Operationally Russia built something better than the RD-9B and the R3M-26, it was the R-11 otherwise known as the AM-11 and later RD-11, it was operational in MiG-21s and was far more powerful than the R3M-26 engine used on the SM-12/MiG-19, the increase in thrust and operational status were already reached in the MiG-21 you do not want to see the follow on to the RD-9 fitted to the MiG-19 was the R-11 and this is a more powerful engine, Russia did not want the SM-12 niether the I-75 or the I-420 for their air forces because they got something better.

China did not design the MiG-21 niether had aircraft like the SM-12 or I-420 in 1960 niether in 1970, their Q-5 has in fact worst performance than the SM-12

China got the product of those I-420, I-75 and Ye-2s in the MiG-21, what China did up to the 1979 was basicly upgrade the RD-9 when Russia did it 20 years before with the R3M-26, Do not lie to your self Russia was leader and has been leader in aviation since the 1920s.

Russia never got into production the SM-12 or I-75 because they got something better it was the MiG-21.

Even the Chines considered the early MiG-21F engines to be very unreliable, and ditto when they also got the R-13-300 later. They spent much of their improvement efforts on the engine on enhancing their reliability and flight hour life. Suffice to say, they could never accept the J-7 into service if the engine life is less than that of the J-6’s which already have been doubled. When the J-7 finally came into service on the PLAAF with big numbers, it was already in the -B version and had a number of improvements over the original -F and -FL version such as strengthened wings with hardpoints for fuel tanks.

The Soviet Union don’t seem to have a very good idea what engine life means. Every customer they had are always complaining about that issue. One thing to make peak thrust, another thing to make it last.

In contrast to the Soviet made MiG-19s, the J-6s had a number of improvements that seriously made them better. They confronted issues on reliability such as on the fuel lines and flight controls which had to be regularly replaced on the Russian versions. The flight controls were also improved, and they increased the wing span to lower wing loading and improve low speed performance.

The MiG-21 was a good dogfighter only in its earlier versions. On the third and the fourth, the wing loading issue was getting serious. There is nearly a ton of weight difference between the first and the final version while there is no improvement on the wing area.

As for the Q-5, it was a lot more forgiving and predictable to fly than any J-6 and MiG-19, at the slight penalty in turn rate.

They will probably get to the moon in the next decade or so, but they don’t seem to be in a rush. Rather there are a million things they want to test and experiment before they get there.

The next moon plans incorporate having an automated rover on the moon surface.

However the reason China was not satisfied with the MiG-21 was simply they dragged too long with an old aircraft and they did not design anything better until they took the J-10 design enterprise.

I don’t think you read any Chinese reports to make claims on what their viewpoints are as well as the reasons for doing this and that. Their issues are much like everyone else though; the MiG-21 has some serious drawbacks, starting with a very short range that permits far too little loiter and station time. Unlike the Russians, which is facing their potential enemies with nothing but a land border, the Chinese is facing a sea. Another problem is the propensity for the aircraft to commit into flat spins, and the way it departs from controllability is sudden.

Experimental aircraft is very far from an operational aircraft because the latter has at least a minimum requirement of reliability. There is a reason why the engines you mentioned remained experimental.

] from my point of view the most beautiful chinese aircraft i`ve ever seen

But IMO that’s because all other Chinese military aircraft are ugly; maybe except the PLAAF P-51, which isn’t a Chinese aircraft of Chinese origin.

IMO, the JH-7A looks rather good too. I like the way it looks more than the J-10.

I don’t think an alien civilization can “fly” from one star to another. More likely they would “cheat” through space by going through wormholes

I find that many ideas proposed in SF like force fields to be rather extremely energy inefficient. For defense for example, it would be better to detect any incoming particle then knock it off with a direct energy blast.

Direct energy weapons are energy inefficient, subject to medium attenuation and the inverse square law. For this reason, projectile based weapons are far more efficient because a projectile or missile is able to ‘conserve’ energy into a package, and you can manipulate this package to the target with better accuracy. Thus in my view, the ‘future’ weapon is the electromagnetic railgun. Set in orbiting stations in space, large rail guns would snipe at anything they can see below, from air fields to cities to army bases. The aliens would have missiles too, just like us, except a lot smarter, more agile and energy efficient. Add to that would be the ability to jam or EMP anything that would use radar or electronics.

