Back in the 80s of the last century, when I was in elementary and junior high school, I became a teenager military fan, super fond of all kinds of military aircraft, fighters and bombers, especially domestic fighters.
At that time, I was always dissatisfied with the nose air intake tract of our Air Force's J-5, J-6, J-7 and J-8 fighters, and thought that this was definitely a manifestation of backward technology. I have always thought that the J-5 fighter is the most advanced and powerful fighter of our Air Force, and the main reason is that the J-5 has air intakes on both sides, the nose is pointed, and there is a thorn.
For a long time, I subconsciously felt that a good plane was one with a spike in the nose. From J-7 to J-20, I have also witnessed my journey from a young boy to a middle-aged man.
At that time, I especially hoped that our country's J-7 fighter could also be changed to the shape of "the nose is spiky and thorny", even if the nose air intake is retained, it must be equipped with a large radar, and even specially found the Soviet MiG-21PF, MF and other all-weather improvements, I feel that this kind of thickened air intake, the model with a large radar installed is much better than our country's J-7II fighter, until the heresy in the J-7 family was discovered: the J-7III fighter.
In 1977, the Air Force and Aviation System went to Romania for inspection, carefully studied the MiG-21MF fighter, and decided to develop a major modification of the J-7 capable of all-weather combat on the basis of the aircraft, and named it the J-7A. It is mainly used to make up for the shortcomings of the J-7i fighter that can only fight during the day.
In 1978, we secretly imported a MiG-21 MF fighter from the Egyptian Air Force and conducted mapping studies. At this time, we are entangled again, whether to refer to the original quasi-machine for independent development, or a rivet without changing the complete mapping imitation, these two views quarreled happily.
I quarreled like this for two years without results.
By 1980, the Air Force was in a hurry, and at this time the night of our airspace was like a sieve, and there was a serious lack of all-weather fighters capable of night operations, so it could only rely on more than 100 J-5A and J-6A night fighters on duty, these night fighters were already old, and their technical and combat performance was low, so that our night air defense was full of loopholes.
Coincidentally, India's Hindustan Aeronautical Industries Corporation was also organizing the introduction and production of the MiG-21MF during this time, and by the time the production was discontinued in 1981, a total of 150 MiG-21M MF fighters had been produced in India.
At this time, the aviation industry was still arguing, and the Air Force gave up, demanding a complete and thorough mapping of the imitation of the Soviet MiG-21MF, and then the controversy was ended, and this order was carried out to the letter. After another four years, the J-7III fighter was finally created. Because the prototype introduced earlier had been disassembled, the Air Force had to spend $5 million in 1983 to buy another MiG-21MF and a MiG-21UC, which was a sky-high price at the time, just in time to buy half of the American F-16 fighter.
Although the J-7III fighter is equipped with large-caliber radar and missiles, and has all-weather combat capability, the Air Force found that the shortcomings of this fighter are also prominent, poor maneuverability, short range, and overall combat capability is much lower than that of the J-7M fighter that emphasized maneuverability and advanced head-up radar fire control in the same period. Coupled with the finalization of the J-8II fighter, the J-7III will not be fragrant immediately, and the Air Force's purchase of J-7III fighters is only in double digits.
This is one of the bumps in the road of the development of our fighter aircraft, without which there would be no great progress in our aviation industry. After more than 30 years of hard work, up to now, our aviation industry has entered the "kingdom of freedom", not only to create an advanced J-20 stealth fighter, but also to change the MiG-21 into a flower.
The J-7 fighter is China's longest-running aircraft, with a total of 49 years from its first flight in 1964 to 2013, with a total production of more than 2,400 aircraft, and dozens of improved models.
After the birth of the J-7 fighter, China's aviation industry has continuously improved it, based on the basic type of J-7, derived from many improved models, including J-7, J-7, J-7A, J-7B, J-7E, J-7M, J-7MG, J-7PG, J-7P, J-7MP, J-7FS, J-7MF and other series, and each series has different sub-models.
Based on the Jianjiao-7 training aircraft, China has developed the Trainer-9G "Mountain Eagle" training aircraft with air intakes on both sides. Based on the J-7, the FC-1 "Thunder" fighter with DSI air intakes on both sides was newly designed, and then the JF-17 "Thunder" Block3 fighter equipped with active phased array radar was improved, which was changed to Mikoyan's mother.
At this point, the nose of the J-7 fighter was finally changed to a "pointed" one, and there was a "thorn" in front, which fulfilled my childhood dream.