What a load of bull.How difficult would it be for the Chinese to buy or steal an engine or the blueprints for an engine that would be used by the f22 or f23.Not difficult at all.
Blueprints are one thing...
Think of all the Chinese knockoffs you’ve encountered.
Stand back safe distance.
That in itself isn't enough - the real challenge is the manufacturing/heat-treating of the first-stage turbine blades.
It’s not the design or the blueprint the ChiComs really need. They probably already have those. It’s the metallurgy that they lack. Jet engines have some really exotic metals and if you don’t have all that knowledge making parts durable and flexible at the same time the engines will implode and break into little hot, extremely sharp pieces of shrapnel.
CC
Oh they could steal one, but replicating it is simply beyond their manufacturing capabilities. The tech involved is very sophisticated. Kind of like if we stole a true starship from some alien and tried to replicate its warp drive en masse...
Can we say ‘materials science’???