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Air Chief Marshal PV Naik is not a big fan of China’s fifth generation aircraft programme. Without naming the neighbouring country, the air chief dropped enough hint to condemn the programme, asking if it was ‘ethical’. Worldwide it has been speculated that China has developed its fifth generation aircraft through reverse engineering. “Is reverse engineering an ethical process? Because we know of a country which recently developed a fifth generation stealth aircraft… There is no R&D involved in its development. So is it (the project) ethical or an illegitimate backdoor entry?” he asked, speaking at the inauguration of the eight edition of the Aero India International Seminar on Monday. It was evident that Naik referred to the J-20 aircraft which China recently flight tested at its Chengdu air base. The J-20 is the most keenly-watched defence aviation programme in the world since its first flight in January as many countries and defence analysts in the west have doubted China’s ability to develop such a plane. The IAF chief also called for the development of technology at a faster rate due to the rise in terrorism. “Terrorists no longer work in their traditional manner to affect the immediate surroundings, but are now targeting the ‘political, sociological and economical’ aspects. There is a need for global cooperation as it would benefit everyone,” he said. http://www.in.com/news/current-affairs/fullstory-air-chief-marshal-pv-naik-questions-ethics-of-5th-generation-project-17485815-80d7d77c1685ef8b5ccd121e3f8f26d7b1f97970-rhp.html

-20 a ‘wake-up call,’ former intel chief says By Dave Majumdar - Staff writer Posted : Sunday Feb 13, 2011 8:21:21 EST The Air Force’s recently retired intelligence chief warns the U.S. to pay close attention to the Chinese stealth fighter that took to the air last month, saying the aircraft could turn into a formidable opponent. The Chengdu J-20 took off Jan. 11 and flew for about 15 minutes over an airfield in the southwestern city of Chengdu. Lt. Gen David Deptula said the fifth-generation fighter “may turn out to be a very, very formidable aircraft” if the Chinese can effectively harness active electronically scanned array radars, engines and stealth. The J-20, like the F-22, would be able to cruise at supersonic speeds at very high altitudes, Deptula said. But it would also carry more weapons, including three types now under development: air-to-air missiles with longer ranges than their U.S. counterparts; anti-ship and anti-surface weapons; and, potentially, weapons to destroy U.S. satellites. Such a plane might be used against U.S. refueling planes and large sensor aircraft such as the E-3 Sentry and E-8 JSTARS, he said. Discuss: J-20 Chinese stealth fighter The emergence of both the J-20 and the Russian fifth-generation fighter, the PAK-FA, indicates that a U.S. advantage is slipping away, Deptula said. “The United States has owned a monopoly on stealth for the last 25 years, and now, as both the Russians and Chinese acquire that same capability, you’re going to see that advantage we used to hold disappear very quickly, and that is going to have a very significant effect on our current operational plans,” Deptula said. “The first flight of the J-20 needs to be a wake-up call to the strategic complacency of those in the United States who assume continued air and naval dominance in the Pacific.” The J-20’s appearance also should “cause prudent decision-makers to reconsider the closure of the F-22 [production] line,” Deptula said. Lockheed Martin officials said they are on track to deliver the 187th and last Raptor, with tail-number 4095, in April 2012. Following Air Force orders, the company is working to preserve the tooling and knowledge necessary to restart the production line, said Jeff Babione, Lockheed’s F-22 general manager, in an e-mailed statement. Deptula also said the J-20 should prompt the U.S. to begin work on a replacement for the F-22, noting the Chinese jet would enter service in five to seven years, when the Raptor will be more than 15 years old. Other analysts’ reactions were more measured. Loren Thompson, an analyst at the Lexington Institute, Arlington, Va., said the J-20’s appearance is consistent with that of a long-range strike aircraft designed to further Chinese goals of denying U.S. forces access to the western Pacific. .But he said the J-20 appears to have a particularly small radar cross-section only from the front, somewhat like the U.S. Navy’s F/A-18E/F Super Hornet “Having stealth in the forward aspect and not having it on the sides or the back would be consistent with an aircraft designed to strike distant ships at sea or nearby countries like Japan,” he said. .”Thompson said he doubts the J-20 is an air-superiority fighter similar to the F-22, but “given the geographic asymmetry of our circumstances, perhaps a long-range maritime strike aircraft is more worrisome to us than something like an F-22 Analyst Richard Aboulafia of the Teal Group, Fairfax, Va., poured even more cold water on the J-20. “It’s a kludge,” or a machine thrown together from mismatched parts, he said. “I’ve never seen so much hysteria.” Aboulafia shares Thompson’s view that the Chinese lack the systems integration skills and the technology for a true fifth-generation fighter. In particular, he said, the Chinese have difficulties developing engines. One of the J-20 prototypes is reportedly powered by the Shenyang Liming WS-10 engine, which has suffered catastrophic failures in flight; the other by the Russian AL-31 engine from the Sukhoi Su-27, he said. .Aboulafia said the J-20 might not even be all that stealthy from the front, thanks to its canards, which reflect radar energy as they rotate during flight The U.S. may be overestimating the Chinese aircraft, just as the Air Force overestimated the Soviet MiG-25 Foxbat during the Cold War, Aboulafia said “I think Joseph Nye said it best in Foreign Policy [magazine] this month: There is an American tendency to overestimate them, and Chinese hubris based on self-overestimation,” he said. AP The Air Force's recently retired intelligence chief, Lt. Gen. David Deptula, says the Chengdu J-20, above, “may turn out to be a very, very formidable aircraft” if the Chinese can effectively harness active electronically scanned array radars, engines and stealth. « Previous 1 of 1 Next » Contests and PromotionsService Members Of The Year http://www.airforcetimes.com/news/2011/02/air-force-deptula-calls-j20-a-wake-up-call-021311w/

