China Accelerates J-20 Stealth Fighter Jet Production. U.S. Maintains Massive F-35 Advantage

Related Video Above: F-35s To Europe

By Kris Osborn – President & Editor-In-Chief, Warrior Maven

China is moving quickly to massively rev up production of its J-20 5th Generation stealth fighter jet in what could be viewed as a transparent effort to keep pace with the large numbers of F-35s now arriving to U.S. and allied forces.

Completely apart from any kind of performance comparison, there is at the moment a staggering difference in numbers. As of 2021, China has only built 150 J-20 stealth fighters, whereas the U.S. Air Force already has more than 280 F-35As and plans to acquire 1,763.

This is the Air Force alone, meaning the number does not include the growing number of F-35Bs traveling on Amphibs with the Marine Corps or the now arriving carrier-launched F-35C Navy aircraft. Overall, current force plans call for 353 F-35Bs and 67 F-35Cs for the Corps and 273 F-35Cs for the Navy.

On top of this, the number of allied countries now quickly adding F-35s is growing at an alarming rate in terms of planned fleet size and arriving aircraft. Overall, at least 13 countries operate or plan to operate F-35s. South Korea operates 16 F-35s so far and Denmark and Norway are receiving and operating their F-35s. Many other countries are at various stages of acquiring healthy numbers of the jet to include Switzerland, Japan, Israel, Poland, Australia, Italy, The Netherlands, Belgium, Singapore and the UK. Japan, for instance, plans to acquire roughly 200 F-35s to include a mix of F-35As and F-35Bs and the UK already owns 21 F-35s with plans to acquire more.

J-20 Production vs. f-35 Production

What all of this means is that J-20 production is massively behind current F-35 production, something of great significance given that China intends for its J-20 to rival a U.S. F-22 or F-35.