Who cares if they paint them camo or black? As long as they don’t develop T-50 features into the Su-34 like the levcon’s, the new intakes, EODAS equivalent, and all moving rudders.

Let’s face it, if you flew MiG-23’s the only type you wanted was equipped with R35 and not either AL21 or R29.

Right now the vote is framed as fighter jets or social spending. The Swiss public like other western countries is drunk on freebies.

There was never a doubt that an invasion by land would have touched off a tactical nuclear exchange at a minimum. The truth is all the simulations gave the Russians optimal logistics and NATO the perfect storm of failure. The truth is even the Russians gave a window of opportunity to win such a war in years not months, and at the expense of their own civilization as they knew it. As the picture began to get more granular then factors like pandemics would have settled in to where the window turned to decades. Not to mention their plan involved frequent truces and buildups to renew the fight. There will never be another Mongol invasion or the like of Europe ever again. History has shown that mother nature has built in factors that will make one world one party never happen.

I have no doubt that MiG-23 would be a viable fighter today if it had resources put into it. The root pylons should have been canted like on the F-14 to hold either two r77 or a drop tank and one r77. The chines should be capable of an r77 on each side or y-mounts for a total of four r73. The nose was plenty big for a decent multi-role radar, although its more power-restricted than size restricted. Modern materials and swivel mounts like on the Tornado would have given great swing role options. It could have used a more modern intake design, but the one it had wasn’t exactly a failure. If it had been a little sexier, say with underbody scoops and an LERX, it would have been probably too prone to fan ingestion.

All drones are expendable by nature.

The range of the missiles already offset no drop tanks. This is a further bump.

Does JMSDF have any bold new plans to rapidly move troops around the Yellow Sea to counter Chinese future-potential threats?

The problem is that P&W is locked into a design, unable to improve the engine unless authorized to do so. If one was to revive F136 then you would need P&W to open up a competition to improve their own engine or you’re not improving anything, just politics substituting sole sourcing.