China’s scientific elite gathered to honor Ben De, the newly minted recipient of the 2025 National Highest Science and Technology Award. As the founding father of China’s airborne pulse Doppler radar and a pioneer in phased-array technology, Ben’s career trajectory serves as a blueprint for the nation's multi-decade quest for electronic warfare dominance. His work has effectively provided the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) with what state media calls 'Fire Eyes'—the ability to detect, track, and engage threats across land, sea, and space.
Born in 1938 into a poverty-stricken rural family in Jilin, Ben’s early life was defined by the hardships of war and the realization that technological backwardness leaves a nation vulnerable. This formative environment fostered a stoic discipline; he famously recalls running barefoot to school to preserve his only pair of handmade shoes, a habit that left physical calluses and a mental fortitude that would define his professional life. His academic journey took him through the Harbin Institute of Technology, eventually landing him at the 14th Research Institute of CETC, the cradle of China’s radar industry.
In the 1970s, Ben was tasked with the '7010' project, a massive undertaking to build China’s first long-range phased-array early warning radar. Situated in a hollowed-out mountain to survive potential strikes, the radar was a behemoth of its time, utilizing over 8,000 antenna units across a structure eight stories high. Its success made China only the third nation, after the United States and the Soviet Union, to possess such sophisticated early-warning capabilities, a critical shield during the Cold War.
Transitioning from ground-based to airborne systems, Ben faced a daunting challenge in the 1980s: developing pulse Doppler fire-control radar. At the time, this 'look-down, shoot-down' technology was a closely guarded secret among Western powers who refused to sell it to Beijing. Ben led a team of hundreds of engineers through nearly a decade of trial and error, identifying over 100 critical technical hurdles. He personally participated in high-risk test flights on aging aircraft, often ignoring mechanical failures to focus solely on the data appearing on his radar screens.
Today, at nearly 90 years old, Ben remains a fixture in the research community, focusing on the next generation of space-based surveillance and intelligent sensing. His legacy is not just in the hardware mounted on modern J-series fighters, but in the institutional shift toward indigenous innovation. His life story is frequently cited by Beijing as a testament to the success of 'self-reliance'—a narrative that positions scientific achievement as the ultimate form of national defense.