Serbian Air Force Needs and Modernization

I think you are right, if the US wants Serbia to not buy Russian equipment and weapons then they need to start supplying everyhing for free with free maintenance but even then that gives them largely control of your military as Venezuela and Turkey and Pakistan and even Iran have found to their cost over the years.

They will offer things that appear cheap and a great deal... Rafales or Typhoons, but they will give such bargains to get you off Russian gear, and then get their money by charging high fees for support and parts and of course they will have full control of what air to air and air to ground weapons you can have and use.

These Typhoons will likely be the first batch that have been in service for a decade or less but would cost too much to upgrade, so they were going to scrap them... well it seems like instead they might save even more money and give them away.

And then of course they will demand that you get rid of any Russian SAM system that might compromise the secrets of any western aircraft you might accept, so that means Patriot which is very very expensive and not very capable.

The US is putting you in an awkward place but I am sure somehow they wont get any blame at all... some will blame the Serbs and I am sure Putin will be to blame as well at some point.

Yeah, but you are talking about their military, and really their military now has nothing to do with defence.

Having MiG-29s wont stop Washington from bullying them to make them do what they want, and I doubt the rest of Europe would let Serbia do anything they want with their military anyway... especially stuff they want to do like recover lost territory and protect what is left of their history... that really belongs to the whole world but has been and is being destroyed by Albanians with the full support of the west.

Even Serbia is getting its own armed drone. Russia still doesn't have the Korsar ready while the Orion isn't produce in enough numbers.

I am sure Russia is keen to swap places to get these amazing armed drones that totally win conflicts like you know... they could hand over all their subs and all their new fighter planes and tanks and everything because obviously all of that is useless and get some drones to make tiny pin prick attacks on any enemy from platforms that are easy to shoot down with modern air defences...

BTW I would hold my judgement first a lot of countries bought Chinese armed drones and found they were show room level and not really fully fleshed out operational systems.... the low price is no compensation for low readiness rate and high loss rate even when there is no enemy at all...

Obviously they will get better over time, but they will never be more effective than a decent attack helo or CAS aircraft for many roles.

Regarding the MiG-29 shown, interesting they still include R-60MKs and also 32 shot 57mm rocket pods... but then when the target is infantry then 32 x 57mm rockets spread the shrapnel, and against drones or helicopters the R-60MK is certainly good enough too.

The last time HATO attacked Serbia it was easily proven that air power alone wont get the job done and there is no way they would commit ground forces to such a conflict.

If HATO was rational then Serbia would be totally safe.

If HATO was Rational.