US Military News, Reports, Data, etc.
- Thread starter tphuang
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Lethe
Captain
My takeaway is more holistic. These platforms and their enabling systems are enormously complex and require considerable ongoing investments in logistical support, training, maintenance and upgrades. That there's a lot more to maintaining an effective force than simply building lots of aircraft, ships and munitions is one of the reasons I've been less bullish than many others about China's ability to produce more and more and more of absolutely everything, because the costs of maintaining and supporting that growing force will balloon also. I suspect that the situation we've seen develop in most nations over time, each for slightly different but often related reasons, whereby ships, aircraft, vehicles, etc. are being maintained in service for ever longer periods of time, is actually less than optimal, and that a more rapid turnover of platforms and systems would deliver superior results in terms of capability vs. life-cycle costs.
In China's case, past platforms have been maintained to exhaustion even amidst the rapid induction of new platforms in part because envisioned future force structures have loomed ever larger. At some point, that will no longer be the case, and the emphasis will shift to maximising the potency of the existing force structure within more fixed parameters. With its demand-side economies of scale serviced by a vast manufacturing base and unparalleled numbers of scientists, engineers and technicians, China is probably better placed than any other nation to implement and maintain a high-potency, rapid turnover strategy going forward.
TL;DR: The lesson to be drawn from poor or declining availability is not that e.g. USAF or Boeing are incompetent; the lesson is that you shouldn't be expecting to operate these aircraft for >30yrs in the first place.
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With age comes experience so the older average fleet age compensates for the lack of flight hours for pilots.
The Block IIs don't have the updated avionics and they're still using first generation AESA radars with GaA modules. They're old. And really the only advantage the Super Hornets have is that they're based on carriers so they can project power from unexpected vectors. Putting them on land kills this advantages, so why would anyone want to do that unless they have no alternatives. Also, where the heck is this basing going to come from. The American basing options in the Western Pacific aren't amazing, and they're already taken up by USAF and Marine planes.
I think that you're a bit off about China's situation. Right now, they've actually been retiring fighters much faster than the US is. All the Su-27s and Su-30s are gone, the J-7s and J-8s are either gone or reserved for training units, and the PLAN will probably get rid of the J-15s soon even though they're essentially new. The actual number of fighters hasn't increased all that much; they've just been replacing old planes with brand new ones at a very high rate. Right now, the retiring still isn't over yet and I imagine they're going to start on the older J-10s and J-11s.
Honestly, this is what the Americans should have been doing, so I'm going to call them out for incompetence. They should have gotten rid of their old junk ages ago, but because they were still capable platforms for the US' endless expeditionary wars, they're useless fighting against a foe with a fully modern air force. To date, this only matters in a conflict against China, but that's the fight that the Americans are psyching themselves up for.
According to IISS 32 su-27 and 97 su-30 still in service. 100 J-11A still in service. 150 J-7 still in service.
Lots of older planes are still in service. Moreover, PLAAF total fighter jet count is now 2500, which is much higher than before. So they are expanding their fighter jet count as well.
I wouldn't assume that these outlets are going to have accurate numbers. In any case, we know that the PLAAF has been rapidly retiring these planes, and that any that are still left are going to be in tertiary roles. Also, it's worth noting that, aside from the Su-27s, these planes are going to be around 20 years old or newer. In comparison, the backbone of the USAF is the F-16C/D, and these planes average to 30+ years old.