High-res pic of Kazakh Su-27UBM2

http://www.mycity-military.com/imgs2/18848_255069152_Su-27UBM2.JPG

This is the single greatest paint scheme I’ve ever seen on a Flanker.

Yeah, that is unmistakeably North Korean. AND a MiG-21.

Desperate escapee maybe?

Exactly how does one tell the difference between a MiG-31 and a MiG-31BM?

A lot of people say it’s a weapons bay for R-73s. I disagree. I believe it’s too small.

I think it’s a fairing that covers up a jamming pod. Or it at least has SOMETHING to do with EW.

But that’s just me pulling stuff out of my butt. Just looking at it, it doesn’t seem big enough for the R-73.

There was no big secret when it came to Ukrainian purchased BUK giving Russian AF such a very hard time in the first early hours of the war. Something sensitive as that would never come out not any time soon but I too heard the same rumor from word of mouth.

Whether some believe to disbelieve the Russian AF were buzzing over Tbillisi near the end of the war. They couldn’t do that without destroying the BUK’s, and they certainly couldn’t be able to do that without destroying radar sites (X-31 anyone?) and using some high powered electronic aerial warfare equipment.

I think it’ll publicly be bad to show a destroyed BUK for reasons are they are heavily marketing Russian SAMs around the world especially trying to lure Saudi Arabia and others in and that could put doubt to customers seeing a highly prized SAM beaten by a radiation missile even though it is an older BUK-M1 models not the new M2 (50KM improved beast) it still could scare some customers off.

It’ll either scare them off (wrongfully) or make them interested in buying Kh-31s. 😀

Besides, I would imagine that SAMs like that are easy to kill if you operate them in a manner that is not optimal for survival (moving around a lot, turning off radars at the first sign of a launch, etc).

And plus, the Buk is rumored to have downed that Tu-22MR!

yeah but then why the MiG-29 kills were with AIM-7s and not in dogfights here look this is even with the interview of an american F-15 fighter pilot that show down a Serbian MiG-29
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X-HxUFEctvs

The F-15 is not better than the MiG-29, in this series where they have Rico Rodrigez who was a F-15C pilot that shot down a MiG-25 and an outflown MiG-29 into a crash, they say it the MiG-29 is more agile, if you look at this video they say the Serbian Pilot wanted to get close why? because he knew getting close he was going to splash the F-15, the F-15 fired AIM-7s.

Same is with the Flanker versus Fulcrum dogfights in africa, the MiG-29s were shot down with R-27s and just finished with a R-73 in one of the kills. what does it tells, well the MiG-29A has not a really good BVR ability specailly after 30 years of no upgrade.

Just a clarification on your last statement, the Flanker kills over Fulcrums in the Ethiopia/Eritrea war were ALL made with R-73s in visual range. The R-27s that were fired all missed except for one, which damaged a MiG only enough to force it to crash land.

Source, acig.org:
http://s188567700.online.de/CMS/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=138&Itemid=47

Image of the day
Formation of the 18 Gripens flyover over Swedish wedding.

Wow. Where do I rent 18 Gripens for a wedding?

There’s actually quite a lot to consider. Is cost an option? Beings that the nation is oil rich, I would imagine we’d have a fair degree of freedom. Likewise, what do our neighbors have? Are they relics from the mid-Cold War or do they have relatively updated equipment that we need to find parity with?

The nation is fairly expansive (the size of Saudi Arabia) so I would imagine a long range fighter would be needed, as well as a smaller multirole fighter.

Mine:

Fighters:
36 ~ Su-35s (air defense and interceptor)
24 ~ Su-34 (maritime/ground strike fighter, 8 of which are outfitted with ESM suites for jamming and electronic warfare and airborne control)
60 ~ Gripen NG (fighter and light strike)

Support:
5 ~ R-99A (AWACS)
3 ~ R-99B (maritime surveillance)

Transport:
48 ~ C-130 (8 outfitted with in-flight refueling drogues)
12 ~ Il-76

Trainers:
48 ~ Yak-130 (advanced trainer/COIN)

Helicopters:
48 ~ Mi-28N
96 ~ Mi-171