China has already attain the world second largest AirForce???

According to Milicas and Helicas, China has more combat jet and planes than Russia.
How about other sources that also comfirm what stated?

But since China has so much money. It's not a surprise China keep chunking out fighter jets while old planes having good maintenance with the budget.

Lion said:

According to Milicas and Helicas, China has more combat jet and planes than Russia.
How about other sources that also comfirm what stated?

But since China has so much money. It's not a surprise China keep chunking out fighter jets while old planes having good maintenance with the budget.

Click to expand...

I assume this is all combat jets, but what about accounting only third gen and beyond?

If only PLA aircraft that are combat effective against latest generation frontline aircraft are counted then I am sure China's ranking falls by at least a dozen places or more. Sounds like more 'China threat' mongering to me, that or fanboy chest thumping, both undeserved.

numbers wise, china had second largest air force for some time now, after the fall of soviet union.

but even quality wise - it is really getting closer to the top tier air forces.

russia AF was sleeping, lacking money for some 15 or so years. it did little to no modernization during that period. right now they have maybe a 100 fairly modern combat planes, plus some 600 more planes which are technologically still stuck in 1989 or so.

compare that to chinese AF which has some 300 fairy modern planes j10 and j11b, plus 100 su30, plus 170 older but somewhat modernized su27 and j11a. plus 200 or so old but again well modernized with avionics and weapons j8. plus over 500 j7s of various levels of competence.

there are really only a few air forces coming close to that today. france and britain are not in that list, they have too few planes. perhaps israel or japan or such.

Totoro said:

numbers wise, china had second largest air force for some time now, after the fall of soviet union.

but even quality wise - it is really getting closer to the top tier air forces.

russia AF was sleeping, lacking money for some 15 or so years. it did little to no modernization during that period. right now they have maybe a 100 fairly modern combat planes, plus some 600 more planes which are technologically still stuck in 1989 or so.

compare that to chinese AF which has some 300 fairy modern planes j10 and j11b, plus 100 su30, plus 170 older but somewhat modernized su27 and j11a. plus 200 or so old but again well modernized with avionics and weapons j8. plus over 500 j7s of various levels of competence.

there are really only a few air forces coming close to that today. france and britain are not in that list, they have too few planes. perhaps israel or japan or such.

Click to expand...

Quality matters to. I know as soon as I say this, there will be at least 10 forum members jumping out to rebuttal that. But despite how much budget had increase per PLAAF pilot, there is still not as much flight hours per pilot as those Western counterparts. I'm Chinese myself and an uncle of mine is a colonel in the PLAAF, even as recent as last year he told me that they still only have on average of 100 hours a year (if they're lucky). The messed up thing is that his unit is the more elite one, directly facing the Taiwan Strait!

^ I hope you realize how we won't be able to accept that claim without any proof, it is the internet after all.

On the matter of flight hours, there was a thread a few years back that the average PLAAF pilot got a few hours less than US and NATO in flights per year, but it was in that class.
http://www.sinodefenceforum.com/air-force/plaaf-plan-pilot-training-2947.html

As for PLAAF being second largest... well maybe in terms of airframes, and flight hours for some if not most of those airframes as well. But the difference remains whether we're talking only about fighter aircraft or including bombers, transports, tankers, AEW&C, ELINT, SIGINT etc. Looking it in that way, China has a way to go yet, especially with the first three.

Bltizo, you indeed point out where it hurts.

Mature fans emphasis those which do't directly engaging "firing" mission, too.

China is a big country who go through cold war, the number (regarding this thread) is there, plain and simple; the "capability gap" didn't slipt sober minds, either. The distinguish between "the largest" and "(one of, if any) the best" is obvious.

I think in terms if third generation aircraft. PLAAF is not necessary in disadvantage. Besides the Su-27, J-11B, J-10, JH-7A, there is also the J-8F. This account a significant number of modern fighter jet. As for number wise, I think it still counts if the number significantly overwhelm the opponent. If not, USA will not build such a large force in large numbers. USA today's has 18000 all kind of different military aircraft while china stay distant far at 4100, Russia at 3700 plus.

Quality-wise, on average you can say the Chinese Flankers are at least on par with the Russian flankers. Russia has 260 Su-27s and a limited number of other types, while China has somewhere in the range of 200-300 including the Su-30's with the navy, someone will have to correct me on the exact number.

The only other 3rd gen fighter Russia has is the Mig-29.... which no sane person would even try to compare to the J-10. I'm sure the newest versions of the Mig-29 is in the same ballpark as the J-10... but you gotta check out with the Russians actually have in their inventory. I heard a few years back the Russians grounded their ENTIRE Fulcrum fleet... not sure if they got any flying right now.

Only other fighters worth mentioning are the Foxhounds/bats they still have that are partially serviceable.

Correction: Some sources indicate that the Russians have as few as 195 Flankers left... can someone get a more accurate estimate? Wikipedia indicates that the Russians have 195 Flankers, 190 Fulcrums, 147 Foxbats, and 39 Foxhounds for a total of 571 fighters. Wikipedia indicates the PLAAF has 190 J-10, ~280 Flankers, and 180 J-8 for a total of 550 BVR capable fighters, with an additional 190 J-7s.

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