H-20 bomber (with H-X, JH-XX)

FairAndUnbiased

FairAndUnbiased

Brigadier
Registered Member
Gloire_bb said:
B-52 always was meant to strike the most defended airspace on Earth - and even if it long lost its capability to penetrate these defenses personally, it is still meant to.
Even if it has lost its ability to do pre-strike/post-strike survey due to the need to use stand-off munitions - it is still more capable of engaging defended airspace than the B-2. Even now, a decade after losing its ACM loads.

(2)
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B-52 was arguably the core of late-cw USAF anti-shipping capability, in a manner not dissimilar to Soviet maritime missile regiments themselves; B-52 is fully capable of low-altitude flight, thus it could(and to a degree - can) get to strike distance.
While harpoon was light - B-52s could carry loads of them. And now they're getting LRASMs - far more destructive(twice warhead weight) yet even more numerous - full cruiser salvo worth of them per ship, in fact - and will bring more within a few hours if necessary.

(3)not too far of a future brings in hypersonics, too.

BUFF shall never be underestimated.
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B-52 was meant to do so for the requirements of 1952 when:

1. look down radar didn't exist (first one ever: AN/ASG-18, 1960)
2. real SAMs didn't exist (first Russian one: SA-1, 1955)
3. air to air missiles didn't exist (first US one: 1956 AIM-4, first Russian one: 1957 K-5)

as you can see that is a totally incomparable threat environment. before even 5 years passed, it was obsolete in attacking defended targets.

late Cold War B-52s were utterly unsurvivable in the antiship role as Harpoons had only 200 km range vs. Kh-22s with 600 km range.
 
phrozenflame

phrozenflame

Junior Member
Registered Member
ACuriousPLAFan said:
There is a lesser-known rumor from some years ago claiming that China is developing a tactical bomber known as JH-XX (some even gave it the fictional designation of JH-18 or JH-19) that would better fullfill the later role, which I believe would be abundant in the Western Pacific theather.

JH-XX is projected to be smaller than the H-20, but are designed with combination of stealth and supersonic capabilities.

Anyone have any further credible updates on that project?

For reference, this diagram on what the JH-XX could look like has been posted in this very thread some years ago:
View attachment 95654
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Actually I'm not sure if it is a rumor. It was disclosed by US Intel in their annual or something report that caught most people by surprise.
 
Gloire_bb

Gloire_bb

Captain
Registered Member
FairAndUnbiased said:
as you can see that is a totally incomparable threat environment. before even 5 years passed, it was obsolete in attacking defended targets.
Click to expand...
well, at least in 1972 they were doing reasonably fine flying right over highly defended airspace.
With some losses, sure, but in nuclear war it would've been looong over.
Agressive EW&AD supression alone did quite a lot. But this is just a remark.
FairAndUnbiased said:
late Cold War B-52s were utterly unsurvivable in the antiship role as Harpoons had only 200 km range vs. Kh-22s with 600 km range.
Click to expand...
Without carriers, Soviet CSGs had literally no way to prevent Harpoon launches from 200 kms - longest-ranged Soviet(not Russian) Naval SAMs were 75 km-ish(S-300F). And obviously, Soviet ships had no way to look over the horizon, so anything flying low enough(for BUFF - probably 40-50 kms or so) had complete freedom of maneuver.
More than that, they wouldn't even get any warning whatsoever until harpoons will rise for a final target search at around 30-40 kms.

It's actually worth pointing out, that without airborne sensors, Chinese(Japanese, American, Russian) CSGs aren't that different even now - physics and geometry of this engagement didn't get old(even if it's far more dangerous now when AEW actually are in the air).

When we're talking about Soviet naval bombers - we shall always remember that they were meant to fight their way through a prepared, airborne enemy - in the worst case even forewarned with "surge" CAP strength in the air.
Their task was incredibly, 10 times more difficult - they were to fight their way trough both fighters, aews and possible SAM traps, and had to verify the actual target themselves (not every large blip on radar is a carrier).
 
plawolf

plawolf

Lieutenant General
Inst said:
I don't think the claims about the H-20 in a dumb bomb role are overblown. Unlike the Soviet Union, China's strategic position orients it toward being a true airpower and going from simply air denial a la the Soviets to air superiority ala the Americans is not far-fetched.

