According to recent reports, Ukraine is developing new domestic light fighter. However, this project exists in one form or another for 10 years.
According to the publication Jane’s, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko announced that Kiev will build your own twin-engine multi-role fighter. He did it during a visit to machine-building design Bureau “Ivchenko-Progress”. This machine, which today exists only in drawings, called “light combat aircraft”. And she’s not a superficial resemblance to the MiG-29.
Promising Ukrainian fighter will be similar to the MiG-29, but it will be equipped with domestic engines and on-Board electronics. The plane will feature a pair of engines AI-322Ф, and its avionics would be Western and Ukrainian production. “We will soon be able to create their own engine for the fighter,” — said Poroshenko.
Information about the Ukrainian fighter was a little before 2005, and former General designer of the aviation scientific-technical complex “Antonov” Dmitry Kiva in 2014 stated that Ukraine can independently design attack helicopters and fighter jets. But in fact, it is doubtful that Kyiv has the industrial base and money to create a domestic fighter aircraft. In particular, as the industrial base in Ukraine mainly Soviet, it is very unlikely that she will find the means and opportunity to independently develop the avionics for the new fighter, including radar.
“The draft is something like a playful drawing of a hand which likes to draw my son — told The National Interest, the Vice-President of the consulting firm for aerospace issues Richard Abulafia (Richard Aboulafia). — It is possible to tell and differently. It’s the same as if the UAE and MiG agreed to create a new plane.”
If the Ukrainian plane will still be born, it will be very much foreign. For example, components such as radar can supply the United States, Israel or Europe. For example, the Israeli Elta 2052 radar with an active phased antenna array is well suited for a glider the size of a MiG-29. However, the components and assemblies of foreign production will increase the cost of the fighter. In addition, it is unclear whether the consent of Western countries to supply to Ukraine, the most modern systems — because information about the latest technologies it can get to Moscow.
In any case, the Ukrainian plane, which can appear in the end, will probably be much more modest than talking about him right now. Although at the present time, the Ukrainian development is similar to the attempt to create a full-fledged fighter, originally the designers intended to design a more modest plane. First reports indicate that Kiev wanted to create an aircraft called the D-14, which could be modified for different tasks, like the Korean T-50. On one of the diagrams illustrate the concept of D-14, which was planned to be used as fighter aircraft, modern training aircraft and attack aircraft.
Time will tell which fighter will get the Ukraine — if it will build.
Dave Majumdar is editor of the National Interest, covering military issues.
