China’s demand for passenger jets is genuine – but so is its aim to build a commercially credible aviation industry
Beijing is aware of these constraints. Civil aviation cannot be subordinated to industrial ambition alone. Airlines require reliable aircraft to sustain tourism, logistics and domestic mobility. Boeing and Airbus remain operationally indispensable, whatever the longer-term trajectory.
Yet Chinese industrial policy has long accepted short-term dependence as the price of longer-term autonomy. Boeing orders stabilise fleet expansion while easing pressure on a more difficult question: whether China can build a commercially credible aviation industry before external conditions become more restrictive.
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