Airborne detection of stealth aircraft may already be an operational capability. In a series of tests at Edwards AFB, Calif., in 2009, Lockheed Martin’s CATbird avionics testbed—a Boeing 737 that carries the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter’s entire avionics system—engaged a mixed force of F-22s and Boeing F-15s and was able to locate and jam F-22 radars, according to researchers. Raytheon’s family of X-band airborne AESA radar—in particular, those on upgraded F-15Cs stationed in Okinawa—can detect small, low-signature cruise missiles. Moreover, Northrop Grumman’s lower-frequency, L-band AESA radar on Australia’s Wedgetail airborne early warning and control aircraft is larger and potentially more capable of detecting stealth aircraft at longer ranges. Lockheed Martin also hinted at a JSF anti-stealth capability in 2009 in a reference to combat with sophisticated, foreign aircraft. “The F-35’s avionics include onboard sensors that will enable pilots to strike fixed or moving ground targets in high-threat environments, day or night, in any weather, while simultaneously targeting and eliminating advanced airborne threats,” said Dan Crowley, then-executive vice president and F-35 program general manager. Better images emerging from China point clearly to the J-20’s use of stealth technology, but major uncertainties and questions remain unresolved. http://idrw.org/?p=2330

Chengdu J-20. China's tool to ram "cheese boxes on rafts". Vladimir Karnozov (author's translation of the original text in Russian, published on 12 January by Aviation EXplorer) On 11 January 2011 the new Chinese combat jet flew for the first time (in public, at least), taking off at 12:50 local time. The new airplane is referred to as the Chengdu J-20. Chengdu is the name of the city which houses a few aviation industry enterprises, including the aircraft manufacturing plant producing jetfighters and the design house developing them. A few outsiders watched the J-20 fly, as they happened "by chance" to be around the fence of Chengdu factory's aerodrome on that day. The flight itself was uneventful. It took place in the conditions of clear skies allowing photographers to make some good shots. Before touching down, the pilot made several passes over the runway so as to expose his airplane to the cameras of "aviation admirers" all round the place. Those took photos of the aircraft from different angles and depicted everything they wanted except for doors of internal weapons bays. These doors were either thoroughly hidden or removed from the shots by the picture takers on the insistence of very competitive advisers. But it is even more likely that these doors were not actually fitted to the J-20 first operable prototype. They are not needed on the very first operable aircraft dedicated to assessment of flight performance, flight envelope, various engine settings, functioning of the essential onboard systems, proving flight control algorithms. As a rule, third or even later prototypes are devoted to weapons testing, but these are yet to be constructed and outfitted. The J-20 first public flight occurred just in time when US defense secretary Robert Gates was in Beijing on an official visit. Once there, he was trying to calm down the Chinese leaders who were much worried about pending deliveries of modern US-made weapons to Taiwan. Beijing considers this island an essential part of China. A lot of pictures appeared on the Internet on the memorable day of 11 January. These shots gave more information on the new airplane. In particular, they reveal the shape of the wing and its positioning in relation to fuselage. This makes it possible to make some preliminary conclusions about the aerodynamics layout and technical characteristics of the J-20, and make guesses as to the main task the new jet shall be solving after entering squadron service. The J-20 represents a relatively large tactical jet with the canards (foreplanes) and large delta wing. The fuselage length is somewhere between 22 and 24 meters, wingspan between 13 and 14 meters. By our estimation the maximum takeoff weight shall be in the region of 40 tons, and operating empty weight twice less than that. Many aviation experts believe that the J-20 relies on a pair of Russian engines or their Chinese copies. In other words, the J-20's engines are picked out among members of the big family uniting the Item 117, AL-31F, WS-10G and WS-10 Taihang. Two engines together develop in between 30 and 40 tons of thrust. If that is so, then the capability of the propulsion system is enough for supercruise, or supersonic cruise flight at military power (highest power setting without afterburning). We may also expect that the J-20 with restricted fuel and combat load (for instance, when flying air-to-air mission) can fly vertical without losing speed at subsonic regimes and low altitudes. The viewpoint that the AL-31F family engines power the J-20 is now prevailing. It could well be that J-20 operable prototypes have them in real life. If so, it is a good solution for initial testing, to rely on these well-tried and high-performance power plants. But in future the