Senior engineer Yang Shuifeng and his team at the Chengdu Aircraft Design Institute have detailed the project management philosophy that allowed China to fast-track its J-36 sixth-generation stealth fighter, potentially leaving Boeing’s U.S. Next Generation Air Dominance (NGAD) program years behind. Their peer-reviewed paper offers a rare public blueprint for rapid military capability generation.
When you picture a next-generation fighter jet, you likely imagine advanced radar-absorbent materials, AI-piloted wingmen, and directed energy weapons. But according to a lead designer of China’s cutting-edge stealth fighters, the real secret to winning the arms race isn’t just a revolutionary weapon—it’s a revolutionary process. The experience to build quickly and reliably, he argues, is the ultimate strategic advantage.
This perspective comes directly from Yang Shuifeng, senior engineer and director of the performance research division at the Chengdu Aircraft Design Institute. In a paper published in the Journal of Systems Engineering and Electronics, Yang and his co-authors explain the institutional methodology that has propelled China’s sixth-generation fighter, the J-36, into advanced flight testing while its American counterpart remains largely on the drawing board, reported the South China Morning Post (SCMP).
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The contrast is stark. In March, the contract for the U.S. Air Force’s NGAD fighter, known as the X-47 or F-47, was awarded to Boeing. While Boeing is an aviation titan, it has never designed or built an operational stealth fighter for the U.S. military. “The experience and capability of the research and development team cannot start from zero,” Yang wrote, in what industry observers see as a pointed commentary. Meanwhile, Chengdu Aircraft Industry (Group) Company Limited (CAC), the J-36’s manufacturer, has honed its expertise producing the world’s largest fleet of supersonic heavy stealth fighters: the J-20.
So, how did China’s program avoid the pitfalls plaguing many Western defense projects? Yang’s paper outlines a disciplined, pragmatic system. First, they tackle budget overruns head-on. Instead of allowing costs to snowball, Chinese project teams conduct an annual review to “clear” any financial overruns, ensuring problems are solved within the fiscal cycle and not passed forward. Engineers focus on revising designs and streamlining processes to cut costs, rather than simply requesting more money.
Facing technological uncertainty, the team employs a dual-track mindset. They aim high for future warfare scenarios but stay grounded by deliberately dropping secondary requirements to achieve breakthroughs in core capabilities. They also maintain tight integration with China’s dynamic manufacturing sector, rapidly incorporating new technological innovations into the aircraft’s systems. This approach prevents the “do-everything-perfectly” paralysis that Yang suggests has slowed American progress.
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For Yang, development speed is combat power. He likens the fighter race to a dogfight, where the pilot who completes the “observe-orient-decide-act” loop fastest gains the decisive edge. “Equipment is meant to be used,” Yang and his team wrote. The Chinese philosophy is to deliver a capable platform to users quickly, then refine it through real-world operational feedback and continuous, iterative upgrades. “If it remains sealed within the development unit for too long, it hampers functional refinement,” he warned.
This results in a platform that evolves actively. Passive improvements come from field tests and pilot feedback. Active leaps forward are driven by new technologies and changing combat doctrines. “After 10 or even dozens of iterative improvements… their performance and combat effectiveness could see generational leaps,” Yang stated. This means the first and last J-36s off the line may be vastly different machines, each significantly more capable than the last.
The ultimate goal, as stated in the paper, is to “seize the initiative and possibly achieve victory without fighting.” By breaking traditional, slow-moving development models, China aims to field advanced capabilities first, creating a deterrent effect. While the J-36 and its lighter sibling, Shenyang Aircraft Corporation’s J-50, undergo intensive flight tests, the U.S. program targets a first flight in 2028. The management gap Yang describes may prove as critical as any technological one, giving China a formidable head start in the sky of the future.
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