Fantastic article, thanks so much for making this available. Watching the operational art unfolding and having Marat explain it so well, even the layperson can understand it. I found the aviation component to be a wonderful overview of the current state of readiness of the US air force compared to the Russian air force. I also very much appreciate the commenters for their technical discussions.
Very interesting. My Dad was an aviator , an engineer during Soviet era ; he would be proud of the Russian Air Force today. Thank you to Marat and to translator👍
I am impressed by the level of knowledge shown here. As a non military and largely non technical person, I can only stand back and applaud.
However, I am not totally convinced of the relevance of this. You put forward sensible and logical arguments. However, looking at the actions of the Americans during my lifetime, when have they ever gone to war based on logic? I suspect that if the USA decides to officially engage in combat, they will do so irrespective of the condition of their military.
Well, at least Biden didn't sign the documents that Starmer brought last weekend, - to allow ukrops to use long range missiles into Russia proper. Didn't sign yet that is. Otherwise we all could be dead already.
Why do you think Biden has any relevance in this or any matter? Do you think he is anything other than a sock puppet to do and say what his hand(lers) instruct? Forget about Biden. Or Blinken. Or Sullivan per se. The best analogue to the US government is the mafia. The US is run by a criminal cartel made up of the various interested and powerful "families ". The Military Industrial Complex is one. Big Pharma is another. Big Media. The Uniparty. And perhaps over all is the Intelligence Agencies. And within each family are sub families of competing interests and rivalries.
They usually work together where clear paths are open to advance their own interests. Power and money is the game, period. But often the family interests conflict and then you see the hodge podge of crazy quilt policies and contradictions and reversals as each family fights to protect its turf.
If you want to understand anything about the US govt and its politicians you have to view it through the lens of a criminal cartel.
Thanks for the report. Regarding combat aircraft, specifically the Su-57, I believe you've correctly reported the number of aircraft (24) currently in the Russian fleet. However, it's possible that we will not see the fleet grow appreciably over the next year or two. This isn't a matter of Russia not being able to build more, but due to a delay in producing serial versions of the new engine for these aircraft: the Saturn AL51. The current aircraft are fitted with an older version, the AL41, and there are reports that Russia is slow-rolling the production of Su-57's due to the engine development delay. Once the new engine is available, production will once again increase to the level we've seen recently - about 12 per year. Despite the delay, the current version of the Su-57 is a remarkable aircraft with cutting-edge capabilities and the current fleet is easily capable of handling its present role in the SMO.
Regarding US combat aircraft, their fleet backbone are the F-16 and the F-35. These too are very capable aircraft on paper however their reliability is suspect, especially the F-35. Public reports from the Pentagon indicate that no more than 40% of the F-35 fleet is airworthy. (It's a very complex aircraft with difficult to maintain systems.) As for the F-16, it requires about 17 hours of servicing for every hour flown. Under intense use it appears likely that the USA's ability to sufficiently service the F-16 fleet would be in question.
Sheer numbers of combat aircraft in a country's arsenal - while relevant - are not the most important statistics. What matters, obviously, is how many of them are working properly and available for the needed role. An aircraft that can fly three sorties per day is worth triple the number of aircraft that can only fly one.
The situation isn't entirely clear. There are reports that some new engines have been produced, but that these are still being tested on the Su-57 airframe. Reportedly the engine is not yet in serial production. It's possible that a couple of airframes will be produced this year with the new engine for testing, but further production will wait until the power-plant is fully certified. This is from non-official (but credible) sources so take it with a grain of salt.
Lack of clarity has several reasons. Firstly the development of the engine is a secret project 😊. Secondly because of the low production numbers the word “serial” production will always be somewhat speculative. The units are necessarily hand built to a very high degree. Very much like the top end sports cars like Lamborghini.
Thirdly the new engine had theoretical performance parameters set at the outset of the design phase and it may be difficult to reach some of the specific (ambitious) goals. That doesn’t mean that the earlier versions of the engine are not “good enough” for performing combat sorties. But until the parameters are achieved the development phase continues. On the other hand engineers may find ways to refine the engine by improving alloys or other methods so that the engine will exceed its design parameters. This is clearly desirable, but will obviously lengthen the development phase.