J-20 may appear with other types of engines. There were reports about China having got hold of the AMNTK Soyuz R-79/79M/179 series engines developed for the Yakovlev Yak-141 and other advanced fighter designs, - these were in development but cancelled for various reason. Ideally, the J-20 should have engines optimized for sustained supersonic flight, and the AL-31F is not such. When in-flight photos appeared, the J-20 became the hottest topic for discussion among aviation enthusiasts round the world. But as it appeared, the enthusiasts, and even world-famous western journalists, had difficulty in classification of the new Chinese warplane. Is it a superiority fighter? Is it a supersonic bomber? Or, perhaps, it is a multirole, multimode airplane? Even columnists and experts with world's leading aviation magazines have hesitated to give their clear answer to these questions, - that in the view of them having good sources in the US and European intelligence bodies, defense ministries and the industry. It seems that not only journalists, but the professionals were in a state of shock after seeing the new Chinese bird. First of all, let's determine J-20's center of gravity position. There are some photos available of the J-20 taxiing, in which we can clearly see its long fuselage, wing-to-fuselage connection and landing gears. The J-20 undercarriage is fighter's classics: three-point with a nose gear. And so it makes it easy to determine center of gravity position. To do that we take the main landing gear strut, and attach a line to it starting at the wheel's ground contact point. The line goes up with at an angle of, say, 15 degrees, leaning towards the nose of the airplane. The point where it crosses the fuselage center line is the most likely position for the airplane's center of gravity. Here comes the first surprise: the likely center of gravity position rests... too far from the mean aerodynamics chord (MAC) of the wing. As a first iteration for aircraft designers, the center of gravity must be somewhere 25-35% of the wing's MAC, - like so is prescribed in the classic aircraft design books. But the Chinese airplane appears to have the center of gravity position somewhere at MAC's edge. It is fairly strange for a maneuverable fighter, since balancing of the aerodynamic forces and the gravity will require relatively high deflection of the control surfaces - canards in the J-20's case. Should this airplane try to execute high-G maneuvers at subsonic speeds, the deflection of the canards could be a limitation. All this is rather strange for a maneuverable fighter... But not for the J-20, which does not appear to be one of those! Let's take a look at other available photos, in which the J-20 goes in for landing with landing gear down. Apparently, the canards are set at a rather high positive angle (leading edge upwards), while the wing has its leading edge deflected downwards. The trailing edge surfaces are also deflected down, at rather a small angle. Obviously, at the approach for landing configuration, the wing's center line is highly curved by means of the leading and training edges down, which increases lift (achieved through altering the camber of the wing). But not so much as in the case of the classical flaps. All this is, again, fighter classics for the delta winged aircraft with foreplanes. And here lies their limitation: the pilot cannot set the trailing edge further down, since the resulting lift force that builds up on the trailing edge will be hard to balance with the canards, in the view of their limited deflection scope (canards may stall at higher deflection angles). It is well known from the aviation history how to enable delta-winged airplanes to generate more of the lift force at landing. For that purpose the canards are placed as close to the fuselage's nose as possible, to make a larger distance to the center of gravity. For instance, the Tupolev Tu-144 supersonic jet liner had foreplanes that were retracted into fuselage all the time except landing. But Chengdu designers did not do this. Rather, they positioned the canards fairly close to the center of gravity position, and thus sacrificed their effectiveness at landing for some other purposes. What purposes? Firstly, for non-retractable foreplanes it is important to have them within the supersonic cone as it sets on the top of the airplane's nose at Mach numbers exceeding 1.0. This leads to a conclusion what the Chinese must have been purposely shaping the J-20 for supersonic flying. Why did the Chinese shape the J-20 that way? Perhaps, they are unfamiliar with the classic solutions for a delta-winged, canard-equipped fighter? No, this is not the case knowing that Chengdu's previous design was the J-10 light weight fighter, now in PLAAF service. On its first public flight, the J-20 was escorted by a J-10B twin seater, the operational trainer version of the baseline J-10 single seat fighter. The J-10 was the star of the Airshow China 2008 and 2010, when it flew superbly with the PLAAF display team pilots at the controls. The J-10 is a very maneuverable airplane. This fact is the testimony of the Chinese designers' skills