Key Points and Overview: China’s new supersonic stealth aircraft, the Chengdu J-36, embodies an innovative approach to air combat that prioritizes speed, range, stealth, and network capabilities.
-Designed to give the upper hand in potential conflicts like an invasion of Taiwan, the J-36 has a large arsenal of long-range air-to-air and air-to-surface missiles, while advanced sensors and radio links , its role in a series of military operations has been strengthened. system.
– Possibility to command drones and integrate advanced technologies such as lasers.
-With faster sortie speeds and speeds that allow for deeper penetration into enemy defenses, the J-36 strengthens U.S. air power by threatening bases in the second island chain and redefining the paradigm of air warfare. It can be challenging.
– Speed, agility, range, and stealth of individual aircraft types are still important, but are no longer the be-all and end-all of air combat. Advances in sensing, processing, and communications are transforming military operations.
Chengdu J-36: China’s stealth aircraft redefining air combat
The Chengdu J-36, China’s large fighter jet that first appeared on December 26, was developed to take advantage of these changes and support China’s strategic goal of establishing regional dominance, including the ability to annex Taiwan by force. It was done.
If the J-36 could fly at supersonic speeds without using afterburning, as the shape of the prototype suggests, it would be able to get into and out of combat more quickly and safely than traditional fighters and bombers that cruise at subsonic speeds. You will be able to leave. A high degree of stealth greatly helps the J-36 penetrate defenses. Supersonic cruise also means each J-36 can fly more missions in a given period of time.
This design’s large main weapons bay is sized to carry a substantial number of air-to-ground missiles that the J-36 can fire against targets such as airfields, aircraft carriers, and air defense batteries. With its superior speed and height, the J-36 was also able to fly inexpensive glide bombs farther than other aircraft.
The main arsenal is large enough to carry unusually large air-to-air missiles for engaging aircraft at long ranges, including important support units such as tanker planes and air surveillance radar planes. Data for this purpose may be obtained from other aircraft, ships, satellites, or ground sources. The missiles could also be fired at fighter jets within range that would protect the J-36 from counterattacks.
The J-36 itself could become a source of targeting data for other aircraft and ships using the large passive and active sensors that an aircraft of such size can easily carry. They may command the aircraft they fly with. In all this, they will use radio links that are difficult to detect by the enemy.
J-20 stealth fighter. Image credit: Chinese military.
It may not be far-fetched to call the J-36 an airborne cruiser, and it may call into question the decision of the West to prioritize the development and production of a fighter aircraft that is little more than a torpedo boat by comparison.
(An earlier article in this series provided a technical evaluation of the J-36 design. A type designation is likely, but not certain.)
For the Taiwan mission, China’s main counterweight is the U.S.-led air force, made up of U.S. Air Force and U.S. Navy aircraft carriers, supported by Japan, Australia, Taiwan, and possibly South Korea, among others. The air power of China’s adversaries could impede China’s maritime and amphibious operations, resulting in delayed advances and increased casualties.
Therefore, anti-aircraft capabilities are extremely important to China. This is what the United States considers China’s anti-access and area denial capabilities. This includes surface-to-air weapons, fighter jets, airbase attack, and information areas.
To understand where the J-36 fits in, start by considering China’s current military strength, spearheaded by the Chengdu J-20. The J-20 is fast, stealthy, and has good range for a fighter, but its arsenal is limited to short- and medium-range air-to-air weapons. Like the F-35, it is more detectable outside the forward quadrant. This is an even greater vulnerability in a networked environment. Even if the sensor platform on the beam is not properly positioned to fire the weapon, it will still pass the trajectory to a well-positioned platform.
The long-range Xi’an H-6 bomber, used as a missile carrier, can attack air bases throughout the Western Pacific. But its effectiveness is limited to warheads of up to six expensive missiles that must fly far enough to keep the vulnerable launching aircraft safe.
