sunday, november 3, 2024

Chinese stealth fighter J-20 could incorporate Meta materials

Chief Engineer Yang Wei, piloting the J-20 program, reported the use of Meta-materials and composites ”in the design of the Chinese J-20 stealth fighter. Meta-materials are materials with very specific physical and electromagnetic properties, some having negative refractive indices of EM waves, light or sound, thus making them invisible to radars, sonars and optical systems. This statement reinforces the idea that Chinese research, far from lagging behind Western research, is now starting to match or even surpass it in strategic areas. 

In many respects, China has drawn inspiration from the Western model for its research programs: State laboratories working closely with laboratories and private companies, for the benefit of Defense programs with substantial State funding. In addition, Chinese academics are encouraged to create their own companies with the assurance of benefiting from public budgets to further boost national research. 

If, 20 years ago, Chinese research was in its infancy, it has largely caught up since then, China being the country which files the most commercial patents in the world, and its share of industrial patents continues to increase. grow.

At the Defense level, China proceeded in two stages:

  • During the 2000s, it massively acquired technologies from the West, particularly in France, with significant technological transfers. When the transfer was not possible, it proceeded by reverse engineering, and did not hesitate to produce Russian (Su-27, Su-33) or European (rattlesnake missile) equipment without a license, certain that the market that it represented for industrialists compensated for the desire for intellectual property.
  • From the 2010s, it transferred its technological acquisition budgets to Chinese research, with clearly stated ambitions. 

Thus, in less than 20 years, China will have managed to raise its Defense research to the level of that of the most advanced Western countries, such as the United States, France or the United Kingdom, otherwise focused on low-intensity conflicts. non-technological (Afghanistan, Iraq, Mali, etc.) and the 2008 crisis.

We see the consequences today. Less than 30 years after the great ideological victory of the West over the communist bloc, China, but also Russia, finds itself in a position of strength, from a military and technological point of view, facing the "victors" of the Cold War , to the point that General Mattis must recognize that the American forces had lost their land and naval supremacy in the face of these two countries, and to note that the Pentagon is today in a form of noticeable feverishness in terms of Defense programs.

The J-20 constitutes a perfect example of this situation: long neglected by Westerners who considered it too big, who thought that the canard designs reduced its stealth, and that its onboard electronics were inefficient, the Chinese plane which , although barely 30 examples have been built to date, is already in service in the People's Liberation Army, displays a very weak radar signature in the frontal sector, integrated Meta materials, a very efficient AESA radar, and will probably soon be equipped with adjustable nozzles significantly increasing its maneuverability. In addition, an onboard naval version is reportedly in preparation to equip aircraft carriers with Chinese catapults and arresting strands which should enter service from 2022.

Now all Western allies in the Indo-Pacific region view this device with respect and concern. Not bad for a country which, barely 30 years ago, had only managed to produce a modified copy of the mig19...

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