Key facts
- Type
- Strategic bomber
- National origin
- China
- Manufacturer
- Xi'an Aircraft Industrial Corporation
- Status
- In service; in production
- Primary users
- People's Liberation Army Air Force People's Liberation Army Naval Air Force , Egyptian Air Force (historical), Iraqi Air Force (historical)
- Number built
- 231+ as of 2020
- Manufactured
- 1959-present
- Retired
- 1991 (Iraq), 2000 (Egypt)
- Developed from
- Tupolev Tu-16
via Wikipedia infobox
Wikidata facts
- Subclass of
- Tupolev Tu-16
- Has part
- ejection seat
- Country
- China
- Operator
- People's Liberation Army Navy
- Developer
- Tupolev
- Manufacturer
- Xi'an Aircraft Industrial Corporation
- Image
- PLAAF Xian H-6H.jpg
Show 6 more facts
- Commons category
- Xian H-6
- first flight
- 1955-00-00
- total produced
- 150
- military designation
- H-6
- armament
- YJ-12
- service retirement
- 1991-00-00
via Wikidata · CC0
~25 min read
Encyclopedic overview
The Xi'an H-6 (Chinese: 轰-6; pinyin: Hōng-6) is a Chinese twin-engine jet heavy bomber manufactured by the Xi'an Aircraft Industrial Corporation. It is a license-built version of the Soviet Tupolev Tu-16 and remains the primary bomber aircraft of the People's Liberation Army Air Force (PLAAF).
The H-6N nuclear variant is a redesigned modernized strategic bomber carrying the JL-1 air-launched ballistic missile. As of 2025, it is considered to be the only Chinese military aircraft assigned nuclear weapons: 20 bombers are assigned up to 20 missiles with the 106th Air Brigade at the airbase in Neixiang County under Central Theater Command Air Force. It is capable of aerial refueling including via the Xi'an Y-20's tanker variants. The Xi'an H-20 is expected to eventually assume this nuclear role. The initial H-6A variant dropped live nuclear weapons in nine of China's nuclear tests, and served alongside the Harbin H-5 bomber and Nanchang Q-5 fighter before their nuclear roles were removed.
Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “Xian H-6” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.