The J-20 has been built, why China has not been able to build "Apache" armed *** There are three countries in the world that can manufacture heavy armament*** are the United States, Russia and Turkey. The U.S. "Apache" armed forces were in service in 1986, 38 years ago, and they are still the world's No. 1. Russia holds Ka-52 and Mi-28 heavy weapons, but they are inferior to the American-made "Apache" in terms of performance. Turkey's latest T929 has become the world's third largest manufacturer of heavy weapons before China.
Why has the "Apache" been in service for 38 years, and none of the countries have succeeded in copying it? How did Turkey overtake China? Today, I want to talk to you about how it is more difficult to develop heavy armament than to create a J-20 stealth fighter?
In the eyes of many people, the technical difficulty of the fighter should be higher than ***. But if we look at it, it's not cheaper than a fighter at all. The unit price of the "Apache" armament*** is basically more than 100 million US dollars. South Korea has bought 36 Apache AH64-D models for a total price of $3.6 billion. Saudi Arabia bought 24 planes,** climbing to $3.3 billion. Indonesia bought 8 and paid 14$200 million. Of these, India bought 6 of the latest "Apache" AH-64E, which cost 9500 million US dollars, with an average unit price of 1$500 million.
This is more expensive than the F-35 and J-20, and it is on par with the F-22 stealth fighter. Why can "Apache" be sold for so much? At its core, its technology is at the top of the world. "Apache" is the undisputed number one armed force in the world today
It is equipped with a powerful fire system that can carry 16 Hellfire anti-tank missiles. One Apache ** can destroy a tank company. It can also carry 76 cluster rockets, and when attacking the ground, it can be described in eight words: "The fire sweeps away, and not a single grass grows."
In the Gulf War, the "Apache" displayed its might and scored an astonishing record. The U.S. military dispatched 277 Apache** to destroy more than 500 Iraqi tanks. In addition, a large number of anti-aircraft missiles, early warning radars, armored vehicles, artillery, etc., were destroyed at the hands of the "Apache". The Apache is not only powerful in firepower, but also very good in defense. Its fuselage shell is resistant to 12After 7-mm machine gun strafing, 95% of the fuselage was hit by 23-mm shells, it could still fly for half an hour and return to base. Because of its super body structure, the "Apache" is known as the "flying tank".
The biggest technical feature of the Apache is that a "Longbow" radar is installed on top of it, which can scan 360 degrees without dead angles and have a ground detection range of up to 30 kilometers. Even at night, it is equipped with an infrared night vision system that can lock onto targets. The "Hellfire" missile adopts active radar guidance, and it does not matter after launch, as long as the radar continues to illuminate the target, the missile will automatically track, and does not depend on other sights.
Under special circumstances, the "Apache" can be equipped with 4 "Mistral" air-to-air missiles, or 2 "Stinger" air-to-air missiles, which are specially designed to deal with enemy forces and Su-25 attack aircraft used for low-altitude operations. In contrast, the Ka-52 and Mi-28 of the Russian army have obvious shortcomings. The Ka-52 adopts a twin-rotor design, eliminating the tail rotor, and the maneuverability, speed, and climb altitude are all worse. Its firepower is more powerful than that of the "Apache", but the electronic system is too backward and the anti-jamming ability is poor. On the Russian-Ukrainian battlefield, the Ka-52 was shot down in large numbers, and NATO's anti-aircraft missiles almost became a nightmare for the Ka-52.
The Mi-28 is designed to be a comprehensive benchmark for the Apache. The Mi-28 is as powerful as the firepower, and its attack power surpasses that of the "Apache", but the avionics system is not as good as the "Apache". The Apache is equipped with a tactical data link system that enables intelligence to be shared with other combat platforms, something that the Mi-28 does not have. But looking at the world, the Mi-28 is already the closest to the "Apache" heavy armament***.
But how did Turkey overtake China? How did it become the third country in the world to build a heavy military force? The root lies in this: absorbing Ukraine's core technology.
The Turkish T929 heavy armament *** was directly introduced into the Ukrainian turboshaft engine. Ukraine inherited the world's top turboshaft engines from the Soviet Union, including the Russian Ka-52, which is also installed in Ukraine. It was not until 2014, when the Crimean crisis broke out and Ukraine cut off the supply of engines, that the Ka-52 switched to Russian domestic engines. With the support of Ukrainian engines, Turkey has solved the most difficult power problem to overcome. This allowed the T929 heavy Wuzhi to take the lead in China and take the lead in flying.
In fact, for China, the development of heavy armaments is not urgent. Because the large-scale Chada UAV has brought about a subversive technological revolution, it has been able to replace the armed UAV on a large scale in anti-tank combat, anti-armor combat, and anti-fortress warfare. Like the Pterodactyl-2 and Rainbow-5, they can completely replace the armed *** to carry out near-ground air support missions. In today's world, the only significance of the existence of armed forces is amphibious landing operations to cover the capture of islands by marines.
In the future, the integrated UAV will act as a decoy, cooperate with the armed fire suppression, and cover the landing of the island, which will become the new normal of amphibious operations. And in pure ground support operations, the integrated UAV is more suitable than armed ***. Fearless of losses, after fighting a fight, mass-producing a one, this is something that the armed *** can't compare.