The moon is a horrid base for use as a base and a mining resource facility due to its distance and a rather blatant lack of metals heavier in the elemental table. The aliens would probably scout for NEO asteroids and other rocks, then set them in Earth orbit, plant factories on them, and build an everlasting horde of robotic weapons built to engage in air, land and sea. Considering that the Earth is 3/4ths water, an extraterrestial invader would see the value of dominating the sea sphere where vital minerals can lie below. Underwater you can set up bases where you can mind and manufacture more weapons and unleash flying robotic craft from submersible carriers. [UFOlogists call them USOs or Unidentified Submersible Objects. USOs are often sighted in areas of UFO activity.]

I don’t see slow moving “Terminator” robots or something like the Cylons or the robots from the Clone Wars to be a realistic depiction of an alien robotic army. I would probably think instead of four or multi legged machines the size of cars, carrying missiles and projectile weapons, that can move extremely fast over land and over any terrain with the speed and agility of cheetahs, even capable of short distances of flight. Nothing like 3 legged machines that tower over buildings, or the tank like walkers in Star Wars, or two legged bipedal mecha like in cartoons.

Maybe aliens don’t need machines at all. All they need is a lifeform that can do its bidding, one that can consume from its surroundings and breed at will. All these creatures and robots operate through a hive mind, the ultimate expression of data link, network and command technology. The master aliens in turn, play their war against us like a kid playing Starcraft in his computer. They can see all, control all, and minutely command tactical details all in real time.

Such topics usually get my imagination running away. Its as interesting a topic, to the highly related, how future wars will be and how mankind will evolve as a war conducting species.

If aliens are equipped with anything like inertia cancelers (canceling G forces so whoever inside won’t turn into the consistency of cream) anything you put up against them in a manned vehicle would be nothing but fodder.

The fastest things mankind has created, the fastest things that can turn in a circle would be our missiles, if there is any chance to remotely catch a UFO. Our first line of defenses would be missiles, PACs, S-300s, AEGIS. Movable SAMs.

Forget about MiG-31s and F-22s. Forget about radar stealth. Create something to achieve pure performance. If it isn’t a missile it had to be a unmanned vehicle, a robot fighter or UCAV.

Lets speculate for a moment that the invading civilization is advanced, but not too advanced that we cannot cause casualties. Remember, Iraq has shown that low tech can do the job done against a high tech opponent. This time, even the US finds themselves in the reserve. We as the humans find ourselves playing the insurgents, using our “low tech” means to fend off an invasion.

An initial invasion by an extra terrestial force would signal their approach by knocking out our satellite constellations one by one. The GPS, the communications, our surveillance abilities.

Then as our space aimed early warning radars would show blinks and more blinks of multiple reentries. If the aliens have studied you long enough, their initial targets would be anything that gives off radar and radio communications. They would also start blasting away at airports and airfields. Direct energy weapons probably not needed, they can just use precisely reentering shaped vehicles and have them land smack into the airfields.

Oh I can get a good story going in my imagination if I have the time…

Still can not compete with the R-25, it was an engine of almost 10000kg of thrust. This was in 1972, after that the MiG-23 made totally obsolete the MiG-19, and the Mig-29 still even more.

China did not have any decent fighter until the J-10, the J-7 was an archaic design in 1995 and the J-8II only comparable to early MiG-23Ms at best and that already when the Flanker was flying in Russia.

Portraiting the MiG-19 as a super fighter in the 1960s is absurd, the MiG-19 only deserves to be called a good aircraft simply because the F-4 was not armed with a gun, it was simply the lack of a gun what made the MiG-19 a better fighter in General terms a well flown F-4E or a MIrage III were better, that is the reaon the Vietnamese regarded their MiG-21s as the jewel of the crown of their air force and Israel made good use of their F-4Es and Miraeg that simple eliminated the MiG-19 threat.

The US evaluated Pakistani J-6s during the sixties when the planes first came in. After that, they raised the threat value of the aircraft. Of all the early MiGs, the MiG-19/J-6 came out with the best (meaning relatively not so embarassing kill to death ratio) of all the MiGs in all its historical confrontations. PAF J-6s and Q-5s also acquitted themselves well in low level dogfights on exercises with F-16s.

The 9900kg boost on the -bis is an emergency one that scraps the engine.

The MiG-19 and MiG-21 have almost the same swept angle around 60 deg for both aircraft, almost the same thrust to weight ratio, in fact the MiG-21 has an engine with twice the thrust of the two engines fitted to the MiG-19.

On the engine power that wasn’t true until the -21bis.