The prototype KF-2 1 at the off-line ceremony was painted with the flags of South Korea and Indonesia, but Indonesia is likely to quit.
On the other hand, Indonesia is about to buy rafale fighter, France. According to Agence France-Presse, France is about to reach a series of defense cooperation agreements with Indonesia. One of the important contents is to export 48 rafale fighter to Indonesia, with a total contract value of about US$ 7 billion. Rafale fighter, like KF-X, is a medium-sized fighter, equipped with a double mid-thrust engine. It is hard to imagine that a country like Indonesia will be equipped with two fighters of the same class at the same time.
Indonesian may buy news photos of rafale fighter.
That's why I don't like KF -2 1. The market competition of the fourth generation semi-medium fighter is too fierce, and there are too many mature and cost-effective models. There are F- 16V block 70 viper and F/A- 18 E/F block 3 international bees in the United States; Russia has MIG-35; China has j-10c; Three Duck Gusts, Typhoons and Eagle E/F in Europe can be said that no matter how complicated your diplomatic relations are, you can find sellers. Worst of all, isn't there the glory of Great Hindustan? Heavy fighter F- 15X and Su -35, the fifth generation fighter F-35, have the same excellent cost performance, which can completely reduce the dimension. The above models have been put into production for many years, equipped in many countries, and many of them have participated in actual combat. Subsystems and weapons and equipment are quite complete, even without considering the allocation of research and development expenses.
Although KF-2 1 is similar to F-22, stealth and supersonic cruise cannot be realized due to external weapons.
KF-2 1 optical R&D cost sharing is bound to be not cheap, because South Korea has already purchased and equipped F-35 fighter jets, and at the same time, F- 16K fighter jets are also preparing for medium-term overhaul and upgrading to F- 16V. Only KF-2 1, which is planned to replace South Korea's F-4 and F-5, is expected to have only 100~ 150, and KF-2 1 has invested 4.883 billion US dollars by 2020, and it is estimated that at least1will be invested after all the research and development is completed. The unit price of R&D alone will cost hundreds of millions of dollars, but now the price of F-35 fighter jets has dropped to 76 million dollars, and South Korea itself is equipped with F-35 fighters. How do Koreans let others buy KF-2 1 instead of F-35? By the way, South Korea could not complete the test flight of KF-2 1 by itself. The test flight of this fighter plane is planned in the United States and outsourced to Curtis Wright Company of the United States.
The F-35 fighter jets and KF-2 1 delivered to the Korean Air Force were also squeezed into the equipment space of the Korean Air Force itself.
Even if the Korean government bears all the R&D expenses, I am afraid it is difficult to reduce the production cost. Similar to India's Glorious Fighter, too much equipment on KF-2 1 depends on foreign imports. For example, the engine is F4 14 from the United States, the canopy and optical components are Hampson from the United States, the motor, auxiliary power, oxygen supply, life support system and communication antenna are all in the charge of American companies, the ejection seat and missile launcher are provided by Britain, the landing gear and brakes are made in Spain, and the air-to-air missiles use European meteors. In addition, the radar cooperates with Hertha of Israel, and the flight control equipment and electronic warfare equipment cooperate with Saab of Sweden. The domestic opposition in South Korea pointed out that the final price of KF-X may be twice that of high-end F- 16, similar to that of Mitsubishi F-2 fighter. Moreover, there are too many foreign suppliers, which means that the export of fighter planes also has many restrictive factors, which are easily influenced by parts suppliers for political reasons.
F/A- 18E/F block 3 international bees hide external weapons in plastic bags, and the radar reflector is probably no bigger than KF-2 1.
At the same time, South Korea has not proved its R&D capability on fighter planes before. FA-50 is a low-key fighter, which has only completed the modification of advanced trainer, and lacks experience in fighter R&D and production. There is considerable uncertainty about the real performance and performance of KF-X, and many subsystems are first developed in Korea, so there is considerable doubt about the actual performance.
In fact, there is great opposition to KF-2 1 in Korea, and it is believed that the project is the result of kidnapping the Korean government by a consortium. The main contractor of the entire KF-2 1 fighter project is Korea Aerospace Industry Group (KAI), which is formed by the merger of Samsung, Daewoo and Hyundai Aerospace Department. The sub-system contractors include Hanwha Group, LG Group and SK Group, which can be said to include the forces of major consortia in Korea. The KF-2 1 project was vigorously promoted by President Lee Myung-bak during his tenure. Lee Myung-bak himself is a puppet of the Korean consortium, so I don't know the export success rate of KF-2 1, but this project must be an out-and-out feast of the Korean consortium. No matter what the final result is, the Korean consortium will definitely make money and enhance its technical strength.