British F-35Bs Launch Unprecedented East Asian Show of Force Aimed at China: Can They Challenge PLA Dominance?

The British Armed Forces have deployed F-35B fifth generation fighters for joint exercises with Japanese and South Korean air units under Operation Hightower, with the intention of demonstrating the country’s power projection capabilities at a time of rising tensions with China. The British Royal Air Force reported regarding the exercises: “Operation Hightower demonstrates the Royal Air Force’s ability to project air power globally, with UK F-35s operating at extended range from the UK Carrier Strike Group, supported by Air Mobility Force Voyager. The RAF is collaborating and exercising with the Republic of Korea and Japan to strengthen defence ties and improve interoperability with the Japan Air Self-Defense Force (JASDF) and the Republic of Korea Air Force (ROKAF).” The F-35Bs in question operated at extended range ahead of the Royal Navy’s Carrier Strike Group. Their participation in the exercises followed their prior deployment to Darwin in Australia to take part in the Talisman Sabre exercises.

The deployment of Royal Air Force F-35s for operations in the Pacific follows a statement by British Defence Secretary John Healey on July 27 that the country would be ready to fight if a conflict breaks out in the Taiwan Strait, where the People’s Republic of China on the mainland, and the Republic of China based on Taiwan, both claim to be the sole legitimate governments of the Chinese nation. It also follows a growing emphasis by countries across the Western world on expanding their F-35 fleets in Northeast Asia aimed at China, with the F-35 considered the only fighter class in the Western world technologically on par with China’s J-20 and J-35 fifth generation fighters. As a result, not only has Japan become the only country to host permanent F-35 deployments by the U.S. Navy, Air Force and Marine Corps separately, but it has also seen prior deployments by the Italian Navy, the Italian Air Force and the Royal Australian Air Force, and is scheduled to host Royal Netherlands Air Force F-35s in 2027.

Northeast Asia is the only region where the F-35 faces peer level challenges from another fighter class, with the J-20 fleet having expanded significantly, while the aircraft’s lighter counterpart the J-35 is thought to have entered service in both the People’s Liberation Army Navy and the Air Force in early 2025. Entering service a year after the F-35A from 2017, the J-20 is a much larger aircraft which boasts over double the range, a far larger radar, a higher weapons carrying capacity, and overwhelmingly superior manoeuvrability, while its avionics are considered broadly on par.The F-35 and J-20 are considered effectively in a league of their own in terms of sophistication, with the avionics and airframe materials of the only other two operational fifth generation fighters in the older F-22 and Russian Su-57 being far less advanced.

The U.S. Armed Forces and other Western Bloc states have faced growing pressure increase the presence of F-35s in Northeast Asia to slow China’s emergence as the dominant air power in the region. The viability of this strategy remains in question, however, due to multiple factors ranging from the notoriously low availability rates of the F-35, to the fighter’s limited suitability for high intensity air-to-air engagements, and China’s projected emergence as the first country in the world to field sixth generation air superiority fighters, which are expected to leave the F-35 largely obsolete for high end air-to-air engagements. Growing doubts regarding the F-35’s viability resulted in a fall in Lockheed Martin’s stock value after China’s sixth generation prototypes were unveiled, and is considered a primary factor in the U.S. Air Force’s decision to make deep cuts to its own orders for F-35s for 2024. The F-35’s availability and reliability issues have exacerbated these concerns, and were recently highlighted when a British F-35B became stranded in India for 39 days in June-July.