Chinese Jet Shoots Down France’s Best Fighter; NZ And Australia Should Pay Attention

Friday, 23 May 2025, 1:21 pm
Opinion: Eugene Doyle

“Whoever controls advanced chip production shapes the future of human civilization.” Christopher Miller, Chip Wars.

The U.S. is seemingly hell-bent on war with China. It is, however, increasingly likely the U.S. will lose such a war for two reasons: advanced computer chips and total production capacity. For reasons of self-interest alone neither Australia nor New Zealand should join a US-led alliance against China.

The share price of a Chinese military industrial company, Chengdu Aircraft Corporation (CAC), went sky-high this month within hours of a dogfight between Pakistani and Indian fighters after India launched Operation Sindoor to retaliate against Pakistan’s alleged involvement in a militant attack on tourists in Indian-administered Kashmir.

At least one, possibly three, state-of-the-art French fighters flown by India got blown out of the sky above the Indo-Pakistan border in air-to-air combat. Without overstating the implications, the downing(s) sends a message about the emerging real-world capabilities of the Chinese military industry and is yet another reason that countries like Australia and New Zealand should reflect on the wisdom of their current military build-up to support the U.S.’s coming war on China. We don’t want a war, we don’t need a war, and we most certainly don’t want to be on the losing side of a war of aggression against China.

Are Australia and New Zealand on the right team?

Australian defence analyst Professor Hugh White of the Australian National University told Pascal Lottaz on Neutrality Studies recently: “The essence of the Australian government position at the moment is that we think that China’s challenge to America’s leadership is so important that we should be willing to go to war with China in order to prevent it. Now I think that is fantastically dangerous. That’s a war that I don’t think America can win – and to fight it would end up destroying the very thing we’re trying to preserve.”

Professor White also reminds us of the real risk of escalation to the nuclear level and the reckless complacency that governments are showing in the face of this danger.

For its part, New Zealand is set to massively increase its military budget as the government mis-steps into a full-fledged military partnership with the U.S., drifting away from the sounder policy settings of earlier governments. AUKUS, particularly the nuclear-powered attack submarines on order, is as firm a statement as you could get of Australian entrenchment in the U.S. alliance against China. Australia has painted a target on its own back by stationing U.S. nuclear-capable B-52 and B-2 bombers at Tindal air base – and New Zealand has signalled it wants to join the AUKUS party.

As I write, the USS Blue Ridge, command vessel of the U.S. 7th Fleet, is moored in Wellington harbour. Such visits were unthinkable for decades because New Zealand had – and nominally still has – the strongest anti-nuclear weapons legislation in the world: the “New Zealand Nuclear Free Zone, Disarmament and Arms Control Act 1987.” No U.S. ships visited from 1986 – when the USS Buchanan was denied entry – until 2016 when the Key government let in the USS Sampson to “thaw” frosty relations.

Rand Corporation analyst Derek Grossman echoed American pleasure at the boat visit and what it really means. "I think it's symbolic, but I also think it's indicative of the strengthening partnership with an eye towards countering China in the Indo-Pacific."

China has never threatened New Zealand but the Kiwis seem hell-bent on giving them reason to.

Australia, New Zealand and the emerging multipolar world

We should not want China as a regional hegemon; nor should we wish the U.S. to continue to be one. China has signalled no such intention; for its part, it is clear-eyed enough to see that the future is multipolar. The U.S. has dominated our region for decades, at a cost of millions of lives – but, without doubt, to New Zealand and Australia’s benefit.

Those benefits are now in the rearview mirror. The combination of American militarism, strategic incoherence, its participation in the Palestine genocide, declining share of global GDP, and its gormless, burn-the-house-down trade policies should encourage New Zealand and Australia to recalibrate their defence posture away from incorporation into American alliances. Not least because we don’t want to be on a losing team. Our leaders, however, tell us we “share values” with the U.S. and suggest that that should keep us in the tent with the Americans. What kind of people “share values” with people who commit genocide? Certainly our elites do, but not any decent human being I know.

