A Chinese fighter jet came within 10 feet of a US Air Force B-52 bomber flying over the South China Sea on Tuesday, according to the US military.
The Chinese pilot “flew in an unsafe and unprofessional manner, demonstrated poor airmanship by closing with uncontrolled excessive speed, flying below, in front of, and within 10 feet of the B-52, putting both aircraft in danger of collision,” US Indo-Pacific Command said in a Thursday statement. “We are concerned this pilot was unaware of how close he came to causing a collision.”
News of the latest Chinese intercept comes as President Joe Biden is expected to speak with Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi when he visits the White House on Friday, CNN reported on Thursday. It is not clear whether the meeting will be a formal discussion or a more informal meet and greet. Wang is also expected to meet with Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Thursday and national security adviser Jake Sullivan on Friday.
Shouldn’t all bombers be flying with fighter escorts? How did a Chinese fighter plane manage to get so close to it?
What difference would that make? They’re not going to shoot it down.
Why not? The Chinese fighter jet got too close. Had a fighter been following that B52 that Chinese fighter wouldn’t have been able to get close, because our fighter jet would shoot him down
If nothing else, the fighter could lock their weapons at the Chinese fighter jet and make them sweat a bit.
Act of war. They don’t do that. That doesn’t happen in real life, that scene from Top Gun was for dramatic effect. They never do that unless they are actively engaged to kill.
The Chinese military is severely lacking in accountability and professionalism. The pilots think this kind of flying projects skill, when really it shows their incompetence.
This is completely not true. It does not show incompetence whatsoever. Quite the opposite actually. Dangerous, reckless, unprofessional, yes. But at those speeds, it takes skill to get that close, and not be pulled into the other plane and crash, when the other plane is not actively participating in the stunt. That’s why the Thunderbirds and Blue Angels, and every other stunt team in the world practice for 100’s of hours on this. It is not easy to do in any case. Bernoulli’s principle makes it get more difficult the faster you are moving. That is why a chinese pilot crashed into an E3 years ago, when he tried to pull the same crap.
A professional would recognize the slim margin for error and numerous things that could go wrong and just not do this type of crazy stunt at all
You’re saying this as if the pilot was just hotdogging and was totally ignorant of the risks. That’s pretty unlikely.
The Chinese government has been pretty clear about what they think of “freedom of navigation exercises”. If Chinese bombers were flying around the coast of the US you can be damn sure we’d be scrambling fighters to crawl up their butts too.
Those pilots got orders and carried them out successfully. You may disagree with the orders but it’s silly to accuse the pilot of lack of professionalism.
Lol… All the dumb downvotes these days… At least reply after a downvote to explain why You downvoted in the first place. Annoying 😞 but funny 😂🤣
Edit: how’d I get more downvotes then the messages below? 👇 🤣😂
Presumably the pilot would have been ordered to do this. To what end? Why?
Yes China, we know you want Taiwan back. Either commit to solid action or don’t. This bizarre behaviour just risks lives and expensive aircraft.
Seriously, what’s the point?
