Apparently the Sri Lanka deal is different from the previous deal involving an undisclosed Asian country. This means that there are two countries purchasing JF-17s!
JF-17/FC-1 Fighter Aircraft thread
- Thread starter johnqh
- Start date
SinoSoldier
Colonel
Or that SL hasn't really struck a deal yet.
thunderchief
Senior Member
Like they say, plans are made to be broken .
J-10B would be probably preferred choice for China, but having a backbone fighter flying on foreign engines is not a good policy . J-10B production is increasing and combined with J-10A fleet they have a huge quantity of fighters depending on Russian engines . If WS-10B does not become ready for production soon and WS-13 becomes available, there would be no harm to order let's say 200 examples of JF-17 for PLAAF . And with such mass production foreign buyers would have more confidence in the plane .
vesicles
Colonel
If they want to limit the number of planes depending on foreign engines, they would most likely turn to J-11B, the only fighter with domestic engines. the JF-17 also has foreign engines. So what is the point of turning to the JF-17? There is simply no chance for them to go to JF-17 now.
Like many have said, they made the decision long ago that the JF-17 would be export only. I don't understand why, all of a sudden, people start talking about inducting JF-17 into the PLAAF...
plawolf
Lieutenant General
I think you are grossly overestimating how big an issue Russian engines is for China, especially the AL31.
China has been using AL31 powered fighters for nearly 2 and a half decades now. China has a vast and comprehensive logistical network dedicated to the AL31 and pretty much manufactures all spares in house.
There are even strong suggestions that China is re-manufacturing old engines or even making brand new (upgraded) examples of AL31s domestically for their J11 and Su30 fleets.
In effect, the AL31 is embargo proof.
Even if Russia stopped all deliveries of new engines and spares, the Chinese have the capacity to switch to domestic suppliers and the inventory of spares built up to not have that affect operational availability of its fighter fleet as it makes that transition.
On the other hand, I do not think you are fully appreciating just how costly and complicated it would be to introduce an entirely new fighter type to the PLA force structure.
The JF17 has almost no parts commonality with any other Chinese fighter, so training and logistics will all have to be built up from scratch.
But the biggest problems with the JF17 are twofold.
Firstly, it is too small a fighter.
China is a vast country, and it just doesn't fit the new doctorine the PLA is transitioning towards.
As the PLAAF retire its legacy J7s and Q5s, it is also transitioning from point defence to strategic defence. The goal is no longer to engage and stop enemy air power from attacking key facilities and locations, but rather to stopping hostile air power before they can even threaten the mainland.
That means moving the engagement area from above Chinese soil and airspace to the oceans and over enemy territory if needs be. That needs fighters with long legs.
The JF17 has longer legs than the J7, but still not quite long enough for the PLA's tastes.
Notice how J10s are almost always pictured with drop tanks while training? That's not because they have short legs, but because of how the PLAAF envisages them to operate in real life combat scenarios.
The second major factor working against the JF17 is that it doesn't have an unique role to justify its existence within the PLAAF.
Instead it will be competing directly with the J10 for role within the PLA, and while the JF17 is cheaper, it isn't cheap enough to warrant choosing it over the J10, especially with the J10B coming online.
The suggestion of using them as aggressors doesn't really wash either. Putting asside the immediate veto on cost grounds alone, the PLAAF operate their aggressors very differently from western forces.
For the PLA, the Blue Force opfor always uses the better tech and equipment than the Red Force regulars they are training with.
That means PLAAF aggressors will be the ones flying J10Bs, J11Bs and soon J20s.
The JF17 is simply not suitable as aggressor material for how the PLAAF runs theirs aggressor programmes.
For DACT training, the Chinese could and would be better off organising more joint training events with Pakistan and fly against their JF17s rather than buying their own just to do that.