A “Deepseek” moment in aerial warfare

How did the J-10C Vigorous Dragon, built by Chengdu, best the vaunted French Rafales which are touted as being amongst the most advanced fighters in the world? Promising “air supremacy”, each Rafale package cost India over $200 million. Defense planners around the world sat up and paid attention, not least because the Chengdu J-10C comes in at a comparatively modest $40-50 million each. Some suggest this was another “Deepseek Moment”1 – the Chinese literally delivering more bangs per buck.

According to multiple sources, including Pakistani foreign minister Ishaq Dar, three of India’s French Dassault Rafales were downed by the Chinese J-10C jets. The number is contested. France 24 reported: “According to a source within French intelligence quoted by CNN, at least one Rafale fighter jet was reportedly shot down by the Pakistani military during the clashes on the night of May 6.”

The Rafale, often mentioned in the same breath as the US F-35, has previously proven incredibly deadly, killing large numbers of people in Libya, Mali, Iraq and Syria – admittedly these people didn’t have jets.

This month’s contest was different and – again, without overstating it – may be one of those moments which sends defence planners back to the drawing board. Definitive comparative analysis would require lots more violence and we don’t want that.

Defense 360 said this week that a J-10C can detect when it is “locked on” by an enemy radar: “It then analyses the signal’s frequency and pulse characteristics and transmits a tailored barrage of noise and deceptive wave forms - injecting false targets into the [enemy] display, forcing the opponent to chase ghosts whilst genuine threats close in.”

Such electronic warfare tools are at the heart of the tech war that will likely determine the outcome of future wars. It is worth mentioning that J-10C is only rated a fourth-generation fighter and is being phased out by the Chinese. China is already deep in the development of sixth-generation stealth fighters with far more advanced electronic warfare capability.

The U.S. is seemingly hell-bent on war with China. It is, however, increasingly likely the U.S. will lose such a war for two reasons: advanced computer chips and total production capacity.

Advanced computer chips and total production capacity

Modern fighter aircraft like China's J-10C depend on advanced semiconductor chips, particularly in their long-range missile systems and electronic warfare capabilities. It is one of many reasons the U.S. is forcing allies Taiwan and the Netherlands to stop shipping to China their advanced tech like EUV (extreme ultraviolet) machines that create the most sophisticated chips. Between them, ASML (EUV machines) in Holland and TSMC (advanced chips) in Taiwan, had the high-end chip market sewn up. That’s no longer the case.

Huawei cracks EUV technology

Last month China’s tech giant Huawei struck back against U.S. sanctions, announcing a breakthrough release of its own EUV technology – microscopic light printing which is critical to advanced chip production. Chief Executive Ren Zhengfei said: “This new EUV technology will break the chains of U.S. sanctions.” Developed with Shanghai’s Academy of Sciences Institute of Optics and Fine Mechanics, the new lithography machines can work at levels smaller than a virus (unimaginably tiny).

Like the J-10C dogfight, China showed it has taken great leaps forward in breaking free of U.S. chokepoints and is nearing parity on the kind of advanced processors that will shape the coming century.

China’s production capacity is a war-winner

China’s manufacturing output is now at least double the U.S. China builds 40% of global shipbuilding by tonnage, compared to less than 2% for the U.S.. When it comes to warships, the rate China can build a ship is many times faster than the Americans, at a significantly lower cost. Aircraft, drones, artillery shells, missiles and other military production are increasingly tilted in China’s favour. None of this is to discount the U.S.’s own formidable technology, its world-ending arsenal and advanced cyber- and other warfighting abilities. For the first time in history, however, the U.S. and the Western world face a genuine peer competitor in China.

I just thank whatever gods may be that the Chinese have shown patience and strategic maturity in the face of American, Australian and, increasingly, New Zealand belligerence. We have every reason to foster good relations with them as they are a great nation to trade with, have not fought a war since the 1970s, share the same region as us, and that we would likely and deservedly face real-world consequences if China is forced into a war with the U.S and its allies. Our Defence and Foreign Affairs needs to appreciate that tomorrow will not be the same as yesterday and that holding on reflexively to a white, Western worldview is not in our own peoples’ interests.

Eugene Doyle

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