SU57 is clearly meant to exceed many of the standard requirements for combat aircraft and it looks like Rostec will not rest until those goals are reached or exceeded. Whether we can ever call it serial production in the normal industrial sense is debatable.
This is all true. Russia is at war and one can't expect them to be transparent about the production of a critical weapon. We're all making assumptions, hopefully reasonable ones. The information I provided about the AL51 engines is from a credible source on military aviation technology, but it's not from the Russian Ministry of Defence. One of the reasons why I pass it along is that it makes logical sense from a production standpoint. Why build Su-57's with the old engines now, when you could wait a bit and build them with the latest and greatest power plant - to go along with all the other superb features the aircraft has. The current fleet of ~24 aircraft is adequate for the role it's assigned in the SMO, so there's no need to rush.
It doesn't appear like the Su-57 is destined to be made in great numbers, but when I say serial production I'm referring to building out the fleet to its original projected numbers at least. And that's enough to give them serial status, even if the final tally is modest.
Marat it is always such a pleasure to read your informative and engaging articles. While Russian technical, moral and intellectual capacity is beyond question, what happened to the US? I have understood the evil of US leadership since the Cuban missile crisis, the incompetence, while vastly appreciated, is such a mystery. America is a warring state and it seems that such a state should be at the top militarily even while the rest of the country disintegrates. Any enlightening thoughts on this subject will be much appreciated.
Check out Marat's friend Andrei Martyanov's books on Amazon. Very educational on the subject of your question. For instance " Losing Military Supremacy : The Myopia of American Strategic Planning" published in 2018 ; " Disintegration . Indicators of the Coming American Collapse" published in 2021 ; " The ( real) Revolution in Military Affairs" of 2019 ; and the very new one that just came out " America's Final War". He also has a very interesting blog -- Reminiscent of the Future .
Thank you so much for this information. I really like Andrei Martyanov, he is intelligent, no nonsense and very witty. I appreciate you taking the time to suggest these titles for me
"The US, despite its general well-being and the absence of internal upheavals..."
What country are you talking about here? Not the US, that's for sure. All i see here is dysfunction and upheavals.
Fantastic article, thanks so much for making this available. Watching the operational art unfolding and having Marat explain it so well, even the layperson can understand it. I found the aviation component to be a wonderful overview of the current state of readiness of the US air force compared to the Russian air force. I also very much appreciate the commenters for their technical discussions.
Very interesting. My Dad was an aviator , an engineer during Soviet era ; he would be proud of the Russian Air Force today. Thank you to Marat and to translator👍
I am impressed by the level of knowledge shown here. As a non military and largely non technical person, I can only stand back and applaud.
However, I am not totally convinced of the relevance of this. You put forward sensible and logical arguments. However, looking at the actions of the Americans during my lifetime, when have they ever gone to war based on logic? I suspect that if the USA decides to officially engage in combat, they will do so irrespective of the condition of their military.
John Rothery 😎 (Tauranga)
Well, at least Biden didn't sign the documents that Starmer brought last weekend, - to allow ukrops to use long range missiles into Russia proper. Didn't sign yet that is. Otherwise we all could be dead already.
Why do you think Biden has any relevance in this or any matter? Do you think he is anything other than a sock puppet to do and say what his hand(lers) instruct? Forget about Biden. Or Blinken. Or Sullivan per se. The best analogue to the US government is the mafia. The US is run by a criminal cartel made up of the various interested and powerful "families ". The Military Industrial Complex is one. Big Pharma is another. Big Media. The Uniparty. And perhaps over all is the Intelligence Agencies. And within each family are sub families of competing interests and rivalries.
They usually work together where clear paths are open to advance their own interests. Power and money is the game, period. But often the family interests conflict and then you see the hodge podge of crazy quilt policies and contradictions and reversals as each family fights to protect its turf.
If you want to understand anything about the US govt and its politicians you have to view it through the lens of a criminal cartel.
Thanks for the report. Regarding combat aircraft, specifically the Su-57, I believe you've correctly reported the number of aircraft (24) currently in the Russian fleet. However, it's possible that we will not see the fleet grow appreciably over the next year or two. This isn't a matter of Russia not being able to build more, but due to a delay in producing serial versions of the new engine for these aircraft: the Saturn AL51. The current aircraft are fitted with an older version, the AL41, and there are reports that Russia is slow-rolling the production of Su-57's due to the engine development delay. Once the new engine is available, production will once again increase to the level we've seen recently - about 12 per year. Despite the delay, the current version of the Su-57 is a remarkable aircraft with cutting-edge capabilities and the current fleet is easily capable of handling its present role in the SMO.
