China’s GJ-21 Stealth Drone Completes First Takeoff and Landing Aboard Type 076 Assault Ship Sichuan

China’s GJ-21 stealth unmanned combat aerial vehicle (UCAV) has completed its first takeoff and landing aboard the Sichuan, the People’s Liberation Army Navy’s (PLAN) first Type 076 amphibious assault ship, the official Xinhua news agency reported on October 30, 2026, citing a navy source. Xinhua described the GJ-21 as China’s first shipborne stealth drone integrating reconnaissance and strike functions. Beijing has not disclosed the date of the trial, the number of launch and recovery cycles flown, or whether the aircraft used the ship’s electromagnetic catapult and arresting gear.

The milestone comes as the Sichuan, hull number 51, nears the end of its trials program; state broadcaster CCTV reported in July 2026 that the ship had entered its final testing phase. The ship was launched on December 27, 2024, began its maiden sea trial in November 2025, days after the carrier Fujian was commissioned, and sailed from Shanghai to the South China Sea in April 2026 for a cross-sea trial that state media said would test systems including ship-aircraft coordination. Xinhua also reported that the Sichuan ran consecutive sea trials in late October, the most likely window for the GJ-21 sortie.

GJ-21 Stealth Drone Moves From Parade Ground to Flight Deck

The GJ-21 is the navalized derivative of the Hongdu GJ-11 Sharp Sword, a program launched in 2009, designed by the Shenyang Aircraft Design Institute with Hongdu Aviation Industry Group as co-developer and prototype manufacturer, both part of the state-owned Aviation Industry Corporation of China (AVIC). The land-based GJ-11 first flew in 2013 and appeared in a production-representative configuration at the October 1, 2019 National Day parade.

The naval variant surfaced publicly at the Victory Day parade in Beijing on September 3, 2025, among the new uncrewed combat aircraft unveiled that day. In late January 2026, imagery circulating on Chinese social media showed a fully covered aircraft, assessed by observers as a GJ-21 mock-up, on the Sichuan’s deck as the ship was moved out at its Shanghai shipyard. In July 2026, state broadcaster CCTV aired computer-generated footage of a GJ-21 catapult launch from the Type 076, and in August 2026 videos posted on Chinese social media showed what was identified as the GJ-21 flying over Huludao in Liaoning province.

That sequence, from parade reveal to shipboard trials in 14 months, points to a compressed schedule in which aircraft and ship matured in parallel, as with the Fujian.

Sharp Sword Lineage: Airframe, Payload, and GJ-21 Specifications

Beijing has released no official specifications for either variant. Publicly available estimates for the GJ-11 baseline describe a tailless flying-wing UCAV with a length of 10 to 12.2 meters, a wingspan of 14 to 14.4 meters, and a height of roughly 2.7 meters. Signature reduction relies on a shrouded engine exhaust and serrated weapon bay doors. Two internal weapons bays, positioned symmetrically between the landing gear, are reported to carry up to 2,000 kilograms of ordnance; an AVIC model displayed at Airshow China 2021 showed four munitions per bay resembling precision-guided glide bombs.

Propulsion comes from a single non-afterburning turbofan, widely reported as a WS-13 derivative, giving the aircraft high-subsonic performance. No official or credible open-source figures exist for maximum takeoff weight or combat radius.

The GJ-21 adds the structural changes that shipboard operations demand: folding outer wings for hangar and deck stowage and, for catapult launch and arrested recovery, a tailhook and a twin-wheel nose gear with a launch bar, features observed on mock-ups and prototype imagery rather than confirmed in official specifications. Xinhua’s reconnaissance-strike label indicates the GJ-21 retains the dual-role sensor and internal-carriage architecture of the land-based design rather than serving as a dedicated scout. For an amphibious task group, that means a low-observable platform able to locate and engage surface combatants or air defense radars well beyond the reach of its helicopter screen, without exposing crewed aircraft.

How the Type 076 Sichuan Was Built Around Drones

The Sichuan is the only amphibious assault ship in the world fitted with an electromagnetic catapult. According to China’s Ministry of National Defense, it displaces more than 40,000 tonnes at full load and combines a twin-island superstructure with a full-length flight deck. Open-source estimates put its length at roughly 252 to 260 meters. Official Chinese descriptions cite a fully automated landing guidance system, a new integrated power system, and electromagnetic catapult and arresting technology, allowing the ship to operate fixed-wing drones, helicopters, and amphibious equipment. Footage aired by CCTV and reported by state media on August 1, 2026, showed a dead-load catapult test and a live-fire countermeasures launch aboard the ship, both made public for the first time.

No Western large-deck amphibious ship offers a comparable configuration. The US Navy’s America- and Wasp-class ships depend on short takeoff and vertical landing F-35B fighters, while Türkiye’s TCG Anadolu operates the Baykar TB3, a non-stealthy drone launched from a ski-jump without catapult assistance. The Sichuan’s catapult and arresting gear free the PLAN from the weight and fuel penalties of vertical-landing designs and allow it to recover a heavier, low-observable airframe carrying internal weapons.

Analysis: Recovering a stealth UCAV on a ship that is not a carrier gives the PLAN a second, distributed source of fixed-wing combat aviation. In a Taiwan contingency or a South China Sea operation, a Type 076 group could field reconnaissance-strike drones to find and target opposing naval forces and coastal defenses without committing the Fujian or the Shandong. For the US Navy, which restructured its armed carrier drone effort into the unarmed MQ-25A Stingray tanker in 2016 and has no armed stealth UCAV at sea, the gap is doctrinal as much as technological. The caveat is maturity: a single takeoff and landing announced by state media does not establish sortie generation rates, all-weather recovery, or integration into the PLAN’s targeting chain.

The next indicators are the Sichuan’s formal commissioning, imagery of GJ-21 catapult launches with ordnance aboard, and evidence of multi-aircraft deck operations. Observers will also watch for GJ-21 trials aboard the Fujian, which the drone’s folding wings and catapult compatibility would permit, and for any construction of follow-on Type 076 hulls. Chinese authorities have not announced a commissioning date for the Sichuan.