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The Flanker Fleet -The PLA's 'Big Stick'
The PLA's acquisition, since 1991, of nearly 300 Sukhoi Su-27/30 Flanker long range fighter aircraft, represents the single greatest investment in modern fighter aircraft seen since the Soviet re-equipment with the Su-27 and MiG-29 during the 1980s.With further growth in this fleet now inevitable, currently planned and deployed numbers are approaching 400 aircraft, making this fleet numerically competitive with the US Air Force fleet of 400 legacy F-15A-D fighters, and 200 F-15E strike fighters. By any conventional metric, the Su-27 and Su-30 represent direct equivalents to the US F-15C and F-15E, and offer superior capabilities to the US fighters in several key areas. The latest variants include all of the avionic and systems refinements historically exclusive to US and EU combat aircraft... Considerably more, and pics, at link. Posted by: Anonymoose 2007-04-09 |
| http://www.rantburg.com/poparticle.php?ID=185360 |