March 22, 2020
China's Air Force Is Growing Fast, But It's Mostly Fly Old Planes
Out with the old.
by Sebastien Roblin
Key point: Roughly 33 percent of the PLAAF and PLANAF’s combat aircraft are old second-generation fighters of limited combat value against peer opponents.
The People’s Liberation Army Air Force of China and its sister branch, the PLA Naval Air Force, operate a huge fleet of around 1,700 combat aircraft—defined here as fighters, bombers and attack planes. This force is exceeded only by the 3,400 active combat aircraft of the U.S. military. Moreover, China operates a lot of different aircraft types that are not well known in the West.
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However, most Chinese military aircraft are inspired by or copied from Russian or American designs, so it’s not too hard to grasp their capabilities if you know their origins.
https://nationalinterest.org/blog/buzz/chinas-air-force-growing-fast-its-mostly-fly-old-planes-134867
