Future PLAAF fleet procurement and composition

Tomboy said:

AFAIK, thats where unmanned fighters and CCAs come in. Lower end patrols and escorts could literally be done by drones which likely offer much lower lifetime costs than trying to keep aging 4.5th generation fighters alive. There is no reason why the PLAAF in the 2030s would still need large amount of 4.5th gen for these lower end missions, which while being more expensive, offer less in mission flexibility and takes up valuable crews that could be flying something better.

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FairAndUnbiased said:

MALE drones are being shot out of the sky in both Ukraine and Iran.

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FairAndUnbiased said:

Real world experience tells us that 4th gens are very survivable as missile and glide bomb strikers even over the frontlines, not just at complete standoff range.

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Tomboy said:

I'm not talking about GJ-2 or MQ-9 etc, I'm talking about the drones we saw at the 9.3 parade. UADFs can autonomously handle patrols and combat while lower end CCAs can act as stealth payload extenders and maybe autonomously do some lower end combat. Swarms of GJ-11s can provide ample strike options while remaining quite survivable even in defended airspace.


Real world experience tells us 4th gens are getting shot out of the sky even against enemies with next to no air defense. Check how many F-15s have been lost in the past few weeks against Iran who doesn't even have a semblance of a modern integrated defense network.

While China is expected to fight against enemies like US, Japan and Taiwan, possibly even SK simultaneously in the first phase. Who all have access to modern and networked air defenses systems and are continuing to procure and upgrade their systems.

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Tomboy said:

Real world experience tells us 4th gens are getting shot out of the sky even against enemies with next to no air defense. Check how many F-15s have been lost in the past few weeks against Iran who doesn't even have a semblance of a modern integrated defense network.

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siegecrossbow said:

You people are underestimating the issue with maintenance. Even though J-20 is better than its peers in terms of reliability and readiness rate, flankers and J-10 still got it beat by a pretty significant margin. PLAAF is not so rich that it could blow J-20/A/S and J-35 on every intercept or menial tasks like ground pounding after acquiring aerial superiority.

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Blitzo said:

IMO that's actually the wrong way to see it -- it is more that the PRC is arguably one of only two nations who are able to procure 5th gens and CCAs/UCAVs (and soon 6th gens) on both a timely basis and in sufficient scale such that they have the luxury to retire 4.5th gens early if they wanted to.
The other nation of the two of course is the US, and tbh even the PRC might in some ways be ahead of the US in that respect depending on how the likes of F-47, F-35 Block 4, and US CCA programs progress relative to PLA programs.

Other nations which are not the PRC and China will be stuck with flying 4th, 4.5th and small 5th gen fleets for years to come because they don't have the industrial strength and the industrial capacity to produce 5th gen aircraft, UCAVs/CCAs, and 6th gen jets at a sufficient scale and speed.
Having to do so is a very undesirable position to be in, because ideally they would be able to transition to all 5th gen + UCAVs/CCAs and to prepare for 6th gens by 2030+.
Even the USAF is likely to continue flying 4.5th gen and MLU'd 4th gen aircraft well beyond 2030 because of industry and funding limitations.


At most, one could somewhat jokingly suggest that the PRC is "suffering from success" -- but that success is very much a desirable trait for the contest for air superiority, because everyone wants to fight as much of an unfair fight as possible against the enemy, and for the odds to be tilted as much in their own favour as possible.

(Additionally, one could argue that mass procurement of 4.5th gens including J-10C and J-16 set the stage for development and proliferation of contemporary and future aerial warfare tactics and technologies that were a necessary step for refining 5th generation aircraft development and beyond... leaving aside of course their importance if a conflict were to occur before 2030).




As mentioned before, the proliferation of UCAVs/CCAs really shouldn't be the determining factor in whether they start to mothball/retire 4.5th gens or not post 2030.
The main deciding factor is whether they want to expand or maintain their overall manned fighter fleet size come 2030 onwards, because by that point it is likely that 5th generation cumulative production will have been able to replace all pre-4.5th gen aircraft, making 4.5th gen aircraft the oldest generation fighters by then. If 5th gen production continues post 2030 and 6th gen production starts in the same time period, then they'll have to make the decision of whether to expand the manned fighter fleet size or not -- and if they don't expand it, then it will be the 4.5th gens slated next for replacement.

Putting it another way, UCAVs/CCAs are likely to influence the overall manned fighter fleet size, but they won't change the underlying drivers of whether it makes sense to replace 4.5th gens with 5th gens from 2030 onwards overall.

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dingyibvs said:

The current J-20 construction speed already matches or exceeds that of J-16/J-10 combined from a few years back. The massive new SAC facility will produce J-35A at a decent rate as well. This means that 4.5 gens can be retired even while the overall manned fleet expands.

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FairAndUnbiased said:

Air to air isn't the only mission. It isn't even necessarily the most important mission as seen in the real world.

Both Ukraine and Iran have demonstrated that an unstealthy heavy fighter is still useful as a striker and a fighter airframe is still much more survivable than a subsonic bomber as long as you have a dispersed air force and large terrain. This is done by all sides. There's a reason the US wants to keep buying F-15EX and the F-15 is still Israel's MVP. US still uses B-52s due to their payload but H-6K doesn't have substantially higher payload than a J-16 while being much slower, it just is physically larger.

Strike planes are necessary and it's better to use a J-16 as one than a much less survivable JH-7 or H-6K in contested airspace. Payload isn't even all that much worse than a H-6K.

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