4 ms·

This is all very old. I don't think modern top aircraft can defect so easily.

• pjc50 12y ago
  There's no real means to stop them defecting, surely? All the pilot has to do is fly over the border and land, while not getting shot down by the country he's defecting to. Iran got hold of a drone. It's not quite the drone "defecting" but it's somewhat similar.
  • gatehouse 12y ago
    This is a high end weapon, heavily computerized, loaded with explosives ... I'm not saying there is definitely a self-destruct command, but if I were landing one in China I'd be sweating.
    • rbanffy 12y ago
      Most of the explosives on a plane are pretty much designed to be easily dropped. While some components may have self destruct capabilities, I doubt a defecting pilot could be easily prevented from defecting. In the case of the F35, I'd love to see many of them reaching enemy countries.. Attempting to replicate it would send their aerospace industries back decades.
    • astrodust 12y ago
      They don't have a self-destruct of any sort. In 2001 an aircraft loaded with state of the art surveillance equipment collided with a Chinese fighter and was forced to make an emergency landing in China (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hainan_Island_incident https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hainan_Island_incident) which must've been an interesting experience for the crew. They had to destroy as much of that presumably staggeringly expensive equipment as they could to avoid it falling into the wrong hands. I did not know that instead of the C4 you'd expect to see from movies, they used hot coffee to destroy most of the equipment.