Let's first reiterate that we have no APKWS equivalent that we know of in PLA service, and we don't know if such a system would be a straight up structural adaptation of any existing rocket pod system they have.
For the purposes of discussion, let's be generous and assume such a solution would be adapting an existing rocket pod.
My question is, so what? That just means one weapons system to integrate onto 5th gens -- considering what is at stake is a difference of 700 aircraft continuing to be 4.5th gen or mothballed in favour of 700 5th gens, that seems like a minor price to pay.
We're talking about critical vulnerability to perhaps the most relevant black horse weapon system of today, one which is specifically deployed at scale by two critical bluefors(US & Island).
It's certainly feasible to have it done a long way around, develop new, specialized pods, rockets and do rest of the stages per old good CIA sabotage guide.
Things like APKWS isn't even WVR, it's for targeting low end one way attack drones.
If you want to make it a mission for PLA tactical fighters as standard, that's fine, but don't make it sound like integrating it onto 5th gen aircraft is somehow such a burdensome task that it outweighs the rest of the consequences of keeping around 700 4.5th gen airframes versus 700 5th gen airframes for the overall fleet!
APKWS shoots anything, their range in pursuit isn't terribly lower than sidewinder. They're certainly used (already) to shoot LACMs too.
It is a critical task for +5 years to come (2026-31), with another +5 not really well seen but likely (where will tech race go? worst case, it would be unwise to end up around drone at all, and it's better not to juuust about finish integrations at that point of time - i.e. it's better to have discardable capability which will wind down anyway).
Whatever the case, fighters which have rocket integration are most of the way there already. For fighter without it you have to do full weapon trial cycle, probably disrupting your normal integration work (F-35 case with weapon integration pipeline stretching into mid-2030s), and it not necessarily will end up well (F/A-18E/F failed apkws).
Note that even if not-APKWS delivered literally tomorrow, it'll become a fleet capability(for 4th gen force) more like within ~2-3 years; APKWS isn't fleet wide skill in USAF fighter force yet. If we add development(even emergency one) and weapon trials, we're pushing solution into 2030s. And who knows who'll be hunting whom at that point. Drones already try to bite back.
You were talking about self protection jamming; F-35 at any rate has 360 degree active EW emitters for self protection (in addition to things like towed decoys). The use of its frontal AESA for jamming is not for "self protection" but for more offensive purposes.
NAVAIR hopefully is authorative enough. It almost certainly does not; only locating emission location. "Band array"(on known F-35 technical diagram) doesn't mean it's active.
Funny that, 2030+ is in the "future".
We're still in early 2026. It's certainly future, and moreover there's certainly enough years rest to fit a major war in, and honestly very likely to have the one we're talking about here quite often.
If one accepts that the PLA will see significant addition of 5th gen airframes from now to 2030 (and afterwards as well), then you only have two options:
- Either expand the overall size of the manned fighter fleet post 2030.
- Or retain about a similar manned fighter fleet size, and retire 4.5th gen aircraft a bit earlier than their airframe lives would project.
For the next +10 years 4.5 generation fighters with readily integratable capability set(shortest path to capability at scale) is the best corse of action. Especially when alternative force is more useful elsewhere.
We already saw how most advanced
leech type air forces on collector's edition F-35s can't intercept a dozen of pieces of foam with petrol engine(and intercepted local property instead); this is just not a good example to follow.
Talk about emergency problems isn't as sexy as discussing future iterations of force - this is absolutely a problem hitting all armed forces IRL for decades (pushing excel lines with higher combat coefficients, for higher net force, is better for both cool factors and promotions).
But there's a price to pay for that, as we see between two 3-day special military operations by two different countries.
