by Chris Devers

Many nations in the world are turning to the Russian made Su27 in the present period as the fighter aircraft of choice for their military air force. Is the Su-27 a superior fighter to lets say the F-15 Eagle? No, not even close, but realize that indeed it is available to all nations as Russia does not discriminate to hostile or rogue nations in their arms deals; you got the cash, they got the planes and they are building more. So, why is everyone buying these aircraft and what is it that makes it so great anyway?

Well the story of the SU-27 is much like many of the fighters made by Russia’s top aeronautical scientists from 1968 to 1975;

http://ma.hit.bg/su27history/history1.html

http://membres.lycos.fr/cbonnet/sukhoi.htm

There have been many modifications and refinements and today it is really not a player anymore. The new generation of aircraft are so much better. The Su-27 was much in response to the F-15 and it was competing with the Mig 29 Fulcrum in Russia at the time too. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MiG-29 .

Interestingly enough in the near future the US will not even have pilots in their aircraft and with morphing wings, 18 “G” UAVs and speed of light transmissions, target identification and hypersonic speeds the battles will be over before they begin. Increased range and Artificial Intelligence, laser firing, the game will be all but over for a piloted aircraft interceptor. Send them up, only to be blown into a million pieces, vaporized or melted into thin air.

That is basically the reality and really it is only physics, simple stuff really, that is where the US is at in technology? It is not like the old days out producing the Germans better technology with 10’s of thousands of B-17s, B-24s, P-51s, or the Japanese light weight maneuverable Zero’s made of plywood or Kate Torpedo Bombers with Hellcats, Corsairs, SBDs and Avengers.

You need to pick a much better technology if you want to be taken seriously. Like the SU-33 that China is buying 50 of. Because even as Venezuela talks of buying Mig 29s, that is not really a threat to the USA.

Now remember that Russian Lt. Gen. Igor Khvorov, the commander of Russian long-range aviation crossed over the North Pole undetected to prove it has something to sell China besides just the Russian Su-33. A recent exercise involved 70 Tu-160, Tu-95 and Tu-22M3 bombers, which test-fired 18 cruise missiles and some of these bombers crossed the Arctic Ocean and flew over the North Pole and also reached Alaska, while others crossed the Aleutian Islands and Japan’s western coast without entering any country’s airspace. If you want to scare people, you need to use different aircraft and more plausible scenarios, Still all in all, USA is a lot better than you think with micro-tethered satellites and getting into the kill zone of a battle group or US controlled airspace? Well you are really going to have to work on it or you are toast you see? Perhaps of interest in considering the Su-27 and Russian military aircraft for sale to the highest bidder in 2007.