since then, they have advanced to the point where the Russians were visiting CIDEX exhibition several years ago to source different Chinese components (including T/R modules) for Russian systems. J-10C operationalized AESA radar before any European fighter jet was able to do so.

I don't think I underestimate their capabilities in IIR and AESA systems. I do think you underestimate the technological level achieved in USA, European countries, Israel, Japan and South Korea. Those countries have fielded first AESAs 20-30 years ago and now have large number of them operational. One difference to China is that those countries also had large number of very advanced MSA and PESA radars than what China had and have not always hurried to AESA technology. Making a decent AESA has not been a problem for those countries for some 30 years now, but making it significantly better than PESA or even MSA radar has not been always economical. For example there are E-2D, E-3 and AEGIS systems which use PESA technology but are still really powerful systems with huge capabilities. Sure they will be replaced with AESA systems sometime in the future, but there is no pressing need for that in the near future. China on the other hand had and have lots of rather unimpressive PESA and MSA radar systems.

IIR is another similar thing as technology has been available for 30 years also in USA and France at least. ASRAAM for example has been operational for 20 years already. Same with Javelin and Spike ATGMs. AIM-9R could've been even earlier than those, but was cancelled due to cost considerations. China has just shown their first IIR guided ATGM and PL-10 AAM. That's great improvement in their technology and increases their capabilities but ASRAAM, AIM-9X, MICA-IR, IRIS-T and Python-5 for example are at least equal in capabilties, likely a lot more mature and available in large numbers.

I do agree that China seems to have pretty clear lead over Russia in IIR and AESA systems.

[sferrin]

1) Show me the source please, such as research papers that passed peer review.

Show me "research papers that passed peer review" that show the US is producing more military hardware than China. Oh right, there aren't any. Stop being obsessed with a phrase you saw on tumblr and open your eyes. China is producing more military hardware each year than the US.

2) That matters until now. If your jet has low L/D, your jet suffers from low kinematic performance.

Show me Chinese fighter that has be proven by "research papers that passed peer review" to have such a low L/D that it is a terrible fighter.

Gun powder and rocket were not invented by China.P.R. Read carefully, I mean P.R (after the republic was created in 1949)

There you go, moving goalposts again.

When it comes to man power, quality-wise or quantity-wise? Keep in mind: US defense corps have top science / engineering talents in their candidate pool around the globe because they can provide competitive compensation even compared to finance and / or banking, while in china and other asia countries, top talents seldom go to defense companies due to very low salary.
China has the greatest quantity of mathmaticians, but never won the Feilds Medal.

"US defense corps have top science / engineering talents"

Yeah, most of them are Chinese and go back home once they've learned all they can here.

[hornetfinn]

"US defense corps have top science / engineering talents"

Yeah, most of them are Chinese and go back home once they've learned all they can here.

Out of curiosity, is that so? I've worked with pretty decent number of US defense corp engineering people and I've never seen any Chinese or even Chinese Americans or any kind. I'm sure those people exist, but I seriourly doubt you can say that most US defense corp top science and engineering talents are Chinese.

[gta4]

Yeah, most of them are Chinese and go back home once they've learned all they can here.

You need to be serious on this one.

Show me a top aerospace conference whose best student paper was awarded to a Chinese student.

Show me a Chinese Nobel prize or Fields Medal winner, except the only lady who won the medical one which has nothing to do with defense/aerospace

[gta4]

Show me Chinese fighter that has be proven by "research papers that passed peer review" to have such a low L/D that it is a terrible fighter.

If you compare this with the drag polar of F-16, this is a terrible fighter indeed.