China has turned the Singapore Airshow into a stage for its rising aerospace ambitions, pairing a high-profile military display with a commercial push that directly targets Western incumbents. While United States hardware and companies are present, the optics of the week tilt toward Beijing’s growing influence in Asia’s crowded skies.
The result is a show that doubles as a barometer of power in the region: China projecting confidence, Southeast Asian buyers shopping for options, and Washington struggling to match the tempo as its resources and attention are stretched across multiple fronts.
China’s military showcase and Southeast Asian interest
Beijing’s strategy at the Singapore Airshow is straightforward: use spectacle to sell hardware and, by extension, influence. China brought a prominent military delegation to the Singapore Airshow, using the event to flex its aviation muscle in front of regional officials and industry executives. The presence is calibrated to signal that China is no longer just a buyer of foreign systems but a full-spectrum supplier, from fighters to transport aircraft and drones.
The centerpiece of that message is The PLA Air Force aerobatic team, which made a headline-grabbing debut with its Chengdu J-10C fighter jets, an export-ready platform that Beijing is keen to position as a viable option for countries priced out of Western fleets. The crowd around Chinese stands has been thick with Southeast Asian defence officials, a visible SOUTHEAST ASIAN INTEREST that underscores how seriously regional militaries are weighing Chinese offers.
From Shenyang J-35A to Chengdu J-10C, a catalogue on display
China is not relying on a single showpiece, it is rolling out a catalogue. Alongside the flying display by The PLA Air Force and its Chengdu J-10C, Chinese state-owned firms are using the trade floor to market next-generation designs. The star attraction in the fighter category is a model of the Shenyang J-35A stealth jet, pitched as a low-cost alternative for countries that might otherwise look to the Lockheed F-35 but lack the budget, political alignment, or both.
The Shenyang J-35A is being promoted aggressively by AVIC, which is highlighting the aircraft’s stealth profile and multirole capabilities while stressing that it is designed with export customers in mind. At the same time, Chinese booths are packed with other systems, from missiles to support aircraft, reinforcing the impression that Beijing’s arms industry, led by groups such as AVIC, is ready to equip entire air forces, not just sell one-off platforms.
Commercial aviation push: Comac, Airbus and a strained market
Behind the fighter theatrics sits a quieter but arguably more consequential campaign in commercial aviation. China is using the show to push its homegrown airliners into a market long dominated by Airbus and Boeing, with a particular focus on Asia’s fast-growing carriers. A model of the Comac C929 on display at Changi Exhibition Centre in Singapore is a physical reminder that Beijing wants a slice of the widebody segment, not just the narrowbody niche already targeted by the C919.
Industry executives describe this as a deliberate COMMERCIAL AVIATION PUSH, with China seeking to grab share from Airbus at a time when Western manufacturers are struggling with production delays and certification bottlenecks. The Comac stand is backed by data showing a surge in regional passenger demand, and by projections that Asia will account for a large share of new aircraft deliveries in the coming decades, a trend highlighted in Comac material presented at the show.
Supply chains, demand surge and the opening for China
The timing of China’s push is not accidental. Global aerospace is grappling with GEOPOLITICAL CHALLENGES that have turned supply chain chaos into a new normal, particularly for Aircraft engine makers that depend on critical materials such as titanium and nickel. Western primes are struggling to ramp up output fast enough to meet record order books, leaving airlines waiting longer for deliveries and forcing them to consider alternative suppliers.
Regional executives in Singapore describe a sharp mismatch between demand and available capacity. As the aviation market continues to grow, there is a widening gap between what carriers need and what traditional manufacturers can deliver, a point underscored by Jeffrey Lam, president of ST Engineering’s aerospace arm, who has warned of persistent constraints even as passenger numbers climb. That imbalance, documented in GEOPOLITICAL CHALLENGES facing the sector and in regional demand forecasts that cite COMAC data on passenger growth, creates precisely the opening China is trying to exploit.
Asia’s arms race and the US role on the sidelines
All of this is unfolding against a backdrop of rising military spending in Asia, where defence budgets are growing apace as governments respond to a sustained build-up from an increasingly assertive China. Regional planners are trying to hedge, seeking both to deter Beijing and to avoid overdependence on any single supplier, which is why Southeast Asian delegations are visible at Chinese booths even as they maintain long-standing ties with Western vendors.
Yet the optics at the show are striking. While US aircraft and businesses are formally described as anchor participants at this year’s Singapore Airshow, with Pentagon-linked displays and a roster of American firms on the floor, the narrative energy is elsewhere. China’s efforts to penetrate the commercial market and its high-profile military marketing, from The PLA Air Force aerobatic team to the Shenyang J-35A model, are drawing the crowds and the headlines, while Washington’s presence feels more routine. That imbalance, captured in reports on COMMERCIAL AVIATION PUSH and in analyses of Asia’s arms spending that stress how China is capitalising while US resources are strained across the globe, helps explain why the world’s biggest airshow in the region feels like a stage where Beijing is setting the pace and Washington is reacting.
That perception is sharpened by the way Southeast Asian defence officials are crowding Chinese stands, a pattern highlighted in accounts of SOUTHEAST ASIAN INTEREST and in descriptions of Asia’s arms spending trajectory that link procurement decisions directly to concerns about an increasingly assertive China. At the same time, coverage of US aircraft and businesses as anchor participants, including detailed rundowns of Pentagon-linked displays by Jeremy Stillwagner, underscores that Washington is physically present but struggling to dominate the narrative in the way it once did, even at a show where its companies remain central to the industrial ecosystem.
China’s presence is not without limits. Some reporting notes that China has in past years scaled back the most overt displays of war machines at the Singapore Airshow, with state-owned Avic and Catic taking the lead in representing its arms industry rather than sending large numbers of front-line platforms. Accounts of how Avic and Catic fronted China’s presence at Asia’s biggest airshow in earlier editions, and how China was not entirely absent even when heavy war machines were fewer, show that Beijing is still calibrating how hard to push. But the trajectory is clear: from The PLA Air Force aerobatic team and Chengdu J-10C flights to the Shenyang J-35A model and the Comac C929 mock-up, China is using Singapore to signal that it intends to be a permanent, and increasingly dominant, fixture in both the military and commercial skies over Asia.
For regional governments, the message is double-edged. On one hand, more choice in suppliers, from Chinese fighters to Comac airliners, can mean better prices and leverage in negotiations with entrenched players like Airbus. On the other, the same dynamic that gives them bargaining power also deepens their exposure to the strategic competition between Beijing and Washington. As Asia’s arms spending grows and aviation demand surges, the Singapore Airshow has become the place where those trade-offs are most vividly on display, with China flexing its capabilities and the United States, despite fielding US aircraft and businesses as anchor participants, increasingly forced to watch as the centre of gravity shifts.
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*This article was researched with the help of AI, with human editors creating the final content.
