The 97 number is from Defense News, which described it as if it were the total number of F-35s to be delivered to all international F-35 customers, not only US customers (USAF, USN, USMC).
"Until now, Lockheed predicted that the first F-35s loaded up with what’s known as the Tech Refresh 3 (TR-3) update could be delivered by the end of the calendar year, but the company now estimates that the first delivery won’t occur until sometime between April and June 2024. As a result, the company anticipates that a
total of 97 F-35s will be delivered in 2023, down from a previous estimate of anywhere between 100 to 120, the company said in a statement."
The difference between "produced" and "delivered" is somewhat different, because in aircraft production parlance, completion of the airframe doesn't necessarily mean the aircraft has finished production. Integration of the software is rather important, and that is of course why the TR-3 enabled F-35 airframes that were produced by Lockheed won't be accepted by customers this year which is why they're stating 97 F-35s will be "delivered".
In terms of actual airframes "produced," Lockheed are still expecting to build 156 this year.
"Lockheed said it is continuing F-35 production,
expecting to build 156 this year, while continuing to work on finalizing the development and testing of TR-3′s software."
As for what was originally meant by the "more 5th gen than US this year" statement, if we want to be really anal retentive, we can view the permutations of possibilities based on whether 萌虎鲸 was referring to F-35s delivered versus F-35s produced this year in 2023, and whether he was referring to F-35s intended for the US or not or whether it meant total F-35s...
But I have a feeling he probably didn't think about it that carefully when he wrote it, so, and I doubt he is aware of how many F-35s of 97 delivered this year or 156 produced this year (respectively) are intended for the US, so I suspect he referred to the total number of F-35s in both instances (the right column).
Which basically leads us to the question of is he suggesting China this year will build or deliver 97 J-20s this year or build or delivery more than 156 J-20s this year (to make his statement true) -- and I would be somewhat surprised if it was the latter, because in 2023 we are not expecting J-20 production this year to exceed the 150 mark yet.
So putting it all back together, it's probably just an esoteric way of saying that he anticipates China to build or deliver some 100 odd J-20s this year. And even despite all that we can't really specify whether he is referring to "build" or "deliver".
.... and this is why I often don't like these kind of vague Weibo quote posting where we have to do so much work just to reverse engineer what the intentions of their statements are.
| US F-35s only | Total F-35s |
Referring to F-35s "delivered"
(97 airframes) | No. of J-20s > No. of the 97 F-35s intended for US | No. of J-20s this year >97 |
Referring to F-35s "produced"
(156 airframes) | No. of J-20s > No. of the 156 F-35s intended for US | No. of J-20s this year >156 |
