Meet China's new-old killer drones

[haidian]

Meet China's new-old killer drones
By John Reed Tuesday, January 8, 2013 - 5:51 PM

When you think of drones that will likely be used in a conflict between two advanced militaries, you usually imagine brand new, unmanned stealth jets. But China appears to be taking a different approach. It's converting its ancient Shenyang J-6 fighters -- copies of the Soviet Union's 1950s-vintage MiG-19, the world's first operational supersonic fighter -- into unmanned jets. (Yes, China is also develping brand new drones.)

Converting old fighters into remote controlled jets is nothing new. The U.S. has used retired fighters as unmanned target practice drones for decades. However, China plans to use the old fighters as ground attack jets. We've been hearing about the unmanned J-6 project for a long time now. What's caught people's attention is that China has apparently massed dozens of the jets at airbases in Fujilan province.

Imagine waves of the unmanned jets tying up air defenses while more advanced jets and missiles attack. As this article from 2010 points out, the J-6 drones could be used in conjunction with the Israeli-made Harpy UAVs that are specifically designed to defeat ground-based radars to "punch holes" in the defenses.

Converting manned fighters into drones isn't hard. The U.S. even converted B-17s Flying Fortress into unmanned plane to collected radiation samples from the air over the nuclear blasts during the Operations Crossroads nuclear bomb tests in 1946. In the case of the Air Force's QF-4 Phantom drones, the jets' guns are removed and black boxes connected to the flight control systems are installed in the vacant gun compartments -- allowing ground operators to control the planes.

Unmanned J-6 fighter jets put on Fujian air base

Central News Agency

2013/01/07 17:19:30

Hong Kong, Jan. 7 (CNA) A large number of old J-6 fighter jets that have been converted into unmanned attack aircraft are being stationed at Liancheng Air Base in Fujian province, according to the latest issue of Kanwa Defense Review.

China's Huanqiu.com cited the Canadian online magazine as saying that satellite photos taken on July 31, 2011 showed there were at least 55 of the J-6 aircraft on the base.

The magazine said the air base most likely has more J-6s than any other base in Fujian, showing that the Chinese Air Force attaches great importance to the capabilities of the unmanned fighter.

Reports said the J-6, the Chinese-built version of the Soviet MiG-19 'Farmer' fighter aircraft, was produced by Shengyang Aircraft Corp. and formed the backbone of the Chinese Air Force in the 1960s and the 1970s.

The J-6 fleet was retired in the late 1990s. But because of the J-6s' maneuverability, high thrust-to-weight ratio, and light weight and their suitability for close-distance combat, the planes have since been converted into unmanned attack fighters.

(By Stanley Cheung and Lilian Wu)

剑指钓鱼岛!我空军大量歼-6进驻福建机场

 

[haidian]

more than 3,000 unmanned supersonic flying bombs of J-6 are a total nightmare of any navy ships,including aircraft carriers.

 

[gambit]

more than 3,000 unmanned supersonic flying bombs of J-6 are a total nightmare of any navy ships,including aircraft carriers.

And six bombs...

Will ground them for at least a day. The next day there will be six more. And six more...

 

[haidian]

 

[UkroTurk]

It is the most important news i ever heard. It should be example for Turkey.

J-5's have converted to cruise missile with 2000km range and Convertaion costs only 800.000yuan.
Turkey is being suffered with a lot of projects. Here is the best example, lets do and copy on the retired TurAF fighters.

j-6's have converted to drone with ground attack capacity.

Some USAF Q4 drones also have ground attack capacity with HARM missiles.
This is the J-6 UAV

This is the J5

AS HIGHLIGHTED ON THIS SITE AS A THREAT FOR YEARS: CHINA’S CONVERTED SURPLUS FIGHTER DRONE FORCE EYEBALLED FROM SPACE | AviationIntel.com

QF-4 drone firing the HARM missile.

http://www.defenseindustrydaily.com/more-qf-4s-and-a-new-trick-for-old-dogs-04650/

 

[C130]

could turn these old birds into kamikaze drones.

fly them right into the enemy

 

[Rajput_Pakistani]

And six bombs...

Will ground them for at least a day. The next day there will be six more. And six more...

@gambit
A little off-topic
Okay good job with precision strikes. But I rather find it surprising that 6 Runway intersections are hit, while in the same picture one can see 10 fighters parked in the open, unharmed...
Was it a strategy or error or what?

