China's J-20 Fighter Is Now a 'Clear Threat' to the F-22 Raptor
What You Need to Know: China's Chengdu J-20 stealth fighter has rapidly evolved, threatening to surpass the U.S. Air Force's F-22 Raptor. China's ability to mass-produce advanced warplanes like the J-20 contrasts sharply with the limited number of U.S. F-22s, hindered by a sluggish defense industry and bureaucracy.
-While initially outclassed, the J-20 now rivals the F-22 in capabilities and has penetrated Taiwan's defenses undetected. With mass production and technological parity, China’s J-20 could outlast the U.S. in attrition warfare.
-If the U.S. fails to reconstitute F-22 production and lower defense costs, China may gain a critical advantage.
China’s J-20 Outpaces the American F-22
There is a severe, and growing, imbalance in fifth-generation warplane capabilities when one compares the United States Air Force with the capabilities of the People’s Liberation Army Air Force (PLAAF). It might surprise you that the imbalance that now exists between the two competitors no longer favors the Americans.
That’s because China’s high-tech sector has grown by leaps and bounds over the last couple of decades and these technological capabilities have been bolstered by China’s long-time advantages in mass production.
The Americans, meanwhile, are mired by a sclerotic defense industry and elephantine defense bureaucracy that more often stifles innovation than it does spurs it on. What does it say when communist China is more innovative and less bureaucratic than the supposedly capitalistic Americans?
China Can Mass Produce Advanced Planes Now
A recent report by my colleague at the Asia Times, Gabriel Honrada, shows how China has completely flipped the strategic script on the Americans. This is at a time when China’s military is similarly flipping the strategic script on the Americans in basically every area of the military competition that exists between the two great powers.
For instance, China now has such a comprehensive advantage in anti-access/area-denial (A2/AD) systems in the Indo-Pacific that most military experts in Washington are dubious about the prospects of penetrating deep inside Chinese territory in the event of war.
Chinese technology has so thoroughly caught up with the wayward Americans that China, not the United States, has a working arsenal of hypersonic vehicles. China is working on radical new submarine technologies that can stymie their American rivals.
That, and the Chinese are mass-producing a navy that outnumbers the Americans.
Now they’re doing the same with their fifth-generation Chengdu J-20 warplane which is Beijing’s answer to America’s F-22A Raptor. Indeed, new assessments of the J-20 show how this advanced platform has just about caught up to the American F-22 in significant ways. Initially, this plane was nowhere near the F-22.
After a decade of refining the design, China has created a system that recently penetrated advanced air defense systems protecting Taiwan so well that the Taiwanese had no idea that the Chinese stealth warplane was there.
The Chinese not only have a fifth-generation bird that can challenge the F-22 but they can mass produce these things. At the same time, the American fifth-generation warplanes, notably the F-22s, are limited in number and far too complex to easily maintain. What’s more, Americans cannot afford to keep expanding their limited numbers of F-22s, especially since the Obama administration prematurely cut the F-22 program in 2009 and 2010.
America is Going to Lose to China via Attrition
Whereas before Honrada’s revelations, it was always assumed that even a small amount of F-22s could rebalance any fight with China in America’s favor, now that Beijing has married their mass production capabilities with advanced technology in the J-20, American advantages are all but gone.
The F-22, while not entirely a wasting asset, will become very costly to deploy into war with China, notably if there are rival J-20s on the other side of the line. China could conceivably lose countless units of its J-20 and still be in the fight. If the Americans lose even a small number of their F-22s in combat, replacing them will prove difficult.
Washington needs to figure out how best to reconstitute its F-22 production line quickly and the Pentagon must start lowering all defense industrial costs before the next world war erupts, it is likely starting soon.
Otherwise, the United States will lose simply via attrition.
Author Experience and Expertise: Brandon J. Weichert
Brandon J. Weichert, a National Interest national security analyst, is a former Congressional staffer and geopolitical analyst who is a contributor at The Washington Times, the Asia Times, and The-Pipeline. He is the author of Winning Space: How America Remains a Superpower, Biohacked: China’s Race to Control Life, and The Shadow War: Iran’s Quest for Supremacy. His next book, A Disaster of Our Own Making: How the West Lost Ukraine, is due October 22 from Encounter Books. Weichert can be followed via Twitter @WeTheBrandon.
All images are Creative Commons or Shutterstock.
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