China Discovers Stealth Bombers.. How Does the World's Most Expensive Stealth System Erode?

SadaNews - On the morning of March 1, four "B-2 Spirit" stealth strategic bombers took off from their bases heading towards Iran, on a mission to strike missile facilities buried under the mountains in Iran as part of the first wave of Operation "Epic Rage". The American stealth bombers, the most expensive in history, each costing over two billion dollars, were designed for one purpose: to reach and strike their target, then return without anyone knowing they were there.

The next day, a Chinese company called "Jing'an Technology", which provides military intelligence services for the People's Liberation Army, announced on social media that it had detected the presence of those bombers, claiming that its "Jingqi" war event monitoring system intercepted radio signals from the four bombers, identifying their communication signals, from Petro 41 to Petro 44 (these numbers refer to sequences in military formations; the first number reflects the squadron or formation, and the second number reflects the position of the aircraft within this formation) and reconstructed the entire return flight path.

The system used by the company is not a traditional radar or signal interception system, but a combination of commercial satellite imagery, open flight tracking data, and public military records, with artificial intelligence techniques used to analyze this data. This approach specifically, rather than the claim itself, opens the door to a deeper discussion around "counter-stealth", as another Chinese company used the same tools and what it revealed was much greater than the return flight path of American stealth bombers.

Importantly, none of this happened due to a scientific breakthrough in radar technology, but because of commercial satellites, artificial intelligence techniques, and open-source data available online, forming a global market that America itself built and sold to the world. The question now is: how does the stealth system of the world's most expensive aircraft erode due to these simple and accessible technologies?

The Recent Shift

Weeks before Operation "Epic Rage", another Chinese company called "Mizar Vision" was publishing satellite images from satellites that identified the number and types of American fighter jets and their air defense locations throughout the Middle East. The company documented and published information about 2500 American military assets deployed worldwide before the first bomb fell on Iranian soil.

In the last month before the operation, the company jumped from publishing scattered analyses to daily updates on social media, with unprecedented details about American aircraft and weapon systems and their precise locations in and around the Middle East. For instance, one day before the operation, the company published images of seven American "F-22" fighter jets at the Ovda base in Israel with "C-17" aircraft unloading supplies, as well as equipment at Diego Garcia base in the Indian Ocean.

Then the company tracked the aircraft carrier "Gerald Ford" after leaving the Souda naval base in Crete, publishing images of the "Abraham Lincoln" carrier on its way to rendezvous with a supply ship in the Arabian Sea off the coast of Oman. The company demonstrated how to pinpoint aircraft carriers at sea by combining open flight tracking tools with satellite images. Then came the claim from "Jing'an Technology" the day after the mission of the "B-2 Spirit" strategic bomber.

"Mizar Vision" was not the only company to see all this; Western newspapers published reports showcasing the entire American military buildup, relying on satellite images, commercial sources, and the same tools.

Ironically, He Bo, a research professor and director of the Marine Strategy Studies Center at Peking University, confirmed that the images from "Mizar Vision" were not taken by Chinese satellites, but rather sourced from American and European commercial satellites, as evidenced by the satellite orbits and image accuracy. In other words, the images that mapped the American war were captured by satellites made by America and Europe and sold in the open market.

Here it becomes clear what has actually been revealed and what has not. The "B-2" bomber is invisible to radars; this is still true at least at this moment. But it has never flown alone; often accompanying it in every operation is the same system: refueling aircraft, transport aircraft for munitions, early warning planes, aircraft carriers, and destroyers. That system is a fundamental part of the operational method of any modern air force, and what has changed is not the system itself, but the fact that detecting it with such precision previously required military spy satellites and intelligence agencies at the level of nations, whereas today it requires merely subscribing to a commercial service.

Note how some former Chinese officials speak about this campaign; a retired Chinese colonel commented on the activities of "Mizar Vision" that it was a "useful exploration contributing to China’s development as an intelligence power". For Beijing, whether concerning satellite images or claims of intercepting signals from the "B-2" stealth bombers, it may not need to be precise to achieve its goal; it is sufficient to cement the image of the Chinese intelligence system and the companies working with it in information gathering, as well as the modern techniques employed.

This aligns with the Chinese military doctrine, as in April 2024, Chinese President Xi Jinping established an "Information Support Force" as a new strategic branch reporting directly to the Central Military Commission. The primary mission of the force is to create and operate a multi-purpose networked information system that supports joint military operations in any conflict environment and under any enemy attack. According to analysts from the People’s Liberation Army, "success in modern wars relies on the smooth flow of information", making this network a fundamental pillar in wars and strategic competitions alike.

Restricting Visibility

On the other hand, Washington responded by restricting what the world can see; on March 6, the American company "Planet Labs" imposed a 96-hour delay on its satellite images. This company, founded in 2010, is widely used by media and researchers for its satellite imagery. Days later, "Planet Labs" doubled the restrictions to 14 days and expanded the scope to include all of the Middle East and some geographically adjacent regions through which American forces and assets might move.