 

[C130]

And six bombs...

Will ground the

m for at least a day. The next day there will be six more. And six more...

 

[UkroTurk]

Please dont pollute the important topic. I am sory.

 

[gambit]

@gambit
A little off-topic
Okay good job with precision strikes. But I rather find it surprising that 6 Runway intersections are hit, while in the same picture one can see 10 fighters parked in the open, unharmed...
Was it a strategy or error or what?

No error. Damage/destroy the aircrafts and the runway can still host/service other aircrafts. Damage the runway and the base is out of action for as long as it takes to repair the runway.

Look at it this way...You can take away the bullets, but the user can still get bullets from elsewhere. But plug up the barrel, and the pistol is no good.

 

[Hack-Hook]

No error. Damage/destroy the aircrafts and the runway can still host/service other aircrafts. Damage the runway and the base is out of action for as long as it takes to repair the runway.

Look at it this way...You can take away the bullets, but the user can still get bullets from elsewhere. But plug up the barrel, and the pistol is no good.

will it take more than one or two hours to make a damaged runway temporarily flight worthy ?

 

[gambit]

will it take more than one or two hours to make a damaged runway temporarily flight worthy ?

Depends on how good is your runway repair crew.

The USAF have Prime Ribs and Prime Beef...That is not a joke...And Red Horse...

Prime Base Engineer Emergency Force - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Prime RIBS

RED HORSE does it all > Hurlburt Field > Article Display

These units can provide a wide variety of logistics, from tents to earth movers, for %99 of any base's needs, which includes runway repairs.

http://fas.org/nuke/intro/aircraft/facilities.htm

Rapid runway repair is a long, tedious process that is vital to success on the battlefield and in the skies. The main focus in airfield repair is the Minimum Operating Strip (MOS), which the United States doctrinally defines as 15 by 1,525 square meters for fighter aircraft and 26 by 2,134 square meters for cargo aircraft.

Here is an example of that minimum operating strip (MOS) requirement...

If it take you one hr to fill a crater and all you had to fill is just one crater to fulfill that MOS requirement, then you can resume air operations in one hr.

On the other hand, if the enemy saturate or precision strike your runway system, it may take more than a couple hrs to fulfill that MOS requirement.

With this strike by US...

If you repair the center craters and create that MOS, how are you going to get your aircrafts on/off that strip ? You have to refill two craters to regain air operations, either the two at the ends or the two on each runway.

So let us say that you managed to regain air operations in two hrs, what do you think the enemy could do during those two hrs ? A lot of damages elsewhere, perhaps even to vital organs of your war waging capabilities.

Each runway system is different and you can be assured that we have satellite photos of every major air bases and their runway systems in the world to calculate the best possible damage using the least amount of ordnance to produce the longest possible down time to that airfield.

 

[Hack-Hook]

Depends on how good is your runway repair crew.

The USAF have Prime Ribs and Prime Beef...That is not a joke...And Red Horse...

Prime Base Engineer Emergency Force - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Prime RIBS

RED HORSE does it all > Hurlburt Field > Article Display

These units can provide a wide variety of logistics, from tents to earth movers, for %99 of any base's needs, which includes runway repairs.

http://fas.org/nuke/intro/aircraft/facilities.htm

Here is an example of that minimum operating strip (MOS) requirement...

If it take you one hr to fill a crater and all you had to fill is just one crater to fulfill that MOS requirement, then you can resume air operations in one hr.

On the other hand, if the enemy saturate or precision strike your runway system, it may take more than a couple hrs to fulfill that MOS requirement.

With this strike by US...

If you repair the center craters and create that MOS, how are you going to get your aircrafts on/off that strip ? You have to refill two craters to regain air operations, either the two at the ends or the two on each runway.

So let us say that you managed to regain air operations in two hrs, what do you think the enemy could do during those two hrs ? A lot of damages elsewhere, perhaps even to vital organs of your war waging capabilities.

Each runway system is different and you can be assured that we have satellite photos of every major air bases and their runway systems in the world to calculate the best possible damage using the least amount of ordnance to produce the longest possible down time to that airfield.

well , I saw images of Mig 29 and another plane (I guess it was A-10) operating from Dirt runway, I think if your airplane can do such thing

or look at this Mig-21

you can reduce the time needed to fix the runway in case of emergency if your crew knew what they are doing