The fifth-generation stealth fighter Su-57 is among Russia’s top airpower priorities, but the ambitious project has suffered from protracted development and testing and the production effort is yet to gather speed. Alexander Mladenov reports.
The all-out war that followed Moscow’s brutal invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022, has seen the Su-57 Felon’s use in anger, but still in a very risk-averse and restricted manner.
First acknowledgments of the new type’s combat deployment appeared in May 2022, as Russia’s state-run TASS news agency cited unnamed defence industry officials hinting that the brand-new stealth jet had seen use in action to deliver missile strikes against unspecified ground targets. It is believed that the aircraft used in combat missions have been operated by the 929th GLITs’ Flight Test Centre, using long-range air-to-surface missiles unleashed without entering Ukrainian airspace.
Felon’s operational radius makes it possible to mount strikes with light payloads (including no more than two Kh-69 stand-off missiles, useful for knocking out ground targets with known position or two Kh-58UShKE anti-radiation missiles), operating out of the 929th GLITs’ home base in Akhtubinsk, about 150nm from the bo…
