TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — On Monday (Jan. 2), after two dozen Chinese warplanes and four warships were tracked around Taiwan on New Year's Day, the CCTV Military channel released a video that showed Chengdu J-20 stealth fighters conducting a night mission in "combat airspace."
On New Year's Day, the Ministry of National Defense (MND) tracked 24 Chinese warplanes and four warships around Taiwan, with 15 military aircraft intruding on Taiwan's air defense identification zone (ADIZ), including 12 that breached the median line. In what was considered an unprecedented move, some of the Chinese warplanes came within 24 nautical miles of Taoyuan and Hsinchu.
The next day, CCTV Military released a video, which it claimed showed footage of fighter jets taking off on a night mission into the "combat airspace" at 2 a.m. The headline for the video read: "Over-the-horizon air combat training for J-20 and other fighters."
According to captions seen in the video, the fighters took off at 2 a.m. and conducted training until dawn. It stated that when the fighters entered the "combat airspace," multi-type fighter aircraft began conducting combat exercises beyond visual range.
J-16 taking off at night after quick refueling. (CCTV Military screenshot)
It pointed out that flying at night is likely to cause spacial orientation obstacles and that pilots must be highly focused and keep abreast of aircraft dynamics. "This combat exercise is to train the pilot's attention distribution," the video stated.
Hou Jie (侯杰), head of a flight group of the People's Liberation Army Air Force (PLAAF), was quoted in the video as saying: "Pilots cannot see the outline of the plane at night, and can only rely on the external lights of the plane to judge whether the distance is close or far, and which direction the warning comes from."
The video later shows a Shenyang J-16 fighter jet having just returned from a mission and maintenance personnel conducting a comprehensive inspection of the aircraft, as well as "hot refueling" and "hot rearming" without stopping the engine. It claimed that compared with the conventional support mode, such "hot support" can increase the speed at which fighters are redeployed and minimize the flight preparation time without reducing standards.
The footage raised concern that this training is enabling the PLAAF to perfect its ability to launch a "night raid" against Taiwan, according to local Taiwan media.
