H-20 bomber (with H-X, JH-XX)

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gelgoog

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AndrewS said:
I think it very likely that 100+ B-21 will be fully produced.
The B-2 programme was only cancelled because the USSR collapsed and the US had global military supremacy.
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Not just that. It was too expensive to maintain. The B-2 even needs its own climate controlled hangars.

AndrewS said:
The Russians are supposed to have a PAK DA stealth bomber prototype being assembled now, but how many go into service is another question, given the struggle to fund the Su-57 stealth fighter.
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"Struggle". The problem with the Su-57 was never funding. It takes time to get a new weapons system out and ramp up production. I would not be surprised if they produced more Su-57s than the US has F-22s.

The PAK DA will replace a lot of legacy aircraft. Right now there are 17 Tu-160, 63 Tu-22M, 55 Tu-95MS operational. The number of Tu-160 aircraft is supposed to increase substantially but I would not be surprised if they built like 80 PAK-DA aircraft.
I expect a flying wing like the PAK-DA to be cheaper to build than a variable geometry aircraft like the Tu-160. If the Russians were that strapped for cash then the Tu-160M2 program that will build whole new aircraft would have never been started in the first place.

AndrewS said:
As for the H-6, I think it's worth keeping this at a low production level, say 6 per year. With a 30 year lifespan, you would end up with a fleet of 180 to act as missile trucks. And they'll still be useful in 50 years time in that role.
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Once the H-20 comes out in numbers the H-6 will make little sense to operate. It does have the advantage of being a twin engine aircraft so it should have less upkeep costs but that is about it. They might all get converted into anti-shipping and tankers. But then again an Y-20 based tanker would also be superior. So their use case in the far future will be kind of low I think.
 
A

AndrewS

Brigadier
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gelgoog said:
Not just that. It was too expensive to maintain. The B-2 even needs its own climate controlled hangars.
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I would disagree with that. Remember how the USAF kept saying there weren't enough stealth bombers.
So they spent a lot of money and money to repair the one that was damaged in Guam in 2010, and even converted the 1st prototype to combat status.

gelgoog said:
"Struggle". The problem with the Su-57 was never funding. It takes time to get a new weapons system out and ramp up production. I would not be surprised if they produced more Su-57s than the US has F-22s.
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Funding is an issue for the Russians. The Russian economy is the same size as 8 years ago since the Ukraine crisis of 2014. At the same time, Russian military spending increased to 5% and has only dropped down slightly to 4.3% currently.

And if we're talking about equivalence, we really need to compare the Su-57 to the combined stealth fighter fleets of the F-22/F-35 or even J-20/J-31. Russia's 10 year production plan only plans on a total of 78 Su-57. That's less that 8 per year on average.

That is continuing low-rate production and not actually a ramp up. For comparison, J-20s took approx 4 years to ramp up to 36-50 per year currently. The F-35 has even higher numbers.

gelgoog said:
The PAK DA will replace a lot of legacy aircraft. Right now there are 17 Tu-160, 63 Tu-22M, 55 Tu-95MS operational. The number of Tu-160 aircraft is supposed to increase substantially but I would not be surprised if they built like 80 PAK-DA aircraft.
I expect a flying wing like the PAK-DA to be cheaper to build than a variable geometry aircraft like the Tu-160. If the Russians were that strapped for cash then the Tu-160M2 program would have never been started in the first place.
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New Tu-160M2 airframes should be fairly inexpensive given that it's an existing airframe, particularly compared to a stealth bomber.
But let's see what happens with the PAK-DA.

From the Chinese perspective, it would be great if Russia had significantly more economic and military heft, but that isn't the case.

gelgoog said:
Once the H-20 comes out in numbers the H-6 will make little sense to operate. It does have the advantage of being a twin engine aircraft so it should have less upkeep costs but that is about it. They might all get converted into anti-shipping and tankers. But then again an Y-20 based tanker would also be superior. So their use case in the far future will be kind of low I think.
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I reckon that an H-6 costs around $80Mn and that a B-21/H-20 equivalent would be at least 500Mn.

