Posted on 01/06/2011 2:27:44 PM PST by lbryce
China is still years away from being able to field a stealth aircraft, despite the disclosure of images indicating that it appears to have a working prototype, Pentagon officials said on Wednesday.
The images have been posted on a number of websites and were published on the front page of The Wall Street Journal on Wednesday. The Pentagon said they appeared to show a Chinese J-20 stealth fighter prototype making a high-speed taxi test.
The disclosure of the photographs comes just days before U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates is due to travel to Beijing on Sunday, and analysts could only speculate about the motives for their sudden appearance.
"This might be just a way of demonstrating that whatever obstacles there might have been (to China developing these technologies), they've overcome them," said Randy Schriver, a China expert and former State Department official for Asia.
The pictures are likely to heighten concerns about China's military buildup, including possible deployment in 2011 of its first aircraft carrier and a new anti-ship ballistic missile seen as a threat to U.S. aircraft carriers.
Some analysts say that the J-20 photos, if authentic, are a strong indicator that China is making faster-than-expected progress in developing a rival to Lockheed Martin's F-22 Raptor, the world's only operational stealth fighter designed to evade detection by enemy radar.
But U.S. Vice Admiral David Dorsett, director of naval intelligence, said deployment of the J-20 was years away.
"It's still not clear to me when it's going to become operational," he said. "Developing a stealth capability with a prototype and then integrating that into a combat environment is going to take some time."
He dismissed any suggestions that the Pentagon had underestimated China's stealth capability.
(Excerpt) Read more at reuters.com ...
I wonder what secrets the Clinton administration sold to the Chinese to help them develop this.
I know they did abscond with rocket technology making their missiles more accurate.
Is this the same Pentagon that said no problem with gays in Military? The same Pentagon that had not clue what that contrail was off the west coast? Well i feel better now....NOT.
Iran is also years away from developng a nuke.
These were taxi tests. Flight testing comes later. The journey to air supremacy begins with a single step...
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I always believe its safer to give your enemy more credit for advances, than less. Not to mention, it seems that our intelligences estimates have been consistently wrong when it counts.
You forgot the big one, thoughit was a long time ago. Something around the lines of the Soviets won’t have nukes for another 30 years when they got them just a few years after said comments were made.
Huh is this the same mentality that made a similar guess on the Japanese navy in 1941? and the F-35 is going to save the day!
J20 is not the weapons platform it is purported to be.
what's more concerning is... this is a long range fighter
As Political correctness and “Diversity” erode our scientific and engineering capability there will come a time when the Chinese will dominate. This particular aircraft may or may not dominate but it sure demonstrates they are trying. We will decline they will rise.
“The United States hopes to field a successor to the F-22, known as the F-35, in the coming years, and news of faster-than-expected Chinese stealth technology could add pressure on Lockheed Martin and the Pentagon to speed development.”
The F-35 is NOT a successor to the F-22, right?
The Chinese Stealth fighter cannot top the new US invisible bomber.
5000 of them would not be a good edge for us.
No more that the F-16 was a successor to the F-15.
F-22 is far superior to the F-35.
“J20 is not the weapons platform it is purported to be.”
It appears to be stealthy from only certain angles. The back, in particular looks like a big ass signature, to me.
This makes me think it is a test bed (using stock engines), or they don’t care about rear attack.
Being stealthy on 5 sides is pretty good, as you have a big IR signature on the back, anyway.
Be good for hitting a target like Taiwan.
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