With nearly 14 million views on Zhihu, this question generated over 1,000 answers — and the tone across most of them is strikingly confident. The optimism isn't blind nationalism; it is grounded in a specific observation: China's military hardware has been visibly, measurably catching up — and in some areas, pulling ahead.
The F-22 Benchmark
One of the most upvoted answers is also the simplest. A commenter notes: "When I was a child, the most advanced fighter jet I knew was the F-22. Now I have a PhD — and it's still the F-22."
This single observation captures the shift in perception better than any spreadsheet. The US military's visible technological edge, which once seemed insurmountable, has not expanded at the pace many assumed. Meanwhile, China has fielded the J-20 stealth fighter, the J-35, the Type 055 destroyer, hypersonic missiles, and a carrier fleet — all within roughly a decade. The gap that once defined the conversation has narrowed dramatically, and Chinese netizens have noticed.
What the Numbers Actually Show
One widely circulated military inventory report, compiled as of February 2026, gives a snapshot of the PLA's current scale:
Personnel
- Army: 900,000 | Navy: 300,000 | Air Force: 420,000
- Rocket Force: 150,000 | Reserve forces: 3.2 million
- Veterans under 45: approximately 12 million
Naval assets
- 3 aircraft carriers (a 4th under construction), with the Fujian-class at over 80,000 tons
- 62 destroyers, including 14 Type 055/055A/055B cruiser-class ships
- 75 submarines, including nuclear ballistic missile submarines of the Type 096 class
- 55 amphibious assault vessels
Air Force
- 420 J-20 stealth fighters, 450 J-16 multirole fighters, 400 J-10C fighters
- The H-20 stealth strategic bomber reportedly approaching its maiden flight
Rocket Force (as of February 2026)
- DF-41 ICBMs: 150 | DF-5C heavy ICBMs: 50
- DF-26 anti-ship ballistic missiles: 500
- DF-17 hypersonic missiles: 200
- DF-15C bunker-buster ballistic missiles: 1,760 — capable of penetrating 75 meters of military-grade reinforced concrete
Emerging systems
- 1.29 million FPV suicide drones
- 47,000 robotic anti-tank dog units
- 119,000 unmanned ground attack systems
- Anti-satellite missiles: 800 in stockpile, with large-scale production reportedly accelerating from 2027
The Structural Shift: From Quantity to Quality
The most analytically significant trend in the data is not raw numbers — it is the direction of change. Year-on-year comparisons between 2025 and 2026 reveal a clear pattern:
- Conventional forces are being trimmed. Army headcount and legacy equipment are being phased down.
- Specialized and asymmetric systems are surging. Anti-satellite weapons, anti-radiation missiles, EMP munitions, hypersonic precision systems, electronic warfare, cyber warfare, space warfare, and AI-driven unmanned systems have all seen sharp increases.
- Navy and Air Force are expanding rapidly, with the Air Force recording its largest single-year expansion in recent history.
- Special operations forces across all branches are growing in size, training intensity, and cross-service coordination.
- Amphibious assault training frequency has spiked noticeably — a detail that has not gone unnoticed among observers tracking Taiwan Strait scenarios.
The pattern suggests a military transitioning from a mass-conscript model toward a leaner, technology-dense, network-centric force optimized for high-intensity, short-duration conflict.
Actions Speak Louder Than Statements
Beyond hardware, Chinese netizens point to behavioral signals as evidence of a changed balance of power. When a Type 055 destroyer conducted a transit near Australia, Western governments — which in previous years would have issued pointed condemnations over far smaller Chinese naval movements — responded only by noting they had not been notified in advance.
For many Chinese observers, the restraint of that response was more meaningful than any official statement. As one commenter put it: "Facts speak for themselves."
The Carrier Naming Logic
One of the most discussed subtopics is the naming convention for China's carrier fleet — and what it signals about strategic intent. The existing carriers map neatly onto China's maritime history of humiliation:
- Liaoning → Covers the Bohai Sea; honors the memory of the First Sino-Japanese War
- Shandong → Covers the Yellow Sea; same historical register
- Fujian → Covers the East China Sea; commemorates the Battle of Fuzhou
The fourth carrier, widely expected to be named Guangdong, would cover the South China Sea — the most contested maritime zone China faces today — and would symbolically invoke the Opium War and the burning of Humen. As one analyst on the thread noted, both Sun Yat-sen and Mao Zedong identified the Opium War as the starting point of China's century of humiliation. The naming is not incidental; it is a deliberate act of historical bookkeeping.
Why the Optimism Is Real — and Why It Matters
The shift in Chinese public sentiment about military power is not driven by propaganda alone. It is driven by visible, verifiable hardware appearing in parade formations, naval exercises, and international incidents — combined with a stagnation in the visible capabilities of the primary rival. Whether this optimism is fully warranted, premature, or strategically motivated, it represents a genuine change in how one of the world's largest populations perceives the global balance of power — and that perception itself has consequences.