So 6 H-6s might cost the same as a single H-20.
But each individual H-6 has a comparable payload of 10-12tonnes and a useful range of 3000km from mainland China.
That is useful when you're talking about big antiship missiles or cruise missiles.
 
tphuang

tphuang

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I think it's a given that B-21 procurement numbers will be greater than that of B-2, since it would need to replace B-2 and B-1s. Based on what I can gather, USAF has 45 B-1Bs and 20 B-2s still in service along with 76 B-52s. That does not sound like a lot. The reality is that you don't need a lot of strategic bombers when they have combat radius of over 5000 km. A lot of their bomb truck roles will be taken over by strike aircraft like F-15E or UCAVs. As time goes on, the reality of procurement and maintenance cost for strategic bombers will limit their numbers. As such, I doubt B-21s will replace B-2/B-1B on a 1-to-1 basis over the next 20 years. I also doubt that B-21s will replace B-52s on a 1-to-1 basis. You simply don't need it and can't afford it. Similarly, China probably doesn't need that many H-20s. 50 H-20s can probably achieve all the strategic goals that China has.

I'm pretty pessimistic about Russia's aerospace defense industry and resources. They were only able to buy 21 aircraft in all of 2021 (including fight jets, trainers, transport, everything). It's been that way for a couple of years now after they purchase 80 to 100 aircraft a year back in middle part of last decade. At this pace, they will have a hard time putting a full squadron of Su-57s into service before 2025. I seriously doubt they will have the resource to finish PAK-DA development in the foreseeable future.

For H-20, a fleet of 50 H-20s might allow 20 of them to be available at any given time (if we go by the heavy maintenance cycle that one would expect for such an advanced aircraft). That may not sound like a lot, but it would be sufficient to rotate through a conflict and take out pretty much any military base in surrounding area. You really only need to maintain 2 or 3 H-20s in the air and bombing target military base. How else would be able to do that outside of USAF?

I was taking a look at maps this morning to just understand the strategic impact of H-20s. I don't think I need to rehash its ability to take out military installations in Northern India/Japan/Guam/Okinawa, but it's impact goes further than that. By placing H-20 takeoff point at Spratley island, it would be able to attack major Australian naval bases and put the north coast ones out of service for large part of a conflict. That would be huge in a battle. By operating H-20s out of Kashgar, it would have the range to support a Chinese carrier group in action across the Gulf of Hormuz and maybe even Gulf of Aden. It would be very capable of putting all the Indian air/naval bases out of action if the two countries were to get in a war. That would be huge in allowing PLAN carrier groups to win decisive battle against IN and IAF in Indian Ocean. At the moment, PLAN really cannot stop India from interrupting the all in important trade route from Middle East to East Asia.

I think PLAAF would be more focused on improving payload and range of H-20s vs replacing H-6s. The H-6s will be around until they are too old to use. They will be around until probably 2050 or later. They can fire those humongous ASBM and LACMs that don't really make sense to carry with H-20. The point of H-20 is being able to fly undetected over a naval base and take it out with a lot of bombs. Adding more payload would give H-20 greater destructive power. Adding range increases the number of missions they can fly on. It allow them to support PLAN carrier groups and LHDs in more offensive scenarios. You can't really get that with J-20s unless they start setting up a lot of oversea bases.
 
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Andy1974

Senior Member
Registered Member
tphuang said:
I think it's a given that B-21 procurement numbers will be greater than that of B-2, since it would need to replace B-2 and B-1s. Based on what I can gather, USAF has 45 B-1Bs and 20 B-2s still in service along with 76 B-52s. That does not sound like a lot. The reality is that you don't need a lot of strategic bombers when they have combat radius of over 5000 km. A lot of their bomb truck roles will be taken over by strike aircraft like F-15E or UCAVs. As time goes on, the reality of procurement and maintenance cost for strategic bombers will limit their numbers. As such, I doubt B-21s will replace B-2/B-1B on a 1-to-1 basis over the next 20 years. I also doubt that B-21s will replace B-52s on a 1-to-1 basis. You simply don't need it and can't afford it. Similarly, China probably doesn't need that many H-20s. 50 H-20s can probably achieve all the strategic goals that China has.