The J-36 combines speed, range, and all-round stealth. Potential internal payloads include long-range air-to-air missiles such as the PL-15, which the J-20 cannot carry internally. Heavier air-to-ground missiles will target airfields and warships. It also likely supports the type of high-precision attacks enabled by more accurate, autonomous weapons and, as autonomous technology advances, the delivery of loitering weapons and jamming devices.
China’s new stealth fighter jet. Image credit: X Screenshot.
The J-36’s small outboard weapons bay could potentially accommodate defensive and support weapons, perhaps on extended rails like the J-20’s side bays.
A large transparent side opening in the front fuselage could be a wide-field passive warning and signaling system. But there is another possibility. If you want to integrate a high-energy anti-missile laser into a non-stealthy turret-free aircraft with a hemispherical range or more, it may look like a transparent laser from the outside. A single optical chain can feed left and right steerable heads under a conformal window. cause panic.
Speed erodes the missile’s engagement range, but it is not only valuable for survivability. Even at supersonic cruise speeds of Mach 1.8, the flight time is halved compared to subsonic cruisers, greatly increasing sortie rates.
The United States considered developing a supersonic attack aircraft in the early 2000s. However, the costs of 9/11 and the F-35 program prevented funding for the high-speed project. “Response time and cost per target shot down were the two holy grails,” a Northrop Grumman engineer commented in early 2001. Although supersonic aircraft were larger and more complex, their sortie generation rates were much higher and less frequent than subsonic aircraft. An aircraft was needed. And cheap, non-powered glide weapons could be used, with a standoff range estimated at 170km from a Mach 2 launch.
Speed on one side of a conflict is an important advantage. If the J-36s are able to penetrate to threaten second island chain bases, forcing the US to move B-21s, B-52s, and other high-value assets further to the rear, the US attack sortie rate will increase. and effectiveness will decrease.
It is important to remember that J-36 is part of a family of systems and a functional network. Significantly, the KJ-3000 airborne early warning and control system, based on the Xi’an Y-20 airlifter, debuted during the holiday season.
Chinese NGAD White Emperor fighter jet. Image credit: X Screenshot.
Since 2003, China has manufactured five types of airborne radar systems, more than any other country, all based on active electronically scanned array (AESA) technology. Its role has expanded beyond that of forward-passing enemy tracking data to fighter aircraft. Because AESA radars can update their tracks much faster than rotating antenna radars, these systems can provide guidance-quality en-route updates to missiles.
Compared to the propeller-driven KJ-500, the KJ-3000 is faster, can move further forward to support operations, can fly higher, and has a wider sensor range. In conjunction with the KJ-3000, the J-36 can fire missiles while remaining radar silent.
Once its speed and stealth allow it to safely approach the enemy, the J-36 itself could provide targeting data to other weapons, such as missiles fired by the H-6, which remains discreetly behind it. It also serves as a command and control hub for other aircraft, both manned and unmanned. In the case of a two-man crew, the second crew member is likely to be the unit manager.
As for how to classify the J-36, too many people are in a hurry to call it a “sixth generation fighter”.
Invented in Russia, the term “fifth generation” was adopted by Lockheed Martin as a marketing tool in the early 2000s. What Lockheed Martin calls fifth-generation fighters combine supersonic speed and maneuverability with some degree of stealth. The Chengdu J-20 fighter jet is fifth generation by its standards.
But this “generational” taxonomy is more misleading than informative. This is because fighter aircraft designs do not and need not be categorized into a separate set of characteristic groups.
And the definitions of “fighter,” “bomber,” and “attack aircraft” are becoming increasingly unclear. Nominally a fighter, the Boeing F-15 was mostly built as an attack aircraft, and the fighter-derived Sukhoi Su-34 follows the same path. Designed to counter air and land threats, the J-36 is even larger than the Su-34. Its size and flight performance put it in a category of its own, although it does not have a name. Perhaps “airborne cruisers” will become popular.
NGAD fighter mockup. Image credit: Creative Commons.
About the author: Bill Sweetman
Bill Sweetman is a veteran, award-winning journalist and aerospace industry executive. He is the author of “Trillion Dollar Trainwreck: How the F-35 tonsholed out the US Air Force.”
