Intelligent manufacturing not only leads the development of manufacturing fields but also is an engine that propels the next industry revolution. The machining of aircraft structural component belongs to typical small batch and large flexible discrete manufacturing. In order to realize the intelligent manufacturing oriented aircraft structural component machining, many complicated problems still need to be solved. In this paper, the background, features and connotation of intelligent manufacturing are briefly introduced. Then, the difficulties that will be faced in the realization process of intelligent manufacturing oriented aircraft structural component machining are analyzed. The construction method of intelligent manufacturing oriented digital plant for aircraft structural component is proposed correspondingly, which can lay a foundation for building the future intelligent manufacturing paradigm of aircraft structural component.