Similarly, "Vantour" imposed similar restrictions claiming that it determines them "independently". Restricting commercial images during conflicts and wars is not a new phenomenon; "Planet Labs" imposed a 30-day delay during the Gaza war. But the context here is different, as these restrictions came after Iran subsequently targeted a number of facilities and properties that "Mizar Vision" exposed with missiles and drones.

But perhaps these restrictions were not solely aimed at protecting forces and equipment; they also came after investigative journalism teams used "Planet Labs" satellite images to analyze the strike on the Minab Primary School for girls and verify the type of missile. Journalists indicated that this delay, which later turned into a ban, "slows verification and makes fact-checking harder", and they confirmed that the images from "Planet Labs" enabled their teams to analyze the strikes on the school.

U.S. Secretary of War Pete Hegseth stated that "open sources are not the right place to determine what happened or didn’t happen". However, when open sources are in fact the only available tool for the world to understand what is happening in a war for which they do not possess accurate information, then restricting them is not solely about protecting the forces but also about protecting the narrative.

This exactly is where the responses cross; perhaps China exaggerates what it can see, while America restricts what others can see, but both sides implicitly acknowledge that commercial data has become capable of revealing what was presumed to be secret. Beijing is now investing in this recent shift, while Washington attempts to slow it down, but neither can reverse its direction. To understand the nature of this shift, we must go back in time to the 1980s.

Changing the Equation

When engineers at "Northrop" designed the "B-2" stealth bomber, their enemy at that time was specific, namely the Soviet radar networks. Every line in the aircraft's structure, every angle, and every layer of paint was designed to reduce the radar signature. The principle was simple; if radar cannot see you, you cannot be intercepted.

This principle held true because radar was indeed the only method to see what was happening in the sky. But it also applied for another reason that is not often mentioned; the environment around the aircraft was secured by natural informational darkness. Detecting bases, support aircraft, and supply chains required military satellites and intelligence agencies at the level of nations at that time.

Today, as we have seen, that darkness and protection have both been dispelled, and three directions have emerged that did not exist when the first lines of the "B-2" were drawn on paper. The first direction is the number of eyes in space; when the "B-2" bomber entered service in 1997, satellites capable of capturing high-resolution images were limited to a handful of countries. Today, the "Jilin-1" constellation (China’s largest commercial remote sensing and earth monitoring satellite network) alone comprises about 300 small satellites capable of producing half-meter resolution images, including live video of moving targets.

On the other hand, "Planet Labs" has a fleet of satellites that capture every point on earth multiple times a day, and "Vantour" offers images with a resolution of 0.3 meters. These are not government spy satellites but commercial products available to any paying client. The Pentagon itself estimated in 2022 that China "owns and operates about half of the intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance systems in space worldwide", which includes purely military capabilities. When commercial satellites are added, space is crowded with eyes that do not belong to a single entity.

The second direction is artificial intelligence technologies; what used to require dozens of analysts to scrutinize satellite images and identify aircraft types is now performed by a program that scans thousands of images and automatically detects deployment patterns. This is precisely what "Mizar Vision" did, purchasing commercial images and converting them into actionable intelligence using AI. The operation no longer requires permission from a specialized intelligence agency, but rather a well-funded startup.

The third direction involves the availability of open-source data; flight tracking sites are accessible to everyone. For example, the "Jingqi" system, from "Jing'an Technology", operates by merging satellite images with flight path data and public military records before analyzing the patterns. Analysts refer to this as "stealth transparency"; the stealth aircraft is designed to evade radar but operates within a network of support aircraft, logistical movements, and fixed bases. This network, once protected by informational darkness, is no longer shielded.

It should be clarified that part of this picture was available before; there are sites that can track military aircraft broadcasting signals as they fly through civilian airspace. Anyone observing the movement of transport and refueling aircraft in the weeks leading up to the operation would have noticed an unusual flow toward bases in the Middle East.

However, flight tracking alone does not reveal the volume and quality of the equipment that actually made it to the region; "F-35" and "F-22" fighters typically fly with their transponders off in operational areas, and therefore do not appear on any tracking screen. Flight tracking sites do not account for what is parked on the runways, do not pinpoint air defense system locations, and do not image the deck of an aircraft carrier.

What commercial satellites have added is the layer that reveals everything that flight tracking cannot see, namely the fixed assets on the ground. What AI technologies have contributed is the ability to merge the two layers together, aerial movement and ground images, into a nearly instantaneous operational map. The difference is not between sight and blindness, but can rather be seen as the difference between scattered fragments that an expert can piece together and a complete war map that is now published on social media.

