Russia ready to negotiate with India on MiG-35 fighters

p2prada

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Mig-35, Mig-29K, Mig-29M/M2 are all the same aircraft with different avionics and some changes in airframe. Mig-29SMT/Mig-29UPG are all the same aircraft, more or less.

30 Mig-29SMT upgrades meant for Algeria instead went to VVS. Apart from that VVS has 200+ Mig-29s for upgrades to SMT status, that's at the same level as Mig-29UPG.

Apart from that 69 Mig-29K are on order or delivered to both IAF and VVS.

When it comes to export orders from other countries, both Syria and Serbia have interests with 24 aircraft and 6 aircraft (with a follow on option of another 6). Syria deal is on hold as of now. Mongolia ordered 5. Sudan ordered 22.

Mig-35 orders are guaranteed from VVS. We don't know how many but I think at least 30 will be ordered as they had mentioned back in 2009. If it is any good, orders will swell to 30 more.

Overall Mig is doing quite well. Fresh orders of around ~150 aircraft, with only 24 on hold. An upgrade project for at least 300 Mig-29s which is equivalent to buying 100+ new Mig-29s in terms of costs. Overall, their order books in terms of number of aircraft is nearly twice that of Dassault with just the French orders of 180 Rafales.

Follow that up with the new Sukhoi-Mig development for UCAVs, Mig has a decent comeback planned for itself.

Their current plans to try and push Mig-35s onto IAF will definitely fail, but Mig will survive without it.
 

Austin

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The order to push Mig-35 was mentioned in the interview and he Designer said he would like to see IAF buy Mig-35 no different compared to EF hoping to sell its fighter or American there which is if MMRCA/Rafale fails which is unlikely.

Like all defence organistation Mig or Sukhoi is part of Russian Government and the state would any way fund it because they would need aircraft for their own airforce and importing is not an option or choice for RuAF.....if they can export it , its always a bonus not just for them but for any aviation design house in the world ......it helps them bring money and make them more competitive.

Look at HAL you can count on your fingers the number of aircraft they built and have exported in the past 2 decades still they manage to survive on government funding and orders from IAF.
 

p2prada

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It would be interesting if we do order 17 more Mig-29 (9-20) and take the numbers back to 80, as it originally was. We can build new ones or simply buy it second hand from either Russia or any one of the 50 countries which have grounded the aircraft and have them upgraded.

The same could possibly be done for Mirage-2000 as well. Take the numbers back to 59. We need 10 more here. But there is a proposition out for 2 aircraft.
 

Austin

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IF IAF was serious about depleting fleet they should have just started lic manuf of M2K-5 and Mig-29SMT at HAL facility immediately after kargil war ....it never did and simily sold out to govt multi vendor nonsense , which till date is being negotiated as MMRCA and IAF constantly crying on force depletion. At that time had we gone for Lic Manuf of M2K-5 and Mig-29 we would till date had a 150-200 strong fleet of both fighters and growing , lic deal was also part of original M2K and Mig-29 purchase which was not pursued.

Now the chances of purchase of either is minimal , if MMRCA fails to fly off or get delayed then IAF would simply bump up Su-30 as the production line at HAL screwdriver facility is well estabilshed and staff well versed to build 14-16 aircraft per year.
 

p2prada

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You think it is realistic to build so many types under one entity?

Building the MKI itself was a big deal.

But the M2K and Mig would have completely fixed the gap in our fleet. Heck, they should have just invited the French and the Russians for a tender and chosen one of them. Or simply gone for the French from the beginning. But I would take all of this back if the Rafale deal goes through.
 

Austin

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Either one should also do good , that is why M2K was what IAF preferred then ........the MMRCA took a loooong time to come and unfortunately it would be another new type among the circus that IAF operates with little desire to streamline its fleet and logistics.
 

sorcerer

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MiGs try to conquer India

https://in.rbth.com/economics/defence/2016/10/17/migs-try-to-conquer-india_639481

17 October 2016 Dmitry Litovkin, Alexey Ramm, Izvestia
India’s problem with its aging Air Force fleet is that it requires new fighter jets soon. The MiG-35 is best suited to meet India’s requirements and will be invited to participate in the tendering process in the near future.

