Unlikely any time soon or during initial release of the H-20. Chinese Hypersonic missiles tend to be based on ballistic missiles as glide vehicles for now. We haven't seen much evidence of air carried missiles and these things will take a very long time to develop.
H-20 bomber (with H-X, JH-XX)
- Thread starter Deino
- Start date
I think we are more likely to see H-20 with VLO subsonic cruise missiles. Whatever hypersonic missiles they do design for H-20 need to be stealthy and fit nicely inside H-20. You don't want the missiles themselves to give away H-20 position
Yeah the missile truck role for all types of missiles was what I was thinking of, just did not have the words. The maneuverability can indeed be tones down for that, and we would expect a first tailless design to be more challenging. High maneuverability in addition to RCS, speed, payload and range requirements may indeed be too challenging and costly.
I was thinking, with a larger plane than the J-16, would a larger nose radar also be possible? The larger nose radar would give it substantially greater detection range. It can act as a stealthy sensor node and armed recon platform as well, and be able to engage in ground strikes against moving targets as well. That would be a capability not yet seen, since a strategic bomber is too valuable to spend on a recon role, while a fighter has a relatively smaller and less capable radar.
Similar thoughts here. This has the potential (maybe?) of being a LO platform for carrying hypersonic weapons, like what we've been seeing H-6 varients do lately. Create a weapons bay big enough for one or maybe two
The sensor node is a very interesting application, but personally I would advise caution on trying to integrate too many roles onto a single platform, as it may lead to high R&D costs (both financial and time-wise), possible high purchase costs and potentially a platform that can perform many roles but not optimized for any one.
That said, using the same base platform and make different sub-variants focusing on different things is certainly doable, and imo a very attractive idea on such a relatively large and LO platform.
wow I didn’t realize it saved my unfinished previous reply draft and sent that out as well….
what I meant in the first part is if it can hold one or two ALBM (like what we saw last November at Zhuhai on that H-6), it would have some quite serious potential at both deep strike and anti-ship missions.
what I meant in the first part is if it can hold one or two ALBM (like what we saw last November at Zhuhai on that H-6), it would have some quite serious potential at both deep strike and anti-ship missions.
American are doing hypersonics too but it is still vaporware as of now.
In other words a stealthy 5th gen mig31.
Remember this from early December 2022?
Welp, looks like the Americans have the same thought that they would like to put into place in the future:
Boeing (picture 1 and 2) and Lockheed Martin (picture 3) came up with concepts of stealthy tanker aircraft and transport aircraft based on the blended wing body (BWB) design in 2023 AIAA SciTech Forum and Exposition held in Washington DC last Monday.
There are several key goals for pursuing this kind of BWB design for the future tanker aircrafts and transport aircrafts by the US military:
1. Stealth - Reduce detectability and risk of enemy interception
2. Survivability - Able to operate in higher-risk environment
3. Payload capacity - More onboard payload capacity permitted
4. Fuel efficiency - Airframe design reducing fuel consumption
5. Range - Increased fuel efficiency enxpands effective operational range
In my opinion, these stealthy BWB tanker aircrafts would accompany US bombers and fighters across the Pacific and/or Arctic and refuel them en-route on their deep penetration strike missions and/or nuclear strike missions against military and civilian targets in China and Russia, for that matter. This is broadly similar to what I have described in the my previous post as per quoted above.
The increased payload capacity, fuel efficieny and range of these BWB tanker aircrafts would allow US bombers and fighters to massively reduce their dependence on refueling tankers stationed at air bases and airfields that are closer to China, i.e. along the First and Second Island Chains, which can be pretty vulnerable in case of war with China. This will certainly and significantly pile upon the challenges faced by the PLA, as they would have to extend their strike coverage even further out into the EastPac in order to cover US military installations along the Third Island Chain, including Hawaii.
In my previous post as per quoted above - Said stealthy tanker aircrafts, i.e. HU-20 by China is based on a modified version of the H-20 bomber. Although technically the concept should be sound and workable, yet it may still be a stop-gap measure only. The design requirements into making the H-20 would have reduced the meaningful payload capacity onboard the HU-20, when compared to proper refueling tanker aircrafts like the YU-20.
Therefore, at the same time as finding and improving upon methods to counter these stealthy BWB tankers aircrafts and transport aircrafts coming from the US, I think China should kickstart the research-and-development work for her own stealthy tanker aircrafts and transport aircrafts too. Sure, the stealthy BWB tanker aircrafts and transport aircrafts would have larger RCS than the VLO bombers (i.e. B-2, B-21, H-20), but they are still very effective at shrinking down their RCS compared to conventional airframe designs that we see across transport aircrafts and tanker aircrafts of today.
This is especially as we are expecting that China's wartime operational coverage in the Pacific (and Indian) Ocean(s) would be extended further and further towards the east, north and south in the future. China needs viable methods and mediums to achieve that aim, which I believe could be lying on stealthy BWB airframes.
Welp, looks like the Americans have the same thought that they would like to put into place in the future:
Boeing (picture 1 and 2) and Lockheed Martin (picture 3) came up with concepts of stealthy tanker aircraft and transport aircraft based on the blended wing body (BWB) design in 2023 AIAA SciTech Forum and Exposition held in Washington DC last Monday.
