Surgery depends on two conditions: firstly, the patient’s physical condition; secondly, whether the patient can undergo the next step of surgery after treatment. It is clinically feasible to convert inoperable or initially inoperable intermediate to advanced lung cancer into resectable lung cancer with neoadjuvant radiotherapy or chemotherapy, together with neoadjuvant immunotherapy or neoadjuvant targeted therapy. There have been many such studies and good results have been achieved in clinical practice. Therefore, the decision of whether lung cancer in the middle and late stages can be operated depends on both the patient’s condition and the stage of the disease.