in development of maneuverable fighter aircraft. The J-10 is a classic design with "proper" positioning of the center of gravity, like prescribed in the books. This is clear to tell looking at the main landing gear struts attached to the fuselage somewhere near 15-30% of the wing's MAC. So, let us ask ourselves the same question again: why did the Chinese designers shape the J-20 that way? Here are some suggestions. First, to achieve smooth airflow with desirable parameters at the entry to the engine's fan, the J-20's designers have to make the air intakes rather long - much longer than those on the F-22A Raptor or Sukhoi T-50 (PAK FA or FGFA). As it was put before, the J-20 prototype is likely to be flying on the AL-31s, but in future it may get a new engine type optimized for sustained supersonic cruise, - and that other engine is likely to be longer and require longer air channels. In any case, long air intakes were an important consideration at the design stage. Second, the designers also needed to make air channels S-shaped, so as to hide the fan blades from the radio waves emitted by enemy radars. This is needed for a lower visibility of the airplane. It is worth to notice that the J-20's air intakes resemble those on the Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II ("diverterless" supersonic inlet, DSI). This gives move ground to assert that the J-20 is optimized for supersonic regimes and supercruise, much like the F-35. Third, let us make distribution diagram for the airplane's cross section along the J-20's fuselage centerline. We need to take into account the thickness of the wing, canards and empennage. The diagram appears to be very smooth, - exceptionally smooth! It comes without a peak, running smoothly at approximately the same height from the tips of the air intakes all the way to the engine nozzles. This seems to be the main thing about the J-20. Apparently, the Chengdu designers wanted to make the airplane's equivalent body of rotation as narrow as possible. And they needed to make provision for internal carriage of weapons, which is a characteristic feature of all fifth generation fighters. In actual fact, the J-20 appears to have much smoother cross section distribution diagram than the F-22A Raptor, the F-35 Lightning II and the Sukhoi T-50. Apparently, it required quite an effort from the Chengdu designers and so made them go for compromises on other things. Should the Chendgu designers have made it "classic", they would not have moved the wing all the way towards the engine nozzles. But they did because it was the only effective way to make the airplane's body of rotation as narrow as possible, with the need for big air intakes, air-supply channels and internal weapons bays. Again, this is the main thing about the J-20 design, and it sets it apart from all other known fifth-generation fighters. Other designs have "peaks" some 55-70% down the way from the fuselage nose tip to the engine nozzles (for the Su-27 family aircraft the respective figure is 55-60%, depending on version). A smooth cross section distribution diagram is important for transonic drag. Supersonic aircraft are being designed in accordance with so-called "area ruling". For high Mach numbers (M>2) the distribution diagram is not that important as for the transonic regimes, M=1...1.5. It seems the Chinese designers optimized their new jet for transonic regimes and moderate supersonic speeds. A huge effort on proper shaping of the Su-27 was made by Sukhoi designers in cooperation with TsAGI in order to improve its transonic performance. Three TsAGI's big wind tunnels, the T-112, T-108 and T-109 were used in the process. As a result of very accurate optimization of the fighter's cross section distribution diagram, the Su-27's "wave drag" was reduced by 25% - not before the designers virtually redeveloped the airplane (the initial aircraft was referred to the Su-27, the improved version became known as the Su-27S). My impression from the J-20 is that it is an uncompromised airplane for supercruise, for flying at moderate supersonic speeds corresponding to Mach M=1.4-1.6. Such speeds can be achieved without afterburning. Surely, the J-20 can accelerate to M=2 and faster, but this would require engaging afterburners. In turn, the fuel burn will go high, lowering operational range of the aircraft and enlarging its heat signature. In my view the Chinese designers optimized their new jet for M=1.4-1.6. Here comes the clue: the J-20 is a missile launching platform able to evade enemy interceptors by means of a high cruise speed. The J-20 may prove a good interceptor, - very possibly. But its main task seems to be anti-shipping: firing missiles at enemy warships while denying their air defense cover. One day it may happen that the new Chinese jets would be used in anger. On such a day People's Liberation Army would order its pilots to attack enemy warships off the coast of a freedom-loving island not far from the mainland China. In that sense the J-20 is a likely replacement for the JH-7A strike aircraft. http://www.flightglobal.com/blogs/the-dewline/2011/02/j-20-chinas-ultimate-aircraft.html