The fact of the matter is, China does not have a substantial air-to-ground fleet beyond the short-ranged JH-7s and limited numbers of H-6s. The H-20 is likely not only to play the role of the B-21 and B-2 in the Chinese fleet, but also that of the B-52; a work-horse bomber procured in large numbers that provides substantial air support for China.
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The PLA’s J16 and Su30 fleets would like to have a word, their rapidly growing UCAV fleets as well.
 
A

AndrewS

Brigadier
Registered Member
Gloire_bb said:
.
- B-52s could carry loads of them. And now they're getting LRASMs - far more destructive(twice warhead weight) yet even more numerous - full cruiser salvo worth of them per ship, in fact - and will bring more within a few hours if necessary.
Click to expand...

B-52s with LRASMs will be slaughtered in the Western Pacific. LRASMs need to be launched within 400km, but the B-52 has a huge radar signature that can be detected from much further away. And if there are enemy fighters nearby, B-52s are toast.

I see the B-52s best placed to launch longer ranged missiles like the JASSM-ER etc
 
A

Atomicfrog

Major
Registered Member
AndrewS said:
B-52s with LRASMs will be slaughtered in the Western Pacific. LRASMs need to be launched within 400km, but the B-52 has a huge radar signature that can be detected from much further away. And if there are enemy fighters nearby, B-52s are toast.

I see the B-52s best placed to launch longer ranged missiles like the JASSM-ER etc
Click to expand...

With sensor layering taking shape with detection from Satellites, ground radars, ship radars, awac and now UAV radars...

A couple of web microphones installed arround enemy airbases could give information of takeoff and aircraft types quite easily, could even give heading for a while... and it work for stealth planes. Easy early warning and probably used, just a couple of directionnal microphones on some laptops.

H-20 give the possibility to get undetected in flight for a while and probably launching standoff paylod undetected. I would be surprised that a B-52 or H6 could go undetected and not being shadowed for interception from take-off to landing in case of conflict.
 
FairAndUnbiased

FairAndUnbiased

Brigadier
Registered Member
Gloire_bb said:
well, at least in 1972 they were doing reasonably fine flying right over highly defended airspace.
With some losses, sure, but in nuclear war it would've been looong over.
Agressive EW&AD supression alone did quite a lot. But this is just a remark.

Without carriers, Soviet CSGs had literally no way to prevent Harpoon launches from 200 kms - longest-ranged Soviet(not Russian) Naval SAMs were 75 km-ish(S-300F). And obviously, Soviet ships had no way to look over the horizon, so anything flying low enough(for BUFF - probably 40-50 kms or so) had complete freedom of maneuver.
More than that, they wouldn't even get any warning whatsoever until harpoons will rise for a final target search at around 30-40 kms.

It's actually worth pointing out, that without airborne sensors, Chinese(Japanese, American, Russian) CSGs aren't that different even now - physics and geometry of this engagement didn't get old(even if it's far more dangerous now when AEW actually are in the air).

When we're talking about Soviet naval bombers - we shall always remember that they were meant to fight their way through a prepared, airborne enemy - in the worst case even forewarned with "surge" CAP strength in the air.
Their task was incredibly, 10 times more difficult - they were to fight their way trough both fighters, aews and possible SAM traps, and had to verify the actual target themselves (not every large blip on radar is a carrier).
Click to expand...
In 1972 they were flying against North Vietnam, a country with a minimal air force, and managed to get 30+ shot down regardless, along with 3700+ other fixed wing planes.

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IDK what to tell you if you think B-52s are survivable lol. Soviet air force was incomparable to the North Vietnamese one in 1972 and the North Vietnamese one still required a massive expenditure of F-4s doing SEAD from forward deployed bases in South Vietnam and right off the coast. Needless to say that wouldn't be possible against Soviets.

soviets also had Tu-95RT and Tu-142 as naval recon aircraft for surface and submarine groups alike and communicated target locations to them. It wasn't like they built 600 km range missiles for subs only to find they forgot literal 200 BC concepts about earth curvature.

Soviet doctrine was also to only use subs for offense and surface groups for defense within range of ground based naval aviation.
 
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