I'd say the one on the right side was not shown, it was the larger tailed lambda drone with the weird wing.
Chinese UCAV/CCA/flying wing drones (ISR, A2A, A2G) thread
- Thread starter VESSEL
- Start date
Right, that's the Kratos-like one. It seems like the other one not shown is Type A in @Deino's post. It looks like it might have a top intake and is a larger drone.
Chinese UCAV/CCA/flying wing drones (ISR, A2A, A2G) thread
I hope the PLA decides on a prefix/suffix naming designation for unmanned systems, or to give them specific names not used for manned systems, soon. At least there’s only unmanned attack / 攻击 / GonJi for example, but this (GJ) could be used for manned systems, I guess. Whereas we have...
www.sinodefenceforum.com
Interesting, facing India instead of Taiwan or Japan.
This is the most interesting of the medium CCAs. We've never heard about this one or saw any hints drop over the years unlike the two FH-97 based (judging on looks) CCAs. The various satellite photos of the UAVs parked outside the UAV airbase. Or the CS-5000T, CH-7, and the mystery drone* programs. There were several CH-7 and CS-5000T iterations.
This appears to be considerably higher speed than the others. If the mockup is 1:1 scale, it's approximately 2x mengshi vehicle length meaning it's about 10m in length. It's about 70% the size of the J-50 and J-36 like heavy CCAs.
The engine appears to be at most a mid thrust class (WS-21/19, F414, EJ200) but the nozzle design doesn't appear to allow afterburning. This isn't quite congruent with the aircraft's length to width ratio and its extreme wing sweep angle (almost WZ-8 angle). The shape points to supersonic and even a lower mid thrust engine in the M88 class would give it plenty enough push to go towards mach 2, the lack of afterburning nozzle would suggest it has to supercruise (no afterburning supersonic flight).
*
Last edited:
Video is real. When the video dropped, some people were incorrectly calling it the H-20. It was clearly a UAV and of a distinct planform. You posted the paper in post linked below. It appears (at least in the paper) to be some study into producing a UAV with a common fuselage but exchangeable wings.
This distinct drone is not one of the CS-5000T program's products or the many CH-7 iterations. And yet it was a part of a PLAAF publicity program then pretty much buried and never spoken of again. Might have been rejected or a program that's been cancelled.
So for high tier electronic war, ISR, weapons targeting and guidance sensor network missions there are:
Air to ground focused:
Multirole unmanned fighter "high tier, heavy CCA":
Medium CCA:
Over the years, many other UAVs and programs that produced flying prototypes and either didn't reach service, not yet ready for service or are in service and have not been disclosed.
I didn't include all the CH-1 -> CH-5 UAVs, the WL-1, WL-2, WL-3, MALE UAVs, the Tengden TB-001 heavy bomber, the cargo drones, and all the drones that are smaller than MALE.
- WZ-7 > non-stealth, subsonic, HALE
- WZ-8 > stealthy, >mach 3, high altitude
- WZ-9 > non-stealth, subsonic, HALE
- CH-7 > stealth, subsonic, HALE
- WL-10 >non-stealth, subsonic, HALE
Air to ground focused:
- GJ-11 > stealth, subsonic
- GJ-21 (navalised GJ-11)
Multirole unmanned fighter "high tier, heavy CCA":
- Type A > stealth, supersonic, heavy payload and probably fighter ranged
- Type B > stealth, supersonic, heavy payload and probably fighter ranged
- One unknown high tier heavy CCA they didn't reveal today but was caught on a truckbed a week before the parade.
Medium CCA:
- Type C (FH-97 like) > stealth, subsonic, light payload and lower range than typical fighters
- Type D (FH-97 like) > stealth, subsonic, light payload and lower range than typical fighters
- Type E (Dark Sword modernised?) > stealth, supersonic, light payload and lower range than typical fighters
Over the years, many other UAVs and programs that produced flying prototypes and either didn't reach service, not yet ready for service or are in service and have not been disclosed.
I didn't include all the CH-1 -> CH-5 UAVs, the WL-1, WL-2, WL-3, MALE UAVs, the Tengden TB-001 heavy bomber, the cargo drones, and all the drones that are smaller than MALE.
If we ignore geography and consider a hypothetical sandbox universe, I think China can fight and win wars that are within range with just drones alone. Not a single human soldier or pilot need to even be placed on field.
You have battery powered, rotor propelled drones with machine guns, rifles, grenade launchers numbering in the multi 10s of platform types and total numbers are in the 10s of thousands if you include modified commercial types. Robot dogs and unmanned ground vehicles equipped with everything from a rifle to 20mm, everything from anti-tank missile to short range air defence missiles. You have unmanned submersibles that can take out entire typical sized navies.
PLA is turning into a force where a single branch - PLA, PLAAF, PLARF, PLAN can individually defeat pretty much any military conventionally bar the US. PLARF now has enough ballistic missiles of every range and type that outnumber most militaries have armoured vehicles. PLARF fire off over a hundred SRBM to ICBM missile types in training every year and the factories are shown on satellite producing ballistic missiles like sausages. People even on this forum don't seem to understand how much overkill this is becoming. It's like they're aiming to become 10X USA by 2050 with at least 1 generation ahead in every single military product and technology.
They might consider scaling all this conventional overkill back slightly and focus resources and talent on research and development of completely revolutionary weapons. There's just too much capacity here.
You have battery powered, rotor propelled drones with machine guns, rifles, grenade launchers numbering in the multi 10s of platform types and total numbers are in the 10s of thousands if you include modified commercial types. Robot dogs and unmanned ground vehicles equipped with everything from a rifle to 20mm, everything from anti-tank missile to short range air defence missiles. You have unmanned submersibles that can take out entire typical sized navies.
PLA is turning into a force where a single branch - PLA, PLAAF, PLARF, PLAN can individually defeat pretty much any military conventionally bar the US. PLARF now has enough ballistic missiles of every range and type that outnumber most militaries have armoured vehicles. PLARF fire off over a hundred SRBM to ICBM missile types in training every year and the factories are shown on satellite producing ballistic missiles like sausages. People even on this forum don't seem to understand how much overkill this is becoming. It's like they're aiming to become 10X USA by 2050 with at least 1 generation ahead in every single military product and technology.
They might consider scaling all this conventional overkill back slightly and focus resources and talent on research and development of completely revolutionary weapons. There's just too much capacity here.
Hey everyone, we need to stop with this UASF stuff!
The CGTN English broadcast specifically called the 2 big ones “Unmanned Air Dominance Fighters”.
That’s the name, UADF, we should go with it.
Like we should even delete the posts (mine included) so they’re not on the internet lol. We do, after all, shape a lot of the anglophone world’s terminology when it comes to the PLA.