China To Announce New Strategic Stealth Bomber Around 2020: Report

China is likely to announce its home-grown nuclear capable Long Range Strike Bomber (LRSB) around 2020.

According to a report by Chinamil citing an article by a Japanese scholar in July 2015,titled, “"China to develop new type of long-range strategic bomber", which referred to the H-20, a name that's commonly used now. Someone compared it with America's B-2 strategic bomber and called it the "red B-2".

As per the report, the continuous occurring of China’s 20 series suggests that the new LRSB will be developed by 2020.

"20" is a code used for China's new-generation aviation equipment and also implies these equipment's combat capability will be formed around 2020.

Now that China is to develop a new-generation LRSB. Given the connotations of "20", it makes sense to name the new long-range bomber "H-20", but the official name is yet to be announced by Chinese military authorities.

China has overcome many technical difficulties in strategic bomber so far, including engine, air inlet, material and stealth technology. It is progressing fast on the development of precise guided munition, and has amassed experience in manufacturing the Y-20 military aircraft.

"We are developing the new-generation long range strike bomber (LRSB). You will see it in the future," said the PLA Air Force commander Ma Xiaotian at a PLA Air Force open day event when answering reporters’ questions on September 1, 2016.

The next-generation LRSB has an intercontinental flying range of more than 10,000km and combat radius of over 5,000km. With air refueling, it is able to fly and carry out missions around the globe.

Aimed to lower the R&D cost and enhance strike capability, the new bomber will have a slightly smaller bomb load than B-2A (23 tons) but larger than H-6K.

The LRSB will have both nuclear and regular strike capability to hit the enemy's key links and systemic weaknesses. The bomber is also capable of large-capacity date fusion and transmission. It can serve as a C4ISR node and interact with large sensor platforms like UAV, early warning aircraft and strategic reconnaissance aircraft to share information and target data, reported ChinaMil.

At the moment, the US and Russia both have their own long-range bombers, the former having B-52H, B-1B and B-2A and the latter having Tu-160 and Tu-95MS, and they have both plans for developing next-generation strategic bombers.