Russia's stealth bomber nearing completion amid global tensions

The development of the hard-to-detect strategic bomber PAK DA by Tupolev might be further along than previously thought. This aircraft, similar to American stealth bombers, could influence the global balance of power. What is PAK DA, and what do we know about it?

PAK DA, which stands for Prospective Long-Range Aviation Complex, is a Russian stealth strategic bomber designed in a flying wing configuration. The design is the responsibility of the Tupolev bureau, reportedly initiated in 2009.

According to American intelligence sources cited by aviation expert Harrison Kaas, the Russians are close to completing their work. The progress is so advanced that PAK DA may take to the skies faster than the Chinese H-20, a similar aircraft.

Only three countries are capable of building such aircraft. The United States is the most advanced, with the second generation of stealth strategic bombers already being developed. The first—the B-2 Spirit—was designed during the Cold War, with its prototype flying in 1989.

The B-2 already has a successor. It is the B-21 Raider, developed by Northrop Grumman and referred to by the manufacturer as a 6th-generation aircraft. The prototype of this machine, shown publicly at the end of 2022, was flown the following year.

It’s worth considering the work conducted by China and Russia in this context—these countries are only now trying to build machines that the Americans have had for 30 years and for which they have already developed a successor.

The same is true for 5th-generation combat aircraft. China and Russia completed their designs a quarter of a century after the Americans. The U.S. is already starting to retire the oldest specimens of their first 5th-generation aircraft, the F-22 Raptor.

This showcases the United States's advantage in aviation technology. But why are new-generation strategic bombers so important?

The entry into service of the American B-2 was a breakthrough that impacted the global balance of power. It was the world's first machine to be a strategic bomber and a stealth aircraft.

This gave the Pentagon an unprecedented ability to project power: an aircraft taking off from the United States could—with the support of flying tankers—reach any corner of the planet and attack any target, including with nuclear weapons.

China and Russia also work on such capabilities, though information about their developing machines remains sparse. It is known that they will have a flying wing form and will fly at subsonic speeds. In this case, it is difficult to seek inspiration or copying from the Americans—physics is the same for everyone, so machines with similar characteristics have a similar appearance.

According to limited official information, work on the Russian aircraft PAK DA began in 2009. The aircraft will have a four-person crew, be able to conduct 30-hour flights and carry up to 33 tons of armament in internal compartments (for comparison, the B-2 and B-21 can carry a little over 24 tons).

It will be powered by four Kuznetsov NK-32 engines, an upgraded version of the engines that power the Tu-160 aircraft. The new bomber is to carry a wide range of armaments, including various types of cruise missiles and hypersonic missiles.

The planned flight profiles are quite unusual for this class of aircraft. According to the Russians, PAK DA will be capable of high-altitude flights of around 65,000 feet and low-level missions navigating the terrain, which is more typical of tactical strike aircraft.

Information about the imminent completion of work on the Russian machine's prototype, however, can be surprising. While one of the Russian goals was to achieve capabilities similar to those of the USA, the Chinese bomber H-20 was generally considered more advanced and closer to its first flight.

Harrison Kaas points out that Russian capabilities are constrained by the war in Ukraine, which is consuming industrial capacity and available resources. Under such conditions, the Russians can only produce a handful of combat aircraft yearly.

While the TASS agency eagerly reports information about additional batches of aircraft delivered to the Russian Air Force, Kremlin propaganda does not highlight that these are two to three aircraft batches that do not cover the losses incurred.

Therefore, Russian announcements that several prototypes are being built simultaneously and that serial production of PAK DA is expected to begin in 2027 or 2028 should be treated with great skepticism. They should be seen more as propaganda than a real implementation schedule.

Even if information about the prototype is confirmed, the time needed for its construction, necessary tests, and design modifications before production starts will likely be much longer.