Russian Aircraft Corporation MiG will offer the Indian Defence Ministry its latest MiG-35, so that it can participate in a tender to supply medium fighter jets. New Delhi is planning to announce the tender and seek expressions of interest in the near future. Earlier, in 2015, India rejected the ‘MiG 35’, opting for the French Rafale. The Indian Air Force is now organizing the tender, and planning to replace its 200 MiG-21 and MiG-27 airplanes.

In addition to the RAC MiG, those invited to participate in the tendering process are the Swedish company SAAB – with the Gripen NG aircraft, and the American Lockheed Martin – with the “Indian” version of the F-16. A major requirement for tender participants – is maximum localization of production of the fighter aircraft in India.


“The United Aircraft Corporation and RAC MiG will participate in the upcoming IAF tender,” Izvestia learned from the UAC. “We just need to wait for the official technical specifications from the Indian government and the invitation. After that, we will prepare and send a package of documents with our proposals to New Delhi,” the UAC representative said.


New Delhi is currently formulating the technical specifications which, in the form of an RFP (Request for Proposals), will be sent to selected companies participating in the tender. This will be the formal launch of the new tender. According to information from sources in the military and diplomatic circles, Indian representatives, as early as this summer, turned to Russia with a request to describe the possible packaging arrangement of the MiG-35, which the United Aircraft Corporation will be ready to offer in the tender.

According to the source, Russia has sent India an expanded list of equipment and weapons, which included electronic warfare stations, suspended opto-electronic sighting containers, a wide range of aircraft weapons, including air-air and air-land missiles, as well as high-precision bombs.

All members of the future tender had met between 2000 and 2015, during a similar competition for the right to supply 126 fighter jets worth $10 billion. In the course of this long tender, the MiG-35 beat the F-16IN and the Gripen NG, but lost out to the French Rafale. However, due to the high prices, India could not buy one hundred, but only 36 fighters. India did not receive the Rafale production technologies and localization of production in Indian enterprises, as promised.

Andrey Frolov, an expert, told Izvestia that the announcement of a new tender could be interpreted as the public recognition by India that the modernization problem of a rapidly aging Air Force fleet has not been solved.

“Now we are seeing a split in the year 2000 tender,” said Frolov. “The Rafale has been purchased, but the first aircraft will be delivered no earlier than 2019. India's own fighter jet, the Tejas, is apparently not ready yet. And now, in a situation of mass write-offs of the MiG-21 and MiG-27 airplanes, something needs to be done urgently with the domestic fleet.”

Frolov said the outcome of the new tender was difficult to predict. There are some difficulties with all the aircraft invited to participate in the tender. Sweden is prepared to share production technologies of the Gripen fighter, but there are not many Swedish parts in this aircraft. The main components are purchased from the United States and Europe with which they would have to negotiate for permission to localize production in a third country.



Another problem with the Gripen is that, for the production of a new fighter jet, the SAAB Company will be forced to remove parts from aircraft already with the Swedish Air Force. A scandal has recently erupted on this issue in Sweden – the essence of which was the question: does it make sense to “cannibalize” the existing fighter fleet for the production of new aircraft, or is it better to invest in the development and production of a more advanced fighter aircraft? The new aircraft from Saab is scheduled to appear in 2019 which, as in the case of the Rafale, does not solve the current problems of the Indian Air Force.

“With the American F-16 things are easier,” said Frolov. “Its production line in the USA is scheduled for closing in 2017, and Washington could, theoretically, transfer it to India.

In practice, however, Americans have never yet transferred technologies to manufacture their own weapons and military equipment to any other country. Especially since the onboard equipment of this latest version of the aircraft, the F-16 Blok 52/57, includes a radar with active electronically scanned array (AESA), which is considered as the key know-how in the design of modern fighters.

Ivan Konovalov, Head of the Centre for Strategic Trend Studies, believes the MiG-35 is the only aircraft with which the Indian military should not have any issues.

“The aircraft participated in the last tender and showed excellent results,” said Konovalov. “The MiG lost out to the French Rafale for political, rather than technical reasons. The formal reason for the choice in favour of the French aircraft was the fact that, under Indian legislation, the Indian military cannot buy weapons and military equipment from only one supplier. And at that time, Russia had already signed several major contracts to supply India with Su-30MKI fighters and naval MiG-29K/KUB planes.”
 

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