Simply put, the "B-2" bomber was designed for a world where radar was the only eye, and the environment around it was dark. Today, it flies in a completely different world. However, "commercial transparency" is not the only front in exposing stealth; China is also not content with external attempts to detect stealth but is also working on attacking it from internal fronts.

New Radars?

Stealth technology was built on a specific physical principle: coatings and designs deflect or absorb high-frequency radar waves. However, this works with specific frequencies and not all of them, and here appears Beijing's attempts to surpass stealth in several areas.

The first area today is meter wave radars. In May 2025, the Chinese government electronics technology group showcased the "JY-27V" radar at the World Radar Exhibition, describing it as a "master artist" in detecting stealth targets. The simple idea is that it does not use short waves designed for aircraft to absorb, but much longer waves, ranging from 30-300 megahertz. These long waves are difficult to absorb, requiring thicker and heavier coatings, which creates a problem for the aircraft itself as it affects its agility and performance in the air. The radar is also practical and quick to deploy, being able to be installed on a truck and set up in less than ten minutes.

However, meter wave radars alone are not a decisive weapon; they can detect the presence of a stealth target, but their accuracy in determining location is less than that of high-frequency radars, complicating the guidance of an interceptor missile based solely on their data. Their true value and effective ability to threaten the opponent lie in their role as a first link in a multi-layered sensing network, where the meter wave radar detects the target and alerts other more precise systems to take over tracking and guidance.

The second and more ambitious area concerns quantum radars. In October 2025, Chinese media reported the start of large-scale production of quantum radars, believed to potentially detect stealth fighters like the "F-22" and "F-35". Traditional radar relies on sending radio waves that bounce off objects, and the reflected signal is then used to determine the target's location. On the other hand, quantum radar uses particles of light known as photons instead of radio waves, allowing for a higher sensitivity level in detecting the target.

In this type of radar, even a single photon can be dealt with and its characteristics measured accurately, including energy and direction. When the photon enters the device, its energy is converted into a small electrical signal that can be analyzed. The system also relies on the phenomenon of "quantum entanglement", where two entangled photons are produced. When one is sent toward the target, any change that occurs to it can be detected by the other photon present within the device, aiding in detecting objects even if the return signal is weakened.

Nevertheless, as of now, there is no published scientific data or documented field experiments confirming the ability of these radars to detect stealth aircraft under real operational conditions. Experts in the field also point to genuine technical challenges, notably the difficulty in maintaining quantum entanglement in practical environments, in addition to the effects of noise and interference, which may limit the efficiency of these systems for military use. However, the general direction does not require the success of every claim individually; this multi-front pressure, from radars to quantum mechanics to commercial transparency, continues to shrink the space within which the concept of stealth operates nonetheless, year after year.

Narrowing the Gap Between America and the World

The concept of stealth, in its broadest sense, is not merely a coating on an aircraft, but can be considered a pillar of a complete model for demonstrating and imposing power, by moving state armies across oceans, deploying them at distant bases, and striking targets anywhere without being seen before executing the strike. This is what enabled Washington to wage its previous wars with a substantial discrepancy in information; it sees the battlefield, and its opponents see only what it decides to show them. What happened in the war against Iran may indicate that this discrepancy has begun to diminish.

Diana Stroul, former Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Middle East Affairs, pointed out that Iran was able to utilize a "broad intelligence network... and that many satellite images from commercial satellites are now available for purchase, along with, of course, what they were receiving from the Russians and Chinese".

Seth Cromartie, former chief of staff for the U.S. Special Operations Command in the Middle East, went a step further saying: "No one has accomplished more than the Iranians with fewer resources. Iran has precise intelligence, not only about the locations of our bases but also about many of our lifestyles and military operational methods". This is not an assessment from an external analyst or mere Chinese claims, but rather recognition from an expert with broad knowledge of the American military establishment.

In addition to the erosion of informational darkness, there are shifts associated with it, albeit differing in nature. Alain Juillet, former director of intelligence for the French foreign security service, indicated that Iran likely acquired China’s BeiDou navigation system, explaining the improved accuracy of its missiles compared to last June's war. The BeiDou system operates with 45 satellites compared to 24 in the U.S. GPS system, and importantly, Washington cannot disable it. If Iran is indeed using this system, the issue is no longer merely about the concept of stealth, namely America's ability not to be seen, but its monopoly on the guidance systems that enable others to strike with precision.

The "B-2" bomber was designed for a world in which a limited number of countries had the ability to see, and where Washington controlled what is seen and what is not. Of course, that world will not disappear overnight, and American military superiority will not vanish just because a Chinese company published images of American military assets on social media. However, the trajectory we are heading toward is clearer than ever, and its tools are accessible to those who seek them, from commercial satellites and artificial intelligence to open-source data, with the cost of utilizing all this decreasing every year compared to the previous year.

Source: Al Jazeera