In the meanwhile india ordered Hawks T2, so did they need a full syllabus plane like super tucano or pc 21?

I don’t see the problem here. Changing from preliminary to final requirements is nothing strange, that is the reason those distinctions exist.
The article pretty much spells out that the initial requirements were based off the capabilities of the Super Tucano. Relaxing requirements to allow broader competition and a better price is a valid rationale.
Removing initial requirements that aren’t actually required for a mission is exactly what should be done when formulating final requirements.
I don’t really see a reason why a basic trainer needs a zero-zero seat, why extending the take-off distance a bit matters as long as IAF has sufficient runways, or why -8* view distance is necessary.
If you want to simulate instrument failure, you tape some paper over the instrument, and more advanced jet training is done in a different plane, which would still exist and be done whether or not the basic trainer had a few more features.
Unless there’s a specific objective reason why 12:1 glidepath (but not higher) is the minimum glidepath and 10:1 would fail at the task, I don’t see a problem. Many many airforces successfully operate PC-7 as basic trainers after all.
I also don’t understand why the article makes it seem as if it is an issue vs. a domestic HAL product, that was not ready in time, and raising the requirements would have just resulted in another, probably more expensive, foreign product.

Perhaps, but the prime issue is not that South Africa is spending an equivalent amount of money that other Gripen users spend on operational costs for Gripen and not getting anything out of it. The problem is that they aren’t allocating enough budget for operational costs both in the first place, and external operation costs end up being covered by the normal budget, removing funds from normal training and maintenance. So having a private contract wouldn’t help them with that problem, they would just be in default of contract to SAAB. If a contract with SAAB could be given it’s own independent budget, then so can the SAAF’s normal baseline training and maintenance .

Can you discuss Japanese loan exposure to the US in another thread? Probably in off-topic forum?
Same goes for the similarities of China to the nation of Finland which never existed before formed as a holding of Swedish/Russian Empires.
If you’re impressed by “tall buildings” I think that belongs in another thread.
If people don’t want to discuss the actual excercises anymore, that isn’t a reason to drag the thread on forever.

I actually asked an aviation related question a while back, if anybody is aware of news re: UAV usage in the exercise…???

What is the advantages of C-295 / 235 vs. an ATR 72/ 42, which is already purchased as MPA/ASW by Italy and Turkey and Nigeria?
If the UK already operated C-295 as a transport I could see the benefits of commonality, but that’s not the case.
If it was desired to outsource at least some part of operations, ATR would have a larger maintenance and pilot pool available.

Russia has quite a few unresolved territorial boundary issues: from World Factbook:

Thanks for quoting the “World Factbook” much of which reprised exactly what I wrote, but that is all in line with my post. “Various groups in Finland” do not have bearing on whether there is a conflict between the official territorial claims of each country. Russia may not sign a document with Estonia because they believe an Estonian pre-amble may motivate “future” claims, but that has no bearing on whether there CURRENTLY are conflicting official territorial claims between the countries. Estonia does not include any territory claimed by Russia within it’s claimed national territory, as Japan does, who still includes the “Northern Territories” as an official province of Japan. The Arctic sea issue is not up to Russia’s “claims” at this point, as Russia and other relevant parties have already committed to UNCLOS resolving all maritime territory issues according to objective evidence submitted to it. Ukraine and the US may have minor disputes over maritime boundaries, but as I wrote re: the Caspian sea issue, I was using a definition of “territory” to discuss LAND.

Back on topic, any opinions of how this excercise reflects on military reforms in Russia? Any word of use of UAVs?

Yup, that (or rather it’s commercial follow on, but it’s clearly a pre-development for the next ATR program) would seem the gold standard for programs they would like to join in some fashion. Of course, IN is also looking at many of the same planes/vendors for a MPA (also including ATR there I believe, since rough field capability doesn’t matter), but there is no indication I’ve seen so far that Indian MoD has sought to link the two programs even though the fact that the ‘medium transport’ program is so small is a significant problem in making the industrialization strategy viable. Regardless, I think the involvement of an Indian company will be low-level contracting for both the transport and civil airliner, which is fine since this is starting a new capability from scratch for India (in non-state owned aerospace company).

And compete with Airbus, Boeing, Bombardier, Sukhoi, Embraer and chinese? Seems a bit crazy imho. Already crowded.

It is supposed to be 70-90 seats.
The decision for jet vs. turboprop is not clear, although turboprop is the logical choice IMHO, even if India has previously been attacted to the ‘prestige’ of a jet vs. turboprop.
It is not connected to MTA/Il-214 at all, although the ‘medium transport’ moniker has confusingly also been associated with the smaller transport project that An-148, Ilyushin (Il-112?), EADS CASA, and Alenia are contenders for (in association with private Indian partners).
There seems to be a desire to link the latter, smaller capacity transport with a (civil) regional passenger plane, although the viability of that approach does not seem certain.
Even that tender itself has problems on face value as the only mooted contender which meets the supposed requirements (for speed) is An-148,
and setting up further production capacity for An-148 in a civil role at this point would just be foolish.
I don’t see Antonov having the resources to support a clean-sheet world-competitive civil turboprop at this point in time, although perhaps thru cooperation with UAC it would be possible (although that itself has issues).
ATR wants to start (but has not yet launched) a 90 seater turboprop, and partnering with them would work well (vis-a-vis the military transport project, EADS or Alenia could provide linkage to ATR),
Russia would certainly like to be involved in that market, and Saab has given out signals of interest in re-entering the civil regional turboprop market (although they don’t have a product in the military airlift sector, likewise for Bombardier the other major contender in the regional turboprop market, who already seem busy with their CSeries and business jets for the time being).
Alenia is having trouble convincing EADS to share engineering resources necessary to launch such a product thru ATR, IMHO it would make mountains of sense for Alenia to find another partner, either Saab and/or Indian partners, since that removes potential competitors.
If India can co-fund development of a new 90-seat turboprop and ensure a market, I’m sure they can find a viable partner to make a world-competitive product.
Although whether Russia has resources to go forward with Il-112 development simultaneous with a civil turboprop is questionable, a UAC-Antonov collaboration there could be their best bet.
If India did find a Russian partner, and ATR proceeded with their project eventually, I would think that it makes more sense for Saab to join either one of those than launch a 3rd competitor.

So the first 2 are the used Block 1 versions, which will be operated from Creech and put to use immediately in Mali, alongside Harfang…?
I guess the rest of the list of equipment is to offer flexibility, depending how studies into localization turn out, more or less could end up being used.
Is there any plan, or impetus for a plan, to have a joint European Reaper operational base?