I would retire all the Mig-23s and Mig-21s and save up some money to upgrade the Mig-29s to SMT, which would make it much easier for the Cuban AF to run because the SMT is much cheaper to run than earlier Mig-29As. Just by phasing out the Mig-21s and Mig-23s will save money.

how many Mig-29s does Cuba have?

I don’t think cancelling F-X is the best option currently. You see, Brazil can cancel it now, but in the future when they want to buy something, it would make most sense to go something very new like the F-35 or the PAK-FA and not the Typhoon Tranche 3 or the Rafale F3 or whatever, I mean those won’t be much better than the current Su-35. Su-35 and Gripen are my choices. The Su-35 is not just a paper plane, it does exist though is not in service, but would be very similar to Indian Su-30MKIs or Malaysian Su-30MKMs in many ways or hell even the upgraded Russian Su-27SMs.

When you look at the Gripen and the Su-35, the Gripen will be cheaper at the end of it’s service life, but the Su-35 offers a lot more capability, has much bigger range, payload, twice as more hardpoints, and it’s avionics are just that much bigger and better. Not only that but it’s also a bonus that it comes with no political strings attached, can be upgraded in the future for a low cost, and has much better weapons selection. So at the end, the Su-35’s capabilities will pay off.

It really comes down to the offsets and who can offer Brazil better offsets and in this case the Swedes just cannot compete with the Russians and especially in the space programme.

As for the French offsets, the Su-35 or the Gripen will be as good to Embraer as the M2K will be.

Also, whatever is bought, I can guarantee you that there will be NO arms race with Brazil in South American, no one can simply afford it! Chile can barely afford 10 F-16 blk50s and Argentina’s economic crisis is bad.

Thats just Anti-Missile right? Against tactical aircraft and such, the Americans have nothing close to the S-400 or even the S-300PMU2. The THAAD seems to be modestly comperable to the S-300PMU2 if I am not wrong.

Yes, obviously the Su-35 is the only heavy fighter in there, I am sure that lets say Mig-31M, F-15K/T or F-14D were running with it, it would be different. But yes, the Su-35 is what you get is what you pay for. Obviously it will be more expensive than Gripen or M2K in the long run but it has much better performance. The obvious advantages in the Su-35 is unparalleled AA ability, no political strings attached, much like the M2K or Gripen, where the French are not the best how can I put it, at politics, they can easily block spares and such. While the Gripen uses foreign weapons, Swedish policy is screwed up and on top of all it has foreign parts in it like American engines.

Also, what I like most about the Su-35 is it’s weapons selection, no one has a similar selection of weapons the Su-35 offers, like Yakhont-M Anti-Shipping missiles, and the Russians can even integrate R-37M, KS-172 or even the big Kh-SD if you pay a reasonable price.

Umm, AFAIR the project was not that expensive.

damn, thats is impressive.

It’s hard to find good pics of Foxhounds and Foxbats, very hard. It’s alot easier finding pics for Mig-23/27s but not Mig-25s. I have like 30+ pics of Mig-29s or Su-27s but very few of Mig-23s or Mig-25s and Mig-31s.