Sunday, April 1, 2018

Is China’s New Stealth Fighter About To Surpass The U.S. F-22 Raptor?

J-20 Mighty Dragon stealth fighter jet. Chinese Military Review

The Diplomat: How China’s New Stealth Fighter Could Soon Surpass the US F-22 Raptor

The J-20’s rapidly evolving combat capabilities could make it a world leading aerial warfare platform.

China’s Chengdu J-20 fifth generation air superiority fighter first entered service in early 2017, providing the People’s Liberation Army Air Force (PLAAF) with an analog to the U.S. F-22 Raptor. The platform was the first fifth generation fighter to enter service anywhere in the world outside the United States, and came equipped with state-of-the-art radar evading capabilities, avionics, and air-to-air missiles. The fighter’s canard configuration served to further enhance stealth capabilities while maintaining high levels of maneuverability. With less than a year having passed since the J-20 was inducted into service, the next generation platform has already received its first set of upgrades aimed at enhancing its combat performance. These upgrades are but the first of many to come, which could well lead the J-20 to become a world leading aerial warfare platform.

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WNU Editor: If the trend lines continue with the Chinese continuing to improve their J-20 fighter .... while improvements on the F-22 are slow and uncertain .... then yes .... China’s J-20 may surpass the U.S. F-22 Raptor one day.

2 comments:

Stephen Davenport said...

The J20 is an F22.

Anonymous said...

China lacks the numbers and since much of the aircraft is stolen techology, one upgrade can cause an unforeseen problem. But most importantly, US pilots have been flying in combat environments with the F-22 for over a decade and training to fight other 5th gem. fighters for longer. That is probably the most significant detail.