A new study highlights China’s growing air power, and warns that China is looking to build out its Air Force to the point that the U.S. would not be willing to take it on in direct conflict.

The Project Air Force team at Rand Corp. describes an emerging Chinese air force that aims to rival the United States’ own, both technologically and strategically, often by mirroring U.S. military capabilities and doctrine.

“It is important to recognize that many of the PLA [People’s Liberation Army] efforts in the military aerospace sector focus on fielding of specific capabilities in sufficient quantities to deter the United States from entering a conflict; the PLA would vastly prefer deterrence over actual combat operations,” the report reads. “In this sense, the capabilities competition can be regarded as aimed at defeating the United States without actually fighting.”

Copying or innovating their own capabilities are both valid pathways to this goal. However, “the lower cost and higher speed of the copying and adapting approach appears to have made it a preferred approach whenever available,” the report reads.

Different services prefer different styles, however. The People’s Liberation Army Air Force, or PLAAF, tends to copy, while China’s missile and space programs are more frequent innovators.