I'm pretty pessimistic about Russia's aerospace defense industry and resources. They were only able to buy 21 aircraft in all of 2021 (including fight jets, trainers, transport, everything). It's been that way for a couple of years now after they purchase 80 to 100 aircraft a year back in middle part of last decade. At this pace, they will have a hard time putting a full squadron of Su-57s into service before 2025. I seriously doubt they will have the resource to finish PAK-DA development in the foreseeable future.

For H-20, a fleet of 50 H-20s might allow 20 of them to be available at any given time (if we go by the heavy maintenance cycle that one would expect for such an advanced aircraft). That may not sound like a lot, but it would be sufficient to rotate through a conflict and take out pretty much any military base in surrounding area. You really only need to maintain 2 or 3 H-20s in the air and bombing target military base. How else would be able to do that outside of USAF?

I was taking a look at maps this morning to just understand the strategic impact of H-20s. I don't think I need to rehash its ability to take out military installations in Northern India/Japan/Guam/Okinawa, but it's impact goes further than that. By placing H-20 takeoff point at Spratley island, it would be able to attack major Australian naval bases and put the north coast ones out of service for large part of a conflict. That would be huge in a battle. By operating H-20s out of Kashgar, it would have the range to support a Chinese carrier group in action across the Gulf of Hormuz and maybe even Gulf of Aden. It would be very capable of putting all the Indian air/naval bases out of action if the two countries were to get in a war. That would be huge in allowing PLAN carrier groups to win decisive battle against IN and IAF in Indian Ocean. At the moment, PLAN really cannot stop India from interrupting the all in important trade route from Middle East to East Asia.

I think PLAAF would be more focused on improving payload and range of H-20s vs replacing H-6s. The H-6s will be around until they are too old to use. They will be around until probably 2050 or later. They can fire those humongous ASBM and LACMs that don't really make sense to carry with H-20. The point of H-20 is being able to fly undetected over a naval base and take it out with a lot of bombs. Adding more payload would give H-20 greater destructive power. Adding range increases the number of missions they can fly on. It allow them to support PLAN carrier groups and LHDs in more offensive scenarios. You can't really get that with J-20s unless they start setting up a lot of oversea bases.
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How would China attack a US base on their west coast? I guess H20 won’t have the range, and there is probably no winning a war with the US without attacking it’s homeland.
 
tphuang

tphuang

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Andy1974 said:
How would China attack a US base on their west coast? I guess H20 won’t have the range, and there is probably no winning a war with the US without attacking it’s homeland.
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I must say that I find the premise your statement to be alarming. Aside from the fact that it would be a suicidal mission, invading another country unprovoked would also be quite awful. China is having a great renaissance due large part to the current open flow of trades/goods between different countries. China's main goal would be keep this flow of trade going. The only territory it really wants to take over is Taiwan for the obvious reasons. It would be very alarming to other countries in the world if China was to go beyond that.

I brought up the idea of attacking India military bases, because a conflict between India and Pakistan could potentially lead to India trying to stop China's flow of trade. As such, China would need to be prepared to defend its trade route in Indian Ocean. I bright up the need to attack Australia naval base because they may assist USN carrier group in the event of a situation where US tries to shut down ships heading to China. Similarly, being able to attack around the Gulf of Hormuz and Aden are important to keep bad actors from interfering with the flow of oil/trade out of the region. The end goal of all these missions are to keep China's economic engine going. The need to win a war over Taiwan is what leads to the requirement to be able to bomb air bases in Japan, Okinawa and Guam. That's why you will never hear me speculate about an attack into Russia Far East or Japanese population centers. There is no sound reasons why China would want to do that.
 
