A flying symbol of industrial might

What can the West learn from China's new stealth bomber?

On 26 December 2024 China shocked the world with the public debut flights of two apparently 6^th Generation combat aircraft: one is a crewed, three-engine stealth bomber (above); the other is uncrewed, smaller and has been dubbed a “drone mothership”.

Western experts are still trying to mentally reverse-engineer the two aircraft, in order to work out their potential specs, payloads and combat roles. But the fact that they are being flown at all is significant.

It took just ten years from the PRC flying a prototype of the J-20 – its current 5^th generation fighter - to the start of mass production: there are now nearly 200 in service.

On a similar timetable, China could by 2035 have a fleet of aircraft that matches, or outmatches, anything Western air forces can muster – backed of course by its formidable produce-at-scale defence industry.

We are probably still a long way from China achieving its ideal standard for 6G combat air: no crew, no sound, no radar signature.

But the takeaway for UK decision makers is clear: our own 6G project, GCAP, had better work! And we need to find some money and a wider group of partners for it.

In this edition of Conflict & Democracy - written as always for politicos, not aviation geeks – I will explore the implications of the new Chinese stealth bomber for Western defence industrial strategy, and indeed global security.

What do we know about the Chinese stealth bomber?

First, we don’t know its name. Researchers at the China Aerospace Studies Institution (CASI) codenamed it in advance as the H-20, so I’ll use that for now.

We know it has no tail fin, for stealth reasons. We know it is big, so that it can either carry a heavy payload, or a lot of fuel, or a computer big enough to perform AI-related tasks.

We know that the three engines are likely to contain different technologies: probably two are for one kind of flight, the third for something different.

The PRC-affiliated website The China Academy suggests the third engine could be designed to operate at altitudes close to the boundary between the atmosphere and space (80-100km above sea level), dubbing it a “space battleship”

Others, including veteran aviation journalist Bill Sweetman, suggest a more prosaic explanation: the middle engine is used for takeoff and cruise, while the two outer engines are used to manoeuvre the plane without a tail fin.

The designers working on GCAP and its European and American equivalents (FCAS and NGAD) will no doubt be debating the implications.

Operationally, the potential uses of a big stealth plane match several tasks in China’s defence doctrine. In a war to conquer Taiwan, which Xi Jin Ping has mandated the PLAAF must be ready for by 2027, the key concept is what China calls “counter-intervention”.

Assuming the invasion force overwhelms Taiwan’s military and any local US forces, “counter-intervention” is designed to stop the USA hitting targets inside the PRC itself and retaking the island, using the China’s own stealth fighters, ground-based air defence and long-range missile strikes against US bases and ships.

A big, long-range, high-altitude stealth aircraft would certainty add to that capability, especially if it were accompanied by uncrewed aircraft. It could take out the AWACS and tanker aircraft the USA needs to operate against China; it could also hit aircraft carriers and US bases across the region.

In addition, if the new plane is capable of carrying a nuclear weapon, or a hypersonic missile, it would extend the range of the PLAAF’s airborne nuclear deterrent across most of south-east Asia.

The USA has currently three stealth aircraft that could attack into a multilayered Chinese air defence: the F-22 Raptor, the F-35 and the highly classified B-21, a long-range bomber which first flew in 2023 and has three prototypes currently under testing.

The USA’s 6G stealth fighter, known as the Next Generation Air Dominance (NGAD) programme, has flown as a prototype but was paused last summer, while Congress haggles over the cost and technologists consider the rapidly changing technological challenges.

What does it mean for the USA – and for us?

The USA is already laser-focused on China as a strategic threat. As the DOD reported to Congress earlier this month, China has outpaced the US on the military development of AI, matched it on most aviation related technologies and is ahead on hypersonics.

China has fused its military and industrial base, together with seven militarised research universities, into an economic complex that could out-produce, and possibly out-innovate the West in any war.

We also know the Chinese timetable: 2027 for being ready to invade Taiwan, 2035 for completing force modernisation (ie being able to match the USA, operationally and technologically), and 2049 for “returning China to the centre of the world stage” – ie becoming the dominant superpower on the planet.

So there should be nothing surprising about the appearance of the H-20: by the time it is in service, say in 2035, the PRC intends to have a conventional and nuclear force capable of deterring the USA from any armed clash.

By the mid-century – well within the lifespan of such an aircraft - it intends to be able to shape the reality of the world by force, just as America did after 1945.

The role of a stealth bomber in that endeavour is therefore more than just operational: it is political. It is meant, at the very least, to signal China’s ability to dominate south-east Asia, to keep US forces out of the region and to strike its enemies deep.

But it also raises strategic uncertainty. If China ever did achieve its goal of producing an uncrewed, soundless and 100% stealthy aircraft, the implications would be huge – since that is not publicly a current goal of any Western combat air programme.

An uncrewed aircraft could withstand higher speeds, G-force and altitudes. It could operate at the edge of space. And if it were substantially autonomous it would be operating within an ethical framework that no Western military has yet adopted.