Regarding US combat aircraft, their fleet backbone are the F-16 and the F-35. These too are very capable aircraft on paper however their reliability is suspect, especially the F-35. Public reports from the Pentagon indicate that no more than 40% of the F-35 fleet is airworthy. (It's a very complex aircraft with difficult to maintain systems.) As for the F-16, it requires about 17 hours of servicing for every hour flown. Under intense use it appears likely that the USA's ability to sufficiently service the F-16 fleet would be in question.
Sheer numbers of combat aircraft in a country's arsenal - while relevant - are not the most important statistics. What matters, obviously, is how many of them are working properly and available for the needed role. An aircraft that can fly three sorties per day is worth triple the number of aircraft that can only fly one.
Are you the man from the “Millennium 7 History Tech” YouTube channel?
no.
It was reported that all of the Su-57s they are building this year have the new engine.
The situation isn't entirely clear. There are reports that some new engines have been produced, but that these are still being tested on the Su-57 airframe. Reportedly the engine is not yet in serial production. It's possible that a couple of airframes will be produced this year with the new engine for testing, but further production will wait until the power-plant is fully certified. This is from non-official (but credible) sources so take it with a grain of salt.
Lack of clarity has several reasons. Firstly the development of the engine is a secret project 😊. Secondly because of the low production numbers the word “serial” production will always be somewhat speculative. The units are necessarily hand built to a very high degree. Very much like the top end sports cars like Lamborghini.
Thirdly the new engine had theoretical performance parameters set at the outset of the design phase and it may be difficult to reach some of the specific (ambitious) goals. That doesn’t mean that the earlier versions of the engine are not “good enough” for performing combat sorties. But until the parameters are achieved the development phase continues. On the other hand engineers may find ways to refine the engine by improving alloys or other methods so that the engine will exceed its design parameters. This is clearly desirable, but will obviously lengthen the development phase.
SU57 is clearly meant to exceed many of the standard requirements for combat aircraft and it looks like Rostec will not rest until those goals are reached or exceeded. Whether we can ever call it serial production in the normal industrial sense is debatable.
This is all true. Russia is at war and one can't expect them to be transparent about the production of a critical weapon. We're all making assumptions, hopefully reasonable ones. The information I provided about the AL51 engines is from a credible source on military aviation technology, but it's not from the Russian Ministry of Defence. One of the reasons why I pass it along is that it makes logical sense from a production standpoint. Why build Su-57's with the old engines now, when you could wait a bit and build them with the latest and greatest power plant - to go along with all the other superb features the aircraft has. The current fleet of ~24 aircraft is adequate for the role it's assigned in the SMO, so there's no need to rush.
It doesn't appear like the Su-57 is destined to be made in great numbers, but when I say serial production I'm referring to building out the fleet to its original projected numbers at least. And that's enough to give them serial status, even if the final tally is modest.
Thanks. More evidence that US lost the war 3 years before it began and it was always fought with a domestic audience in mind, not reality.
Essentially US lost real hegemony (mostly to China) some 7 years ago - every thing since has just been confirming it.
Marat it is always such a pleasure to read your informative and engaging articles. While Russian technical, moral and intellectual capacity is beyond question, what happened to the US? I have understood the evil of US leadership since the Cuban missile crisis, the incompetence, while vastly appreciated, is such a mystery. America is a warring state and it seems that such a state should be at the top militarily even while the rest of the country disintegrates. Any enlightening thoughts on this subject will be much appreciated.
Check out Marat's friend Andrei Martyanov's books on Amazon. Very educational on the subject of your question. For instance " Losing Military Supremacy : The Myopia of American Strategic Planning" published in 2018 ; " Disintegration . Indicators of the Coming American Collapse" published in 2021 ; " The ( real) Revolution in Military Affairs" of 2019 ; and the very new one that just came out " America's Final War". He also has a very interesting blog -- Reminiscent of the Future .
Thank you so much for this information. I really like Andrei Martyanov, he is intelligent, no nonsense and very witty. I appreciate you taking the time to suggest these titles for me