Well the article is new, so it's not you that's late but Rick Fisher.
PLA AEW&C, SIGINT, EW and MPA thread
- Thread starter Sczepan
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Well the article is new, so it's not you that's late but Rick Fisher.
Hey ... even if surely not as enigmatic as the J-20 ... anyway an important progress:
1. Even if I wasn't sure when the last image appeared ... here is this is now in PLANAF-grey for sure !
PS: The image itself is the avatar used by the one who started this tread:
... maybe someone can ask him to post the full picture, PLEASE !!!
2. And now there are two KJ-500 !
1. Even if I wasn't sure when the last image appeared ... here is this is now in PLANAF-grey for sure !
PS: The image itself is the avatar used by the one who started this tread:
... maybe someone can ask him to post the full picture, PLEASE !!!
2. And now there are two KJ-500 !
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GX6 is definitely arriving better late than never. PLA will need as many MPAs as USN and JMSDF have in the long run, and in the short term they have quite an acute window of vulnerability that needs to be remedied.
Hopefully they will allocate at least half of annual Y-9 airframe production spaces to GX6 and increase Y-9 airframe production overall.
Hopefully they will allocate at least half of annual Y-9 airframe production spaces to GX6 and increase Y-9 airframe production overall.
asif iqbal
Lieutenant General
The wind just had to fly that plastic in the way !!!
ladioussupp
Junior Member
It is said that a third High-Tech (Gao-Xing) regiment of Navy under Naval Aviation 9th Division stands up recently. Its strength includes at least two KJ-500 (GX-10) and three GX-6 ASW. The serial numbers of these aircrafts are 5-digit type, rather than 4-digit type associated with "independent regiment". The photos were taken in Shandong province. And it is supposed to be transferred to Hainan island in a foreseeable future.
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asif iqbal
Lieutenant General
Great news if true. We can confirm the two KJ-500s and hopefully we'll get a count for the GX6s soon.
Hopefully the GX6s will be the first of many. I think PLA will be satisfied with 30 odd AEW&C overall, so I expect a dozen or more KJ-500s produced, but the demand for ASW/MPAs will be much higher, over a hundred.
On the subject of AEW&C, I'm surprised at how many birds PLANAF are getting. They've got 6 KJ-200s compared to PLAAF's supposed 5, and PLANAF now are receiving two KJ-500s compared to air force's single one so far. I wonder why they have so many; after all their air fleet is far smaller than the air force's, so you'd think their command/control demands are less significant.
Or, is it the case that they simply have the mission of surveying westpac air space more than the air force, meaning they'll naturally need more AEW&C. In that case the question which arises is whether the PLANAF AEW&C are able to command and communicate with PLAAF aircraft as effectively as PLAAF AEW&C and whether the PLANAF and PLAAF train together in that way.
Perhaps because PLNAF operates outside the range of ground radars hence need AWACS more vs PLAAF, which can use ground radar for command and control.
Possible, but would they need so many? Their modern land based fighters and strikers come up to slightly over 200. That's not a small combat aircraft fleet by any means and is equivalent to a small modern european air force, yet their AEW&C to combat aircraft ratio is quite high.
I suspect it definitely has to do with the volume of international air space PLANAF may be tasked to monitor compared to PLAAF (thus obviously cannot be effectively monitored by ground based radar), but I'm not sure in terms of command/control given I expect PLAAF to be tasked to missions beyond PRC air space as well, meaning they should theoretically operate alongside both PLAAF and PLANAF AEW&C and PLANAF combat aircraft too.
One minor detail that surprises me the most - even if expected for some time - is the serial number:
So far only the 2. Naval Aviation Division operates these Y-8-special Mission types: the 4. Regiment the AEW/C model, the 5. AR for ASW (for me the first "natural" receiver of the GX-6) + helicopters and the 6. AR for EW/ELINT and so on.
Now for the first time a new division receives such specialized types and even more for a long time being, PLANAF regiments used commonly the second number in their 5-digit serial to denote the AR within a Division, that usually comprises of only 3 Regiments .... now the 5 in the 85x9x-serial could be a hint for an expansion of Divisions to have more regiments ....
Just an idea
Deino
So far only the 2. Naval Aviation Division operates these Y-8-special Mission types: the 4. Regiment the AEW/C model, the 5. AR for ASW (for me the first "natural" receiver of the GX-6) + helicopters and the 6. AR for EW/ELINT and so on.
Now for the first time a new division receives such specialized types and even more for a long time being, PLANAF regiments used commonly the second number in their 5-digit serial to denote the AR within a Division, that usually comprises of only 3 Regiments .... now the 5 in the 85x9x-serial could be a hint for an expansion of Divisions to have more regiments ....
Just an idea
Deino