China Unveils New Stealth Fighter Aircraft

Just in time for US Secretary Gates' visit to China this week, China's military has pulled another fast one.

Just days ago, a stream of photo and video footage began leaking into blogs and mainstream news sites. The subject at hand is a sleek, black, very low-profile stealth fighter aircraft emblazoned with the distinguishable Red Army star and the "Ba Yi" (八一or 8/1) emblem. The emblem denotes the founding of the Chinese People's Liberation Army on August 1st, 1927.

The J-20 (also called J-XX or "Black Eagle") comes as the latest in the "J" series of aircraft to be produced by one of China's leading aircraft design firms, the Chengdu Aircraft Industry Group.

What is a Stealth Fighter?

As the word "stealth" implies, a stealth aircraft is employed usually for clandestine military purposes. It is an aircraft designed primary to evade or at least delay its detection, thus rendering an element of surprise when sprung upon an adversary.

A Short History on Stealth Technology

The deployment of stealth aircraft as a concept is nothing new.

Early forms of stealth in air combat emerged in the form of camouflage - painting of the exterior surface of an aircraft to match its surroundings. As early as World War I, an aircraft's upper surfaces were painted to match the ground features so as to reduce detection by other aircraft flying above. The underbelly of an aircraft bore blue or white paint to match the sky while being viewed from below. See the accompanying image of a Luftwaffe Messerschmitt Me-109 fighter plane painted to match its desert landscape while flying for Erwin Rommel's Afrika Korps.

Other early forms of aircraft stealth include design features to reduce detection on radar systems. The World War II-era De Havilland Mosquito fighter bomber was able to evade detection on German radar by employing a body and control surfaces made primarily of plywood and fabric - materials that don't readily show up on radar detection systems. Only the Mosquito's small engines were made entirely of metal that reflected radar waves. This aircraft - when flown in smaller squadrons - either flew unseen by German radar, or were sometimes mistaken as flocks of birds.

Modern Stealth Features

What raises eyebrows on the announcement of China's new fighter jet are design features that appear to rival the design of US-made stealth fighter aircraft such as the Lockheed Martin/Boeing F-22 Raptor. Not surprisingly, the Chinese J-20 looks very much like the F-22 also.

China's J-20 features may include:

- Subsonic Flight - The ability to fly and maneuver at subsonic speeds eliminates all detection due to the loud "shock wave" impulse heard on the ground when aircraft flying at (supersonic) speeds faster than sound pass over.

- Low-Visibility Profile - To avoid visual detection, a stealth fighter aircraft presents a low visible profile. This reduces the chance of being detected by human eyes as well as by horizon-scanning technologies.

- Low-Heat Profile - As all modern jet aircraft produce heat, so do they produce a "heat signature" which can be detected by infrared-seeking technologies. Heat-seeking defense technologies can home in of an aircraft through the heat emitted by the jet's engines and thus knock it out of the sky. The new J-20's feature set may flaunt low-heat emission design, thus rendering it less likely to be detected due to heat emmissions.

References:

The First Stealth Fighter: The De Havilland Mosquito, John Meléndez for Yahoo!

China's Development Of Stealth Fighter Takes U.S. By Surprise, Los Angeles Times

China Offers Peek At J-20 Stealth Fighter, (US) Air Force Times