The Mikoyan MiG-35 is Russia’s fourth generation plus fighter, intended to drive the Russian Air Force modernization program and support international sales. With its impressive avionics, more powerful engines, and multirole capabilities, only a small number have been produced so far because of financial and logistical complications, starting with Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine.
The MiG-35 was, from the beginning, a renewal project for Russia’s military aircraft to also sell abroad. So far, exports to Egypt or India have not been successful because the machines were unable to better the challengers in important fields.
Technologically attractive though it is – as is the rather low rate of production – this alone underlines the much wider resource drawback on which the Russian defense sector is founded: a policy of international isolation.
The MiG-35 made its first flight in 2016, but only eight had been completed, still telling a story about the capability of Russian jet designers.
Mikoyan rolled out the MiG-35 to its government on January 26, 2017, and showed it to potential export customers the following day.
The new fighter boasted a range of updated technologies among which were a fly-by-wire system; an upgraded cockpit; more advanced avionics; and integrated precision-guided targeting capability for air-to-ground weapons.
The MiG-35 has a podded NPK-SPP OLS-k electro-optical targeting and surveillance system mounted to the fuselage.
Advances over the MiG-29 and MiG-29M increase the combat efficiency, universality, and operational characteristics.
The MiG-35 should not be strictly referred to as a fifth-generation fighter, but it is being offered as a fourth-generation-plus aircraft with fifth-generation information-sighting systems that can be networked to other Russian weapons systems to provide improved situational awareness.
The MiG-35 employs two FADEC RD-33MK engines, a high-improvement derivative of the Klimov RD-33 turbofan engine.
These produce seven percent more power than the baseline model, courtesy of modern materials that keep the blades cool.
The MiG-35 does not boast stealth avionics, however, its engines were designed to reduce the aircraft’s infrared and optical visibility. Plans to develop a variant with thrust vectoring engines were abandoned due to weight and cost concerns.
To date, reportedly, only a handful of MiG-35s have been delivered to Russian forces. As was initially ordered by the Russian Defence Ministry 37 pieces of MiG-35, the number was reduced to 24 and eventually down to six.
In essence, that reduction puts a bitter seal on Russia’s limited resource base. A factor further reasoned out by the ongoing Russo-Ukraine War.
Russia also had plans to export the MiG-35. Egypt showed interest but decided on 46 MiG-29M fighter jets. India also examined the MiG-35 but canceled it on the grounds of radar and thrust capability.
Other countries like Argentina, Bangladesh, and Malaysia have at least explored MiG-35 at one point. So far, the MiG-35 is being utilized only by the Russian forces that conceived it.
Sources indicate meanwhile that the Russian military aircraft design bureau Mikoyan Gurevich is reportedly producing a new super-fast interceptor dubbed the MiG-41, which can reach speeds over Mach 4.0. Sources claim that the MiG-41 was set to fly at an estimated Mach 4.3 and was faster than the current MiG-31 but slower than the old MiG-25.