PLA AEW&C, SIGINT, EW and MPA thread

[shen]

The early radar plane they developed for detecting the constant U-2 overflight is best described as an AWAC today. They developed it because they weren't able to stop the constant U-2 overflights by the joint CIA/CAF at the time. It was an inelegant solution that didn't work. They were only able to down the U-2s via the Soviet SA-2 batteries. I am sorry I cannot find a text source for this. It was on one of the History channel documentaries. Perhaps it was one about the U-2. I will try to find it.

Please don't rely on History Channel as a serious source. I just watch a HC documentary today in which dowsing was presented as a serious archeology tool. History Channel should be in an episode of this.

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Why would China need a airborne radar to detect high flying U-2s? Ground based radars can track U-2s just fine, shooting it down was the hard part.

 

[volleyballer]

Like what others had pointed out, China already had their own Link-16. Secondly... if there are actual and real evidence found in Taiwan selling the E-2 and its tech to China, it will be all over US sites too. But as of now, all you manage to give is a Chinese source which might again not be very accurate (think about it).

I would really like to see this Chinese Link-16 equivalent, could you provide a source for me to study up on? Re: the spy op news source, it was Taiwanese and I saw a news clip on YouTube of the Major in question being taken into custody.

Thirdly, even if such sales actually happen, would it be that the Chinese are more interested in knowing the technology of the US, not to reverse engineered it, but to actually jam it in case of war.

The more I think about it, the more this actually makes sense to me. Jamming is a crucial ability to have. Still, I don't doubt that there would be some useful data to be had from the E-2.

Plus... people had been throwing this reverse engineering thingy around pretty often. Let me tell you something, reverse engineering is not easy, you would need to have an equal base of technology to do it and many a time, to design something new is easier than to reverse engineered that stuff. And reverse engineering is different from copying blindly.

I really don't discount RE at all. It's an extremely difficult art. Hasn't anyone see the Paycheque? Michael Jenning was brilliant. Haha. Seriously though, RE is extremely difficult. I've done software RE work as well as basic hardware RD before, and it was HARD. Really an art.

 

[Blitzo]

Reverse engineering does not exist here, since Phalcon was a joint project between China and Israel to begin with.

Fair point. I think the A-50 phalcon for PLA was one of the only real "joint development" projects that the PLA has undertaken with another nation since it began its modernization. Needless to say they got a good deal, as they retained a lot of the knowledge from the A-50 phalcon knowledge to develop their own fairly independently (with "sightseeing" Israelis coming into china occasionally too of course!)

Amusingly, India is now flying the same AEWC that China had paid to develop. I wonder who got the most out of this deal.

 

[latenlazy]

I would really like to see this Chinese Link-16 equivalent, could you provide a source for me to study up on? Re: the spy op news source, it was Taiwanese and I saw a news clip on YouTube of the Major in question being taken into custody.



The more I think about it, the more this actually makes sense to me. Jamming is a crucial ability to have. Still, I don't doubt that there would be some useful data to be had from the E-2.



I really don't discount RE at all. It's an extremely difficult art. Hasn't anyone see the Paycheque? Michael Jenning was brilliant. Haha. Seriously though, RE is extremely difficult. I've done software RE work as well as basic hardware RD before, and it was HARD. Really an art.

I think the common narrative is that whenever China is acquiring Western technologies their purpose is to reverse engineer and study it to advance themselves. This was certainly true as late as the early 2000s, but is becoming increasingly less so as China's technological base improves. That said, whenever a foreign technology is acquired, it would be malpractice not to extract everything one can from it, which includes studying potential new and different technologies as well as developing countermeasures. The former becomes less prominent as a country that's technologically behind catches up, which is why the reverse engineering narrative is becoming a worn one.

 

[i.e.]

Amusingly, India is now flying the same AEWC that China had paid to develop. I wonder who got the most out of this deal.

true,

but china got the most.

that "failed" program basically jump started its domestic Airborne Active Phased Array early warning radar program. now you will see generations of products coming out, while India will still be kept buying whatever israelis feels like to sell them.

 

[tphuang]

The ROCAF operate E-2Ks, which have Link-16 and an upgraded central computer. Obviously the Chinese would be interested in this since their own equivalent of Link-16 is still in development, but moreover they should also be interested in the sensor data the E-2K gathers.

PLAAF has their own version of datalink. I don't know what the name is, but if you read Chinese forum, you'd know it exists. If you look at PLAN ships, they all have link-11 equivalent. There is no reason to believe that PLAAF doesn't have datalink. It actually sounds pretty ridiculous.

Now the point is that even if they did manage to get info on E-2K recently, it still can't possibly end up on KJ-500 project since it is already so far along in the project.

This is something that you have to watch out for. People have to be realistic about timeline and what's available at the time.

 

[Deino]

We are getting closer ....

 

[hardware]

Here's a better pic that surfaced.

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the small rectangular lid likely house ESM,multiply spiral antenna targeting different RF.this allow KJ-500 to passive tracking of either airborne or ground emitter.
aside from the ESM(which likely to retrofit exisitng KJ-2000 and KJ-200 fleet),KJ-500 may adapt GaN microwave chip,result is the KJ-500 do not need a large antenna similiar to KJ-2000.this make the antenna more compact without sacrifice KJ-2000 radar performance.
the small bulge on the antenna a SATCOM?or IRST? hawkeye IRST was mounted on the top of the antenna,this allow hawkeye to track ballistic missile.

 

[Quickie]

So, the platform aircraft is a Y-9? It looks bigger than a Y-8.

 

[Jeff Head]

Just for historical purposes, and a fact few people are aware of, the first PLAAF AWACS was made from a Soviet Tu-4 aircraft, which was a completely reversed engineered US B-29.

The Soviets got three B-29s when damaged aircraft landed in Russia and were interred, and then never returned. Stalin ordered them reverse engineered and a Soviet version made. By 1947 the Soviets had fielded the aircraft. This was the Tu4 and about 850 were made. They served with the Soviet Air Force until the mid 1960s.

In 1953 Stalin gave 10 Tu-4s to the PRC and they used one of these to develop the KJ-1, which was the first AWACS for China. The radar dome was too heavy for operational use and the program was cancelled in 1971.

However, China continued to operate the Tu4s until 1988. They were the oldest B-29 derived aircraft to remain in active military service.

The B-29 first flew in 1942, so they served in one military form or another for 46 years. I believe that the B-52s, (1952) the Tu-95s (1952) and TU-16 (1952)/H-6 (1959) bombers are the only large bomber aircraft to have served longer. In 6 or 7 more years, the Tu-22M/TU-26 Backfires will also surpass it.

Here's the single PLAAF AWACS Tu-4. I believe the aircraft is stored in Datangshan, China to this day.

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