H-6 Bomber Aircraft Discussions

Facing enemies that'd need supersonic/stealth (or both) bombers is out of China's league at this point, or they could accomplish with the use of 2nd artillery's conventional ballistic missiles. At this point, besides nuclear strike missions, in offensive roles the H-6 is used either as level bomber (with dumb iron bombs, haven't heard they moved to use JDAMs or sort, though it's technically possible to deliver them in pre-programmed mode, drop at pre-designated points) or missile carrier, deliver heavy anti-ship missiles or cruise missiles.

But nevertheless, H-6's carry capacities, be it in weight or physical volume, is nowhere near B-52 or Tu-95, a real disadvantage. If China want to maintain a fleet of bombers in its battle order, the new one needs a significant improvement in carry capacities, even for a stand-off ordinance carrier.

The US wants to be able to bomb any country in the world. China only military targets in its neighborhood. Most of those targets don't move and are fit for bombardment by Second Artillery. Some, especially ships, demand an other approach. China doesn't need the long range and high capacity of B-52 or Tu-95 nor a long range stealth bomber like B-2.
But it is odd to see these aircraft which all flew about 55 years ago, still soldiering on. Why, the WWI strategic bomber Avro 504 ( bombing airship sheds at Cologne and Friederichshafen in 1914 ) was last used in war, for electronic reconnaissance, in mid 1940, only a quarter of a century later.

delft said:

Most of those targets don't move and are fit for bombardment by Second Artillery. Some, especially ships, demand an other approach. China doesn't need the long range and high capacity of B-52 or Tu-95 nor a long range stealth bomber like B-2.

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Second artillery is not that accurate, and besides they dont have that many long range missiles. And do you think that targeting USN and JSDF ships with H-6 will be easy or even doable? Sure, if PLA has air supremacy above western pacific. Something that i doubt will happen

kroko said:

Second artillery is not that accurate, and besides they dont have that many long range missiles. And do you think that targeting USN and JSDF ships with H-6 will be easy or even doable? Sure, if PLA has air supremacy above western pacific. Something that i doubt will happen

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2nd artillery is getting far more accurate, with terminal guidance in their latest missiles. Ships can be attacked by flanker variants or JH-7s, or AShBM later. Anything beyond that distance isn't a matter of concern. H-6K with the 2500-3000 km range CJ-10 will have a very capable stand off capability, and if there is a rotary weapons bay which remains, it shoudl be able to hold current and future PGMs. With D-30 turbofans and WS-10 in future it should allow for better fuel economy and loiter time over battlefields acting in a mini B-52 role.
no one expects H-6 to survive against modern, capable adversaries.

Asymptote said:

Yeh, H-6/H-8 is over 60 years old now. While US is still using the the almost 70 years old B-52, and Russia with their almost 70 years old Tu-95 - there is a huge difference between US, Russia and China - Both US and Russia have very capable supersonic strategic bombers since 1970s (B-1B Lancer and Tu-160 Blackjack respectively) that's still highly advanced by Chinese standard, and American already has stealth bombers for more than 20+ years thats another generation ahead of Russian.

China basically has more than 2+ generations of catch-ups to do.

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The bottleneck lies in designing and building large aircraft, more than anything. The technology for a B-2 like bomber, I think is there (with J-20 stealth is there, the FBW won't be difficult, and the aerodynamics should be the easiest part), but chinese aerospace engineers don't have the experience of building large planes nor does the PLAAF have a need yet for such a class of bomber.

Although the emergence of stealth bomber might favor for China's future strategic bomber development since large supersonic turbo-jet engine is not a requirement (B-2 flies at subsonic speed) therefore it can reuse the same H-8 engines, but American is already looking at (and secretly developing) hypersonic stealth bombers.

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Actually I think the USAF are looking at building 80-100 new "cheap" B-2/X-47B UCAS type bombers to replace B-52s... I don't think we will be seeing hypersonic bombers for a while, espiciailly when ballistic missiles (re AShBM and CPGS) can do similar tasks... Or hypersonic bombers will be space based.
We'll see how well the Y-20 and C919 projects go, which will be important for future development of large aircraft.
If the PLAAF do decide to acquire completely new bombers, I'd prefer one like the USAFs NGB, more of a large, slow, stealthy B-2 analogue than a fast B-1 type.

delft said:

But it is odd to see these aircraft which all flew about 55 years ago, still soldiering on. Why, the WWI strategic bomber Avro 504 ( bombing airship sheds at Cologne and Friederichshafen in 1914 ) was last used in war, for electronic reconnaissance, in mid 1940, only a quarter of a century later.

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That's because what used be bomber's are now done by other aircraft with more flexible roles and less upkeep, and only those who need to deliver extremely large amount of ordinance, large sized ordinance and long endurance mission profile would still need to operate bombers. For China, with PGMs becoming the norm and modern aircraft that can carry almost just as many dumb iron bombs as H-6 did, what leaves would be carrier for large sized ordinance like cruise missiles, be it for anti-ship or land attack profile.

And as aerial tanker HY-6 is just a intermediate solution, for its capacities make it not an ideal platform; it could still serve as electronic warfare platform but ultimately should move onto 2-seater heavy fighter variant like J-11.

I don't think you've googled Avro 504! Otherwise, I agree with you.

H-6's strength is its range.

Assuming US carrier group is 800km from Chinese shore, H-6's range means it can fly around the carrier group and attack from the behind. Facing H-6, however backward it is, the carrier group must provide coverage for all directions. That means E-3 must fly close to the carrier and fighter patrol must cover the rear-end too.

Without H-6, E-3 can be placed 100km to 150km in front of the carrier and the fighters only need to patrol the front and side directions against Su-30MKK and JH-7.

H-6 flight over Nanjing city, ture photos:

according to kanwa, latest variant can carry LT and LS JDAM type guide bomb,bomb load 3x plus higher than JH-7,this hint that the bomber carry rotary launcher,around mid-2010,report from top81 report existance of rotary launcher for H-6(and possible future bomber),rotary launhcer allow guided bombs to be release one at a time to attack high value target .
aside from new power ,it also reduced her RCS .