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Andy1974

Senior Member
Registered Member
tphuang said:
I must say that I find the premise your statement to be alarming. Aside from the fact that it would be a suicidal mission, invading another country unprovoked would also be quite awful. China is having a great renaissance due large part to the current open flow of trades/goods between different countries. China's main goal would be keep this flow of trade going. The only territory it really wants to take over is Taiwan for the obvious reasons. It would be very alarming to other countries in the world if China was to go beyond that.

I brought up the idea of attacking India military bases, because a conflict between India and Pakistan could potentially lead to India trying to stop China's flow of trade. As such, China would need to be prepared to defend its trade route in Indian Ocean. I bright up the need to attack Australia naval base because they may assist USN carrier group in the event of a situation where US tries to shut down ships heading to China. Similarly, being able to attack around the Gulf of Hormuz and Aden are important to keep bad actors from interfering with the flow of oil/trade out of the region. The end goal of all these missions are to keep China's economic engine going. The need to win a war over Taiwan is what leads to the requirement to be able to bomb air bases in Japan, Okinawa and Guam. That's why you will never hear me speculate about an attack into Russia Far East or Japanese population centers. There is no sound reasons why China would want to do that.
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I think you quite misunderstood my comment.

I certainly didn’t say invade, nor did I hint at an unprovoked attack.

I can try to clarify, in a war with the US, China will need to attack America, it needs a way to bomb military installations in the continental US.

I am not sure why this is alarming. Considering it is the US that is warmongering, and in a war situation is only one side allowed to attack the others homeland?
 
tphuang

tphuang

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Andy1974 said:
I think you quite misunderstood my comment.

I certainly didn’t say invade, nor did I hint at an unprovoked attack.

I can try to clarify, in a war with the US, China will need to attack America, it needs a way to bomb military installations in the continental US.

I am not sure why this is alarming. Considering it is the US that is warmongering, and in a war situation is only one side allowed to attack the others homeland?
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In any realistic war scenario between the two countries, it would happen in Western Pacific in the first or second island chain. As such, bombing military installations in continental USA would be suicidal and waste of resources. At best in a distance future, you can probably argue for a scenario where they need to strike Honolulu or maybe Alaska, but PLAN carrier group would need to be far further along than where it is now. Attacking the west coast of USA simply would not help China in a war. The USN carriers aren't there. USAF bases are not going to be flying from West Coast either. What purpose does it serve to launch those types of attacks?

If you want to stop USAF from getting involved, you have to be able to bomb airbases that allow their presence near China. That's H-20's mission area.
 
W

weig2000

Captain
Andy1974 said:
I think you quite misunderstood my comment.

I certainly didn’t say invade, nor did I hint at an unprovoked attack.

I can try to clarify, in a war with the US, China will need to attack America, it needs a way to bomb military installations in the continental US.

I am not sure why this is alarming. Considering it is the US that is warmongering, and in a war situation is only one side allowed to attack the others homeland?
Click to expand...

I agree with you and understand the context of your original statement. It might be better to qualify your statement though.

I don't ever remember I have read anyone at SDF suggest or even imply that China would initiate an attack on CONUS or even Japan for that matter. It's always in the context of China being attacked first, which unfortunately is a real possible scenario that has been regularly discussed by various adversarial countries of China, and China would need reciprocal response. I don't think China has ever had any plan to attack foreign countries preemptively.
 
A

AndrewS

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Andy1974 said:
How would China attack a US base on their west coast? I guess H20 won’t have the range, and there is probably no winning a war with the US without attacking it’s homeland.
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China doesn't actually need to attack the US West Coast.
It's 10,000km across the vast Pacific Ocean from Asia to the USA.

If the small number of bases in the Pacific Ocean can be permanently or constantly neutralised, both China and the USA have no way to reach each other across the Pacific.
 
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