The J-10 fighter The Chinese military has been working for more than 20 years to develop the J-10 fighter, a multi-role single-engine and single-seat tactical fighter, with a combat radius of 1,000 km. The program has seen numerous setbacks, including the crash of a prototype in 1995, which led to a 3-year suspension of the program. Defense News reported this week that the Chinese military had finally deployed approximately 40 J-10A single-seat fighters to two air bases in southern China. Now comes word of a mysterious military plane crash in Guangdong Province. From the AP:
As the J-10’s active duty status was only announced by the PLAAF on December 29, 2006, it would be extremely embarrassing for the Chinese if it was a J-10 that had crashed. The plane was intended to tap into a lucrative export market, and last April the Pakistani air force expressed interest in purchasing as many as 36 J-10s. The mysterious crash of an unidentified military aircraft in southern China may cause the Pakistanis, and others, to reconsider investing in a plane that the “the U.S. Office of Naval Intelligence estimated . . . could be as manoeuvrable as the U.S. F/A-18E/F Super Hornet.”
