My thought for the MiG-29s was that a Soviet squadron was based there, and when the USSR dried up it was left behind like Ukraine inheriting Backfire bombers and part of the Soviet nuclear arsenal. Looking at the Baltic Trio though, for similarly sized Air Forces they're pretty damn small. Six to eight aircraft each, mostly transport planes with a couple helicopters. So the MiGs are out, and we're operating a mix of An-2s, An-26s, and Mi-8s that we're keeping airborne with prayers and wherever we can get spare parts from.
I suppose that we're turning over airspace defense to NATO, like the Baltics. Serednya Slaviya's got some SA-9 Gaskins still floating around, so we're slightly better off than they are, but it still comes down to MANPADS to defend airspace. Radar stations for surveillance, and I still picture the idea of a couple civilian airstrips having a small military detachment to allow dispersal of aircraft away from the main airbase in time of war.
Aircraft...Say four Mi-8s, four Mi-2s, two Cessna 172 trainers, three An-2s, one An-26 that serves as the presidential transport. Each aircraft has more than one crew; I've got about 45 pilots in the Air Force based on the American ratio of 24:1.
Russia's still got deep stocks of working older equipment, we're seeing them deployed in Ukraine. So spare parts and old hardware is definitely available from Russia, though I'm hesitant as hell to rely on them for equipment. The corruption pandemic in the Russian military means I'd probably be buying empty hulls with all their valuable bits sold off on the black market...
So I found some GDP numbers by oblast for Ukraine, and my economics are even worse than I'd estimated. Serednya Slaviya's total GDP is 7.06 billion USD, which is less than the 10 billion I'd taken from Ukraine's total by average. I can increase defense spending to 3% GDP, and get back to my previous figures.
Ukraine's 2021 national budget was 47.65 billion USD, with defense being 9.6 billion dollars. If I take Ukraine's defense spending and cut it by GDP to cover just Rivne and Volyn's totals, that gives me a defense budget quite a bit higher than I'd expected but right now Ukraine's got good reason to increase its defense spending. I suppose I'd do the same, with the national fear that we're next and staring down the Belarussians. So that comes to a national defense budget of 4.8% GDP, or a total defense spending of 339 million USD.
That does wonders for my procurement budget, pushing it to 135.6 million and improves my choices slightly. Granted that's only for 2021, and doesn't count the same for every year, but Serednya Slaviya's in a tight position, one could argue. I've looked into historical defense budgets but the numbers are all over the place; I can't even get agreement on GDP amounts depending on where I look.
So I'm doing better than I initially thought when it comes to procurement and defense budgets, but I'm either going to have to buy cheap or get subsidized purchases. Cheap means B1 Centauro, but not Freccia; BTR-4 could be doable at 1.8 million and it seems locally buildable. Buying Chinese saves me some cash, and lets me modernize a larger portion of my force. I just looked at the latest contract price for Freccia and the damn things run 7.9 million bucks. Piranha IIIs vary depending on the contract, anywhere from 4 to 6 million each. Looking at the French, there's that new Griffon APC to complement the Jaguar, but it's running 2.5 million USD per vehicle and the Jaguar at 5 million. I still want Jaguars for my recon companies, replacing BRDM-2s, but that's a small enough program (only 30 vehicles) that I can eat the cost on it. LAVs are pretty cheap at 2.5 million each, and the Australians are getting rid of theirs for Boxers, but it comes back to the same question I had with the VAB - why am I trading my worn-out 1980s vehicles for worn-out 1980s vehicles? Procurement wants something new and fancy and cheap.
I've got about 200 APCs and 100 gun vehicles to buy for the cavalry squadrons, and another 200 or so APCs for the combined-arms battalions. I'd like to modernize the cavalry first since they're arguably the core of the army. Whatever I get, I'd like it to have a common family if possible. And I need at least 100 APCs
So it comes down to why I shouldn't buy Chinese, because they've got the economy of scale going on and can seriously amortize development costs across a platform.
Anytime you approach from a position of weakness, there isn't a situation where you will NOT find yourself in over your head with less than you thought you were buying.
IOW CHINA might benefit from amortizing costs, but that doesn't mean the efficiencies of scale are going to work in YOUR favor unless there's an advantage for THEM.
get what I'm saying here? Regardless of WHO you're sourcing from, they're going to deal for an advantage. If you THINK you can out-negotiate NORINCO, then you probably think you can out-negotiate General Dynamics. (Odds are you're wrong on both counts).
Given where you're at, you don't have anything the Chinese desperately
want (or want control over). This doesn't work out to deals in your favor-meaning you'll pay the top price for their goods, which is equivalent to the bottom price for goods from, say, IMI (Israel), South Africa, Czechosolvakia (who make some fine armaments for the market), or France.
Any one of those others might actually see an advantage in giving you a deal. (particularly the EU/European outfits, who have a security interest in you being at least a speed-bump against someone getting conqueror's disease in Eastern Europe).
In the ARMS business, national interests DO factor in on credit and pricing-China's big in Africa because Africa has raw materials China needs, they'e big in the Middle East for trade reasons having to do with the flow of goods and services. Where you're at, there's no advantage for Beijing in selling you good gear at a fair price when they can take your money and give as little as possible....but there might be a few good reasons for wealthier neighbors with arms industries to sell you decent hardware at reasonable rates, if for no other reason than because it makes you a speed-bump when the Russians come looking to re-form their empire (historically, this happens quite a lot and has since the 18th century.)
and a peaceful inclined Russia has that same interest in selling you decent hardware at a reasonable rate, because then, they can use you either diplomatically or militarily to secure their own borders/sphere of influence (see the Russian consternation at the expansion of NATO over the last 30 years.)
Poland, Czech Republic,e tc. are far more likely to sell you decent hardware for their OWN reasons, at reasonable rates, than China. It's not just 'book prices', here. It's ALWAYS going to be influenced by shades of national interest on the part of your arms dealer.
the closest anyone since the 1940s has gotten to "We sell to anyone who has the cash" is France. everyone else either has an ideological motive (soviet union, Eastern Bloc during the cold war) or strategic reason (*you have something they need and enough of it to be a bargaining chip, you're positioned somewhere they consider economically or militarily critical/important for economic or security measures, or both).
This is one reason why the Mirage is so widespread world-wide, the French sold it to anyone with the money, as long as they could pay.
but that was in the 20th century when France was still raising capital as fast as they could to get out of the mess they were in after 1940, and it caused quite a lot of nasty side effects in terms of prominence and international respect, so they don't DO THAT anymore.
So there's a factor in your shopping you need to consider, and that's who benefits from selling you weapons, and how much benefit are they looking to get out of it after the Cheques clear?
