Date Posted: 28-Jun-2012
Images suggest Shenyang's fifth-generation fighter is on the move
Robert Foster - Correspondent - London
An airframe that may be a new Shenyang Aircraft Corporation (SAC) fifth-generation fighter, photographed in China in June 2012.
A series of images published on Chinese defence websites show what may be the long-rumoured, but never seen Shenyang Aircraft Corporation (SAC) fifth-generation fighter prototype being carried on a Chinese truck.
While early images of the airframe showed it on a Shenyang-to-Beijing highway, more recent pictures suggest the aircraft was moved to the China Flight Test Establishment (CFTE) base at Yan Liang in Shaanxi province.
While analysts have speculated that the airframe is a SAC fifth-generation fighter prototype, which was first publicised in a 1997 US Office of Naval Intelligence report on threats to US naval forces, the manner in which it was transported - roughly covered on a flatbed trailer - suggests it may be a ground-based testbed rather than a prototype envisaged for flight.
An airframe that may be a new Shenyang Aircraft Corporation (SAC) fifth-generation fighter, photographed in China in June 2012.
The SAC fighter programme is believed to be a privately funded venture that was approved after a SAC fifth-generation prototype featuring canards reportedly lost to the Chengdu Aircraft Corporation's (CAC's) J-20 stealth fighter design, which has been in flight-testing since late 2010. The fact that the SAC fighter is privately funded may explain the lower security surrounding this airframe.
In September 2011 Shenyang unveiled a radio-controlled model of an "F-60" fighter that it built with the Shenyang University of Aeronautics and Astronautics (SUAA). Like most Chinese technical universities, the SUAA is heavily involved in research to support defence companies and the People's Liberation Army.
An airframe that may be a new Shenyang Aircraft Corporation (SAC) fifth-generation fighter, photographed in China in June 2012.
The F-60, which may be intended to complement the larger and heavier J-20, is a twin-engine conventional fighter that resembles Lockheed Martin's F-22 and F-35 aircraft and similarly features a planform and internal weapon stores intended to reduce radar cross-section (RCS). In 2005 Chinese sources suggested that CAC was considering a fighter similar to the F-35, which may have prompted a competing design from SAC.
Chinese commentators also suggest that a stealthy medium-weight fighter design could also form the basis for future naval carrier-based combat aircraft that might complement or succeed the SAC J-15, which is based on the Sukhoi Su-33 and due to enter service onboard the Kuznetsov class carrier, ex- Varyag .
Shenyang Aircraft Corporation (SAC) unveiled an F-60 fifth-generation prototype in September 2011.
Shenyang Aircraft Corporation (SAC) unveiled an F-60 fifth-generation prototype in September 2011.