There are several key goals for pursuing this kind of BWB design for the future tanker aircrafts and transport aircrafts by the US military:
1. Stealth - Reduce detectability and risk of enemy interception
2. Survivability - Able to operate in higher-risk environment
3. Payload capacity - More onboard payload capacity permitted
4. Fuel efficiency - Airframe design reducing fuel consumption
5. Range - Increased fuel efficiency enxpands effective operational range
In my opinion, these stealthy BWB tanker aircrafts would accompany US bombers and fighters across the Pacific and/or Arctic and refuel them en-route on their deep penetration strike missions and/or nuclear strike missions against military and civilian targets in China and Russia, for that matter. This is broadly similar to what I have described in the my previous post as per quoted above.
The increased payload capacity, fuel efficieny and range of these BWB tanker aircrafts would allow US bombers and fighters to massively reduce their dependence on refueling tankers stationed at air bases and airfields that are closer to China, i.e. along the First and Second Island Chains, which can be pretty vulnerable in case of war with China. This will certainly and significantly pile upon the challenges faced by the PLA, as they would have to extend their strike coverage even further out into the EastPac in order to cover US military installations along the Third Island Chain, including Hawaii.
In my previous post as per quoted above - Said stealthy tanker aircrafts, i.e. HU-20 by China is based on a modified version of the H-20 bomber. Although technically the concept should be sound and workable, yet it may still be a stop-gap measure only. The design requirements into making the H-20 would have reduced the meaningful payload capacity onboard the HU-20, when compared to proper refueling tanker aircrafts like the YU-20.
Therefore, at the same time as finding and improving upon methods to counter these stealthy BWB tankers aircrafts and transport aircrafts coming from the US, I think China should kickstart the research-and-development work for her own stealthy tanker aircrafts and transport aircrafts too. Sure, the stealthy BWB tanker aircrafts and transport aircrafts would have larger RCS than the VLO bombers (i.e. B-2, B-21, H-20), but they are still very effective at shrinking down their RCS compared to conventional airframe designs that we see across transport aircrafts and tanker aircrafts of today.
This is especially as we are expecting that China's wartime operational coverage in the Pacific (and Indian) Ocean(s) would be extended further and further towards the east, north and south in the future. China needs viable methods and mediums to achieve that aim, which I believe could be lying on stealthy BWB airframes.
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this is dangerous, as even a moderate decline in RCS would greatly reduce tanker detection distance by hundreds of km which is all is needed to go from "too dangerous to operate" to "within tolerable risk".
maybe if a H-20U project is too ambitious, a payload module where some of the internal bays can be retrofitted with extra tanks to mix between a pure buddy tanker, an extended range lower payload version, and the base model, could be useful.
In addition, there can be more creativity in munitions, such as an extended range version of the Shahed. A 3500-4000 km flying range Shahed-ER style drone that can be dropped in the dozens would be devastating if launched from shore but even more devastating to a much wider variety of targets if launched from the air.
Yes, those stealthy BWB tanker aircrafts having larger RCS than the VLO bombers certainly is a big minus in terms of stealthiness and survivability in high-risk airspaces. However, those BWB tanker aircrafts are not going to accompany the VLO bombers all the way to their designated mission areas - They are only going to fly as far as they need to refuel those VLO bombers before they make a U-turn and head back to base. Only those VLO bombers will continue towards their target.
Instead of having to fly over Canada or Alaska, those BWB tanker aircrafts only have to fly to the Bering Sea, the Arctic Ocean or the Central Pacific at most, where US and allied military installations would be sparse and far apart, hence reducing the chances of interception by US, Canadian and/or Japanese fighters, for that matter.
HU-20 isn't exactly ambitious or out-of-bound per se, but a new refueling platform resulted from the need of a stealthy refueling platform that would extend the H-20's combat range all the way to CONUS. But a modification option for some base variant H-20 units to be fitted with fuel tanks and refueling drouge only (instead of bombs or missiles) should do the trick as well.
Shahed-like loitering drones is useful for Ukraine, Iraq, Yemen and Syria, i.e. countries that has flimsy to zero effective anti-air defenses against larger warplanes, let alone drones. But for countries with fully established and integrated layers of SAM network and even dedicated anti-loitering drone systems like the US and China, deploying Shahed-like loitering drones against targets with substantial anti-loitering drone system coverage is going to be very difficult and suboptimal.
Besides, sending H-20s all the way from China and across the Pacific/Arctic just to attack targets on CONUS with Shahed-like loitering drones is going to be very wasteful. A better way of employing these loitering drones would be housing them inside containerized launchers, while being carried onboard normal container ships. They can be concealed amongst other normal shipping containers, which would then be activated to launch loitering drones once within range of its targets, which can be achieved when the container ships are around or within CONUS territorial waters.
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They could even send them to Mexico, Cuba and even Canada or the US and let them there with predetermined targets. before an attack. Some could even been let in place for a long time around CONUS.
A bunch of GERAN2 style drones coming from Jamaica, Mexico or Haiti could be quite hard to point finger on and still reach quite a lot of targets.
Even on heavily guarded border like Mexico, these would be hard to intercept. Small smuggling planes are passing a lot carrying migrant and drugs to the US.
H-20 and their tankers would have a long way to go, I could see them come from the north and south but not accross the Pacific. It would be quite hardcore even for these.
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