Story by Micah Young
The aircraft, which has been designated the Y-9LG or High New 13, was one of 13 aircraft from all three branches of China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) which took part in Exercise Falcon Strike at the Royal Thai Air Force (RTAF) base at Udon Thani in northern Thailand, which ran from 18 to 29 August.
The Y-9LG was only known to have entered service with China’s PLA Air Force (PLAAF) in 2022, after having been in development since at least 2017. The aircraft at Falcon Strike was in low-visibility markings and carried the serial 30211, indicating it was from the PLAAF’s 20th Special Division.
The new subtype is based on the Shaanxi Y-9 turboprop airlifter and can be identified by a prominent “balance beam” antenna similar to Saab’s Erieye airborne radar and that fitted to China’s KJ-200 Airborne Early Warning (AEW) aircraft, along with several different fairings fitted for its specialised mission.
The latter include a Satellite Communications (SATCOM) dome on top of its forward fuselage, side looking SIGINT antennas on its rear fuselage and Electronic Support Measures (ESM) antennas on its wingtips and at the top of the vertical tail.
Also present at the exercise were a pair of Shenyang J-11 interceptors. These were made up of a single seat J-11B and a J-11BS twin-seater, both of which carried PLA Navy Air Force (PLANAF) markings although their exact unit assignment was unclear.
Two other Chinese participants with a naval affiliation were a pair of Xi’an JH-7 fighter bombers. Both carried numbers indicating they were from the PLANAF’s 9th Naval Aviation Brigade, although interestingly one of the aircraft carried its serial number in yellow in accordance with PLAAF practice, while the other aircraft wore larger red serial numbers in line with the PLANAF system.
This suggests that 9th Naval Air Brigade is one of the PLANAF land-based air combat units that has been transferred to the PLAAF, a process that is known to have been ongoing since 2022.
Other aircraft involved in the exercise include six PLAAF J-10 fighter jets, a Shaanxi KJ-500 AEW aircraft and a PLA Mil Mi-171 transport helicopter, while the RTAF was represented by its Saab JAS-39 Gripen multirole fighters, a Saab 340 AEW aircraft and Dassault/Dornier Alpha Jet light combat aircraft. This is the seventh iteration of Exercise Falcon Strike since the inaugural event in 2015. Despite being a treaty ally of the US, Thailand has bolstered its defence relations with China in recent years, with its military having bought Chinese tanks, amphibious ships and an on again, off-again effort to acquire submarines from China.
About Y-9LG aircraft
Regular Naval News contributor Alex Luck shared the following comment on the new aircraft:
There is significant speculation in the PLA watching community as to the precise role of the Y-9LG/High New 13. The current prevalent suggestion is a role focused on electronic warfare, notably a role as jammer platform including such use of the “balance beam” style AESA. Factual data to confirm a particular role remains absent. As usual PLA does not comment on roles and capabilities especially of their newest systems in service. Consequently, assessments are limited to observable characteristics, unit affiliation and the character of deployments. Personally, I suspect this new configuration is an enhanced AEWC system, which additionally incorporates significant EW capability. Such a design seems in line with the overall trend of AESA development not just accommodating detection and tracking of relevant targets cueing effectors, but additionally suppressing them through means of electronic warfare. The latter is an inherent strength of modern AESA type radars and as such utilised also by foreign air forces elsewhere. Increased flexibility engaging in electronic warfare is a primary demand on new developments globally. Additionally, such an enhanced AEWC system would be in line also with PLA-developments including the earlier KJ-500 (High New 10), also present in Thailand. KJ-500 already incorporated ELINT capability seen in other designs such as the Y-8JZ (High New 8). Some aspects of the new Y-9LG configuration, especially the large rectangular panels on the rear airframe, were first observable on the Y-9Z aka High New 12. The development dynamic on display therefore appears to mirror the earlier efforts in AEWC and overall ELINT/EW-development.
