IRIAF 2020?

This thread is inspired by similar topics by Thobbes.

These day, looking at the US-Iran relations, it appear there is a glimmer of hope of an easing of tension between them. Mind you i don’t have high hopes because you can be sure that the israelis and US hawks (AIPAC and/or MIC serving or not) are dead set to do everything they can to sabotage any such tension easing. Hell, in won’t be surprised if they will support the hardliners in Iran to outs/even assassinate Rouhani! They surely loved Ahmadinejad and his “6 moths or less nukes”, he brought them hundreds of billions in juicy weapons sales in ME, and an excellent distraction for the israelis’ continuous ethnic cleaning of Palestine.

But lets suppose the “good” prevails, and there will be an improvement in relations and lifting of sanctions, and the iranians will be in position to be able to replace/ upgrade their sorely degraded AF. Now it appears that IRIAF does not have a high priority (missiles and irregular forces appear to), so i won’t expect more than 200 combat aircraft on hand. Imo low priority does no mean low readiness, if you have only a small airforce, at least keep it a good level of readiness to be able to perform the role it’s assigned to it. The situation now is imo still dire, probably the best combat ready aircraft they have are the MiG-29 and Su-24, despite claims to the contrary.

So lets assume the US-Iran relation get warmed enough for Iran to actually buy and contract aircraft from the US. Now given the low budget, i won’t expect anything spectacular, say 36-48 new F-16Cs like the iraqi ones (AIM-7M) and upgrades for 36 F-4E and 30-36 F-14 (the F-5s being retired maybe? is it worth SLEP-ing 36 or so E/F?). The F-4E is “easy”, just slap an APG-68 on it, modern electronics, SLEP etc. But how about the F-14? Would it be possible to actually upgrade them at a reasonable cost, especially the radar? If i’m not mistaken the US scrapped pretty much all it’s F-14s right (ostensibly so that Iran can’t smuggle any parts), so likely there are no stored airframes around to take parts and radars from (like APG-71)? Could the AWG-9 be upgraded at a reasonable cost using off the shelf components (from what i know APG-71 has an APG-70 back end, right?) Were there any sort of proposals to upgrade the AWG-9 in the past (eighties or nineties?)

Since the iranians seems keep to US aircraft and specifically F-14 very much (probably more by need than by choice though), even if i’m by no means an US gear fan, an iranian F-14 with F-100-220 or 229 or F110-100/ 129 engines, upgraded AWG-9, modern electronics, AIM-7M and 9M, perhaps upgraded AIM-54 and/or AIM-23 (Hawk) etc sounds quite cool.

This being one theoretical IRIAF 2020 alternative with 30-36 F-14M, 36 F-4EM, 36-48 F-16C/D plus the 24 or so MiG-29 (upgraded to SM) and 30 or so Su-24 (also upgraded to MK2) and finally 20 or so J-7 as advanced trainers. Oh and it’s absolutely necessary they get a primary trainer (24 K-8, or maybe a western type?) and preferably 2-4 SAAB Erieyes (not even going into transports, a few new or refurbished tankers etc.)

PS: Not sure where to fit the Su-25s into all this, maybe upgrade say 12 of them for COIN, or just re-sell them, because of the low numbers available, or quite the contrary get another 12 or more to form a strong COIN asset?

PPS: Another part i haven’t even thought about are primary trainers, not to mention helicopters for army and navy, air defence systems etc etc., quite interesting to discuss also.

PPPS: To give an idea of current iranian holdings, this is what i consider one of the most reasonably accurate assessment, paradoxically it’s an israeli source, some numbers might be slightly off, usually overrated (ignore the hundreds of russian transports “negotiations”) but overall it gives a relatively decent indication of the current situation imo.

http://dno8g1zsiv2fs.cloudfront.net/upload/%28FILE%291357113544.pdf