This Chubby Girl will see you coming
December 27, 2024
The KJ-3000 is China’s next-generation airborne early warning and control (AEW&C) aircraft, and is intended to neutralize the advantage currently enjoyed by US ‘stealthy’ fighters and bombers, with a reported detection range of more than 360 km against LO (low observable) aircraft. The apparent first flight of the first KJ-3000 prototype on 26 December 2024, made it the third new type to make its first appearance on Mao Zedong’s birthday, alongside new fighters from Chengdu and Shenyang.
The KJ-3000 is based on the airframe of the domestically developed Y-20B ‘Chubby Girl’ transport aircraft and is powered by WS-20 turbofan engines. Photos of a wind tunnel model released in December 2022 showed a Y-20B-based aircraft with radomes above and below the forward fuselage and with smaller fairings on the leading edges of the undercarriage sponsons, though the definitive aircraft has a large ‘disc’ above the fuselage (not a rotodome, as it is fixed) probably housing back-to-back dual band digital array radar (DAR) antennas, or possibly three antennas like the A-50Eis supplied to India.
The Y-20B platform offers significant payload advantages (about 16 tonnes more) compared to the Il-76MD that forms the basis of the Russian Beriev A-50 and the Chinese KJ-2000, four of which were converted from China United Airline Il-76MD transport fleet following the A-50U-based prototype. Use of the domestically produced ‘Chubby Girl’ airframe also reduces reliance on imported systems, facilitating and enabling potential large-scale production and customization.
The KJ-3000 may feature active electronic attack capabilities, potentially allowing it to disrupt or disable adversary electronic systems.
