First of all India has bought Rusdian weapons for the last 50 years out of compulsion not by choice.
Not 100% true. We always had option to get things from UK,France and Germany.
We were at the wrong end of US friendship.
It's all different now. No one is denying us anything.
No one is denying anything, thats true however the meaning of friendship does not start and end with sale of high end weapons platform. What has US done to help India in others areas like infra development etc. 123 was signed with much fanfare and the whole idea was that India would get latest in civilian nuclear tech which is not happening now
Second, Russian weapons used to be cheap. Not anymore. They are extracting the price.
1) PAK-FA when it takes to skies would be as potent as f-35 BUT not as pricey.
2) Another point with US weapons is that is they require very intrusive end user monitoring compliance which at times might not be possible. Take the case of Mig-21. India is fast upgrading these with help of non-Russian vendors like Israel and France etc. Not possible with US systems. End User Compliance means that all things have to be of US origins.
Take another case of SU-30 MKI, where on India demands, Avionics and other systems are of India, French and Israeli origins. Would US allow such arrangement on SH or F-16? Dont think so.
3) India cannot expect to lay its hands on f-35, not in another 2 decades. but we would have PAK-FA as soon as its out.
4) Infra cost required to keep US weapons worthy is proportionally more than that of Russian systems
Cost over runs, delayed deliveries have only compounded matters. They have also acted up on tech transfers (engine fir MKI, and T90). Gorshkov is the mother of all screw ups. If we look at current cooperation, it's only where there is Indian participation in development from the beginning is what we are interested in eg PakFa. Even the ships that are being built there are because India doesn't have enough capacity to build.
I guess Russia has agreed for complete tech transfer for T90 and MKI.
However when it comes to cost and time overrun, are you that naive to think that only Russia suffers from this, since last I heard, Israel had faltered on Phalcons, UK on Hawk and US as well.
Yes, Gorshkov is a pain area but then in this case, I am ready to give Russian's a little more money since even after that the ship would still be cheaper than any replacement and its my thinking that responsibility for some portion of this mess rests on India as well
Third, quality of Russian weapons have been suspect.
Really.Tell me of soo many t-90's supplied by Russia to India what% was defective and whats the similar defect% for US made weapons and for Indian made weapons platform and for german made weapons and for UK made weapons etc.
Now tell me that same for Su-30's and R-77[which u quoted above].
Tell me whats the defect% in Su-30 and compare the same with Hawk. Which is lower and which is higher.
You have this kind of qualitative data at hand, share it with us or Lets not make sweeping statements without qualitative data at hand. All Reports that you read in media is NOT Correct, a good majority is paid to write by vested parties.
Russia will have to seriously introspect on how it is doing business with India. Otherwise we will see a shift in indias purchase pattern. Already Israel is breathing down on it.
And Israel is no where near challenging Russia in terms of being India's reliable weapons systems provider. Its fast gaining ground but it wont be there....reason its weapons systems heavily use US made components and are subject to same kind of end user certification