America's NSJ published a commentary on August 27, loudly calling on people to forget the F-35 and F-47, and instead vigorously promote the so-called "seventh-generation fighter" concept, attempting to bet the future air combat dominance on an unformed technological imagination.

The article states that America's next-generation fighter will completely revolutionize the existing operational rules: it will be fully unmanned, driven by advanced artificial intelligence, capable of independently completing complex tasks without pilots, and even making autonomous decisions and executing high-intensity air combat.

In addition, it will integrate quantum radar and quantum encryption communication systems, making stealth fighters unable to hide, and will be equipped with high-energy lasers and microwave directed energy weapons, capable of intercepting missiles, disabling enemy avionics systems, and even directly destroying targets. It can also rely on swarms of drones to conduct coordinated operations, forming a highly distributed, intelligent airborne combat network.

On the power level, the future seventh-generation aircraft is envisioned to rely on combined cycle engines to achieve sustained hypersonic flight above Mach 5, and through full-spectrum stealth technology, achieving low detectability in radar, infrared, and visible light.

The article concludes that the seventh-generation fighter will no longer be a simple flying platform, but rather an aerial command node, capable of integrating all drones, early warning aircraft, and satellites on the battlefield into the same combat network in real time, providing a technical shortcut for the United States to reclaim air supremacy.

American Fighter

This argument reveals a current reality: in the competition between fifth and sixth-generation fighters, the United States is gradually struggling against China.

Although the F-35 remains the most numerous fifth-generation fighter globally, its generation advantage has been eliminated.

The Chinese J-20 outperforms American fifth-generation fighters in stealth design, avionics integration, and long-range strike capabilities.

More importantly, China, relying on a complete defense industry system and efficient production capacity expansion, will gain a clear advantage in numbers: in 2024, the delivery volume of J-20 exceeded 80 aircraft, and in 2025, it is expected to reach 120 aircraft. Meanwhile, the actual procurement number of F-35 by the U.S. Air Force this year was compressed to 24, setting a new low in nearly a decade.

This means that, if the current trend continues, by 2030, the size of the Chinese J-20 fleet may exceed 800 aircraft, while the number of F-35s in the U.S. military will remain around 650 for a long time.

On the other hand, China's carrier-based stealth aircraft, J-35 and J-35A, have entered a rapid mass production phase, complementing the construction of the Fujian Ship and the 004 nuclear aircraft carrier, forming the strongest maritime-air coordination combat system in the Asia-Pacific region by 2030.

At the same time, China's sixth-generation fighters, J-36 and J-50, have taken off, while the U.S. NGAD and F/A-XX projects are still in the stage of scheme evaluation and budget negotiations, without any mature prototype being publicly released yet.

Therefore, the U.S. media began to deliberately shift the focus, promoting the concept of the seventh-generation fighter to shape a new strategic imagination. This is similar to the approach the U.S. took when it fell behind in the 5G standard competition, quickly highlighting 6G technology.

F-47 Image

This mentality is very representative of the U.S.

When the U.S. finds itself gradually approaching or even surpassing China in core technologies and production capacity at this stage, it tends to raise the generation threshold to redefine the competition standards.

In the fifth-generation era, the U.S. established a technological lead with the F-22 and F-35. But when the Chinese J-20 and J-35 rapidly formed a large-scale deployment, and the key technologies such as avionics, stealth, and guidance weapons narrowed the gap, the U.S. could no longer maintain its advantage under the existing rules.

Therefore, U.S. media and the military-industrial complex tend to reset the game rules: shifting the focus of future competition to frontier concepts like the seventh-generation fighter to seize the narrative high ground.

This operation is not only reflected in the military industry, but also widely exists in high-tech industries such as information and communication, semiconductors, and satellite internet. It tries to open up a new imaginative gap by introducing immature technological narratives, thereby weakening China's leading advantage in the current generation.

But aviation equipment differs from communication standards. The core competitiveness of fighter jets is not just who proposes the concept first, but who can convert the technology into combat capability.

If the U.S. cannot reverse the short-term disadvantage in the production capacity of fifth and sixth-generation fighters, even if it secures the technological discourse of the seventh-generation, it will be difficult to change the real balance of power. After all, everyone has imagination, but who can turn PPT into reality is the real thing. Many cutting-edge weapons now show a trend: the U.S. is responsible for proposing concepts and drawing PPTs, while China is responsible for manufacturing them.

Chinese Sixth-Generation Fighter

Therefore, from a practical perspective, it is almost impractical for the U.S. to rely on the seventh-generation fighter for a leapfrog advancement.

All the key technologies of the seventh-generation fighter, including quantum radar, quantum communication, directed energy weapons, sustained hypersonic engines above Mach 5, full-spectrum stealth, and swarm combat networks, are still mostly in the laboratory stage.

Even if there is a principle breakthrough, due to constraints in energy density, material strength, thermal management, and computing power, it will be impossible to form a mature platform for mass deployment in the short term.

On the contrary, China adopts a dual-track strategy: on one hand, it rapidly increases the number of fifth-generation fighters through J-20 and J-35 to form a practical combat advantage; on the other hand, it advances parallel trials of the J-36 and J-50 projects in sixth-generation fighter development, ensuring technological leadership.

More importantly, China's complete defense industry system and supply chain integration capabilities significantly shorten the cycle from concept to mass production of new technologies.

In the next ten years, the key to the air superiority competition will not be in the conceptual promotion of the seventh-generation fighter, but in the large-scale deployment and system integration capabilities of fifth and sixth-generation platforms.

If the U.S. continues to place its hopes on future miraculous aircraft without solving the numerical disadvantage in the current generation, the real combat power gap will only continue to widen.

Original: https://www.toutiao.com/article/7543464408949850678/

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