2019 National Day Military Parade

Deino

Lieutenant General
Staff member
Super Moderator
Registered Member
Are you trying to push the idea that the drone has a fake nozzle?
I think the cameraman purposely avoid taking the nozzle of the sharp sword. however, it is no longer RD-93's round nozzle. I'm not sure if that's for real or just a model.

Not only interesting but even suspicious from the few images posted so far is not only the stealthy nozzle that replaced the regular nozzle of the engine, but IMO the front landing gear looks too small and the intake more like from a mock-up.
 

xiabonan

Junior Member
If you go back 20 years to 1999 and tell the Chinese people back then in 20 years China will have operational stealth jets and supersonic glide missiles people will probably think you're having a wet dream -- and a very very stretched dream at that.
 

SteelBird

Colonel
Not only interesting but even suspicious from the few images posted so far is not only the stealthy nozzle that replaced the regular nozzle of the engine, but IMO the front landing gear looks too small and the intake more like from a mock-up.
Well, I think using mock-up in parade is normal. the question is do they have the real thing and if the real thing looks same as the mock-up one? I also notice many missile have a "G" on is designation which indicates that they have been upgraded.
 

ougoah

Brigadier
Registered Member
Totally conjecture but I think everything of novelty and "importance" shown in the parade is a fake. Not meaning as a mockup - of course the displays are mockups, rather the entire show is using an opportunity to feed disinfo. Most people are not military enthusiasts at all and the propaganda value has been achieved. CCP good, progress, strong etc well done.

The rest is for the actual foreign observers. Whatever geometries and dimensions we've seen is probably an attempt to mislead and confuse. You can't hide things like destroyers, stealth fighters or even anti-ship missiles shown in videos operating and pretty much logged by enthusiasts and observers around the world as they are built and amassed. But for things like hypersonic glide vehicles and new drones just sitting as a mockup, one has to wonder and be skeptical. Why would any sane decision maker/s even allow for actual strategic weapons to be shown so candidly. Especially very new ones.

Stealth nozzle on sharp sword is far from impossible but you got to wonder about the two hypersonics. Way too sensitive. I was surprised they showed anything but the crowds expected something.

At face value, the drone has landing gear and maybe variable geometry. The folds at the end of the wings are supposed to be for subsonic vortices? The Xiamen University experimental hypersonic explored "double-waverider" design and take at look at how that thing looks. I'm not an aeronautical engineer so eyeballing isn't a method but it would still seem like the folds seen on this WZ-8 doesn't seem conducive to hypersonic flight but could be variable for greater controllability during recovery and landing speeds. Rocket engines to sustain hypersonic flight after booster detachment or being dropped from something? Not air breathing that's for sure. Wouldn't be showing such a thing anyway. The Russians and Americans haven't shown off a single hypersonic beyond artist impressions so I guess in this regard, China is strangely transparent.
 

Biscuits

Major
Registered Member
Just because something is advanced doesn’t mean that it doesn’t exist. People now turning to ostrich mentality instead doesn’t change reality. When F-22 entered service, Soviets were still saying stealth is fake, and even if it works, is useless.

Given that nothing at the parade was experimental, it’s no more classified than other in service platforms. None of the Russian or American proposed hypersonic weapons are in service, obviously they would not be shown by the military.
 

enroger

Junior Member
Registered Member
Totally conjecture but I think everything of novelty and "importance" shown in the parade is a fake. Not meaning as a mockup - of course the displays are mockups, rather the entire show is using an opportunity to feed disinfo. Most people are not military enthusiasts at all and the propaganda value has been achieved. CCP good, progress, strong etc well done.

The rest is for the actual foreign observers. Whatever geometries and dimensions we've seen is probably an attempt to mislead and confuse. You can't hide things like destroyers, stealth fighters or even anti-ship missiles shown in videos operating and pretty much logged by enthusiasts and observers around the world as they are built and amassed. But for things like hypersonic glide vehicles and new drones just sitting as a mockup, one has to wonder and be skeptical. Why would any sane decision maker/s even allow for actual strategic weapons to be shown so candidly. Especially very new ones.

Stealth nozzle on sharp sword is far from impossible but you got to wonder about the two hypersonics. Way too sensitive. I was surprised they showed anything but the crowds expected something.

At face value, the drone has landing gear and maybe variable geometry. The folds at the end of the wings are supposed to be for subsonic vortices? The Xiamen University experimental hypersonic explored "double-waverider" design and take at look at how that thing looks. I'm not an aeronautical engineer so eyeballing isn't a method but it would still seem like the folds seen on this WZ-8 doesn't seem conducive to hypersonic flight but could be variable for greater controllability during recovery and landing speeds. Rocket engines to sustain hypersonic flight after booster detachment or being dropped from something? Not air breathing that's for sure. Wouldn't be showing such a thing anyway. The Russians and Americans haven't shown off a single hypersonic beyond artist impressions so I guess in this regard, China is strangely transparent.

The "fold" you mentioned I see them as vertical stabilizer, just there to provide yaw stability, nothing fancy there.

My personal take: I don't think this is "hyper-sonic" in the sense that it glide in atmosphere at hyper-sonic speed. I think the rocket simply boost the thing out of atmosphere, the wings are there for re-entry and glide back.

The reasoning is that anything powered with rocket is going to have abysmal range in atmosphere no matter how good the aerodynamic design is, the worse ramjet powered missile is gonna outrange this thing so why bother with wings and landing gear? Therefore it had to be sub-orbital to make sense.
 
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