thanks i think the PAK FA T-50 will have excellent RCS reduction with the radar blocker

i meant something like this according to some people the PAK FA has no radar blocker

I always liked the MiG aircraft, the MiG-29 and MiG-23 are my favorite MiGs, the MiG-25, MiG-31 are okay and the MiG-1.44 it had the potential to become one of my favorite jets, it is sad to see a dynasty has almost disappeared, the mighty MiG has been eclipsed by Sukhoi, of course i like the Su-27 and Su-24, by the way the Su-24 is one of my favorite aircraft but is sad MiG has virtually disappeared

based upon what i have read and seen, i do not know if the T-50 has or not a radar blocker, i heard they call the jet stealthier than the Su-35, and Su-30, that some reports called it a stealth aircraft or with a 40th of the RCS of a Su-30, i have seen some aircraft have radar blockers like the F-18E which do look like engine blades. I do not think the Russians made a jet fighter with the engine exposed, i say it could be the engine but maybe it is not the picture is not that clear and i see a few differences between the picture of the 117 and the PAK FA inlet i see some details missing plus i have not seen any official report saying it has no blocker, in my personal opinion, i think it will have one or it already has one, however i feel many people say it has not yet one, so i wonder if it has not a blocker then will have one on later batches. any way thank you for your opinion but what i was wondering is if it will have a blocker if indeed we have an official source saying the T-50-1 has no blocker

thats is funny although i like paralay`s forum

thanks do you know if it will have one.

Okay i will thanks no more replies like that

The Problem is the J-20 does not solve any thing, only is a waste of resources like all weapons are, from the point of view i like aircraft, i love speed and agility, but as their real purpose i see no real point in them, the world problems are not going to be solved by weapons, WWII showed, i see more development in the ARJ-21 than in the J-20. Besides the macho image a fighter jet gives to a person weapons are instrument of war i see no point in making weapons that only increase political instability. I love fighters from the point of view of technology and aerodynamics and because they fly fast and are agile, but is very sad to me they are weapons

You have misunderstood me, first i wonder why China needs a J-20? for parades in front of the masses to stirn national feelings of pride and power? or does it only represent a defensive weapon? Can it be used as an offensive weapon? Here is the simple question, why do you need a J-20? The answer might change from person to person, but definitively the F-22 is not making people healthier, happier, or having a better house or have a family well fed and with good future prospects of living. I only see one single purpose to have a stealth fighter, to bully, many expect that China will surpass military and economically the US by 2050 and they think this century will be the century of China, like the XX century was the century of the US. Tell me in what makes me safer to think China is not going to use its fleet of Stealth fighters as offensive weapons? In my opinion China is trying to play the role of the great empire that can build stealth fighters and put men on the space, but i ask you in what economically will help the J-20 to the 1 billion people in China that makes a few US dollars a day? Tell me what is the price of J-20? in my opinion the J-20 shows China wants to play the game of the great powers but this game is making less safer the world. Do you know what is happening in Mexico? do you know many companies go from Mexico to China and this is forcing the Mexican salaries go down? Of course this is not the fault of the Chinese workers, but of the Chinese oligarchy that wants expensive toys but still can not afford to give descent salaries to hundreds of millions of people and that is forcing many countries to cheapen the salaries of their workers. In my personal opinion the J-20 is not a good thing for the world, it only puts more pressure to the world and creates another arms race in Asia and the world.

In my opinion the US will remain a power for many decades to come. China is not going to control the world. The world is only becoming more dangerous, China still is a poor country, disguised as a coming super economic power and rising military, what is the point of having J-20s and a space program if at least a billion of people make less than 4000 dollars a year? Engineers? In Mexico we also graduate many engineers but most of them will go just to control the manufacturing process and very few will go to research and development, definitively i agree having a J-20 makes China a military power of first rate, but the question is are the Chinese people living better than the Europeans or Northamericans (canadians and US citizens)? In Mexico which theoretically we have a better standad of living than China many want to go to the US to live, yes you can have J-20s but it does not mean the general population have a high standad of living. what is the point in having a space program where 1 or 2 guys are in space but one billion are the farmers or labours who work just for a few dollars a day?

Radar blocker or jet engine ? what do you think?

i am looking forward to see it, it like it a lot this new aircraft, looks like a stealthized Su-27 but i love its integral canards aka LEVCONs, what a smart device, really revolutionary jet

i agree with you

i like this jet all russians jets from the mig-23 on i like them