It Was A Very Merry Christmas Indeed,

for Chinese PLAAF pilots,

as they heard that on December 25th at the CAC factory in Chengdu, Sichuan, the first production J-20, "2101", was put through taxiing tests on the factory runway, this seems to signify the move away from prototype production to building fighters for actual military use, "2101" will soon have a coat of radar-absorbent material (RAM) applied over its yellow primer, "2101" is the ninth J-20 fighter built by the CAC in under five years (the first J-20 prototype flew in January 2011) the J-20 will give the PLAAF a technological advantage over every other Asian air force, while the J-20 may not be able to supercruise (fly at supersonic speeds without using fuel-thirsty afterburners) with its current Russian AL-31 turbofan engines, its high level of stealth, long range and electronic warfare capabilities will make it a very formidable foe for other fighters, the J-20 also carries a powerful active electronically scanned array (AESA) radar, nose-mounted infrared search and tracking sensors, and fuselage-mounted cameras to give its pilot a VR 360 degree imaging (similar to the F-35's avionics), 

for weapons, the J-20 would have long-range missiles like the PL-12, PL-15, and PL-21, and short-ranged infrared-guided PL-8 and PL-10, networked with other platforms such as the Divine Eagle anti-stealth drone, the J-20's array of sensors will give it the ability to go toe-to-toe with other stealth fighters, it appears that future J-20's will likely have super-cruise capable Chinese WS-15 turbofan engines and improved gallium nitride AESA radars, with further out options including pilot controlled UAVs, as J-20 testing wraps up, the PLAAF will also have many other new projects to roll out, like the J-31 stealth fighter, H-20 stealth bomber, Sharp Sword stealth UAV and hypersonic weaponry, as I have mentioned before lets wish that none of all of this will ever be used in anger.