Kazakhstan has received a new batch of Su-30SM fighter jets from Russia, as seen in recent posts on the Kazakh Ministry of Defense