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Not all is well in Mother Russia

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Libertas:
Army - Conscripts only to be deployed in case of general war, other stuff gets fed to the contractors.  That should do well for morale, cohesion and coordination.   ::)

http://www.strategypage.com/htmw/htmoral/articles/20130228.aspx

Russian aircraft not being well received.

http://www.strategypage.com/htmw/htatrit/articles/20130226.aspx

The only shocking part is how often the Indian's keep going back to Russia for crappy systems - planes, ships, subs. . .

Talk about slow learners!

 ::)

charlesoakwood:

There is no way to upgrade an F-35 into an F-22.

The Indians want hot stuff.  They asked Uncle Obama
to sell them F-22s and he retorted F-35.  Seems as
though they would rather obtain poorly crafted hot
stuff and tool it than to buy mediocre performing but
well crafted stuff.

ETA: Russian contract army: This may be one bunch of
no bs warriors.

benb61:
Anyone flying Mig-21's are not much of a force to be dealt with. Su-30's are a much better aircraft (more advanced) but with shody manufacturing, airframes and engines don't last long, it's just a b!tc# when you lose a pilot too.  With the litigous mindset in the US, American manufactured aircraft are over safe and last a long time (case in point the B-52).  The F-35, though a lesser aircraft to the F-22, is still a formidable airframe with one of the most advanced engines ever.  Of course with cutting edge tech, bugs seem to crop up at a pretty regular rate in the first 5 years of a new design, hence the length of time it takes the aircraft to get into service.  Those bugs though do get worked out.  I remember when I was in the AF we would regulary get classified briefings and part of them were force estimates for segments of our flight paths.  Often we would be told XX number of Mig-25 are down at a particular base due to maintenence and the most common fix was engine replacement.  It seems that because of the poor manufacturing methods (such as using button head rivets instead of flush head on aerodynamic surfaces) the engines were built for brute force and as such didn't last very long.  Numbers like every 4th or 5th mission they would need to be grounded for up to a week for engine swaps.  Cheap and fast will sell aircraft but safe keeps very expensive aircrews alive.

Glock32:
The MiG-25 was also manufactured largely out of steel. Aircraft aluminum was ill suited to its flight envelope, and the Soviets lacked the metallurgical engineering to make titanium work. Brute force is definitely a good description of their design philosophy -- the exposed rivet heads you point out, and crude wing fences. They were also perfectly willing to cut corners and waste lives in an effort to claim first this or first that, fastest this, highest flying that.

The MiG-25 also drank fuel at such a prodigious rate that its usefulness as an interceptor really depended on being in the right place at the right time. It lacked the aerodynamic agility or fuel capacity to do much in the way of course correction. A Soviet pilot defected in one back in the mid 70s and when the USA got a good close look at it a number of their fears were allayed.

Have you ever read the Firefox novels?  The author discusses the MiG-25 in detail. I also like the movie Clint Eastwood made.

benb61:
When I was going thru gunner training at Castle AFB in the late '79, Viktor Belenko gave us a class on Soviet Fighter Tactics.  It was really an eye opener.  Some of the stories he told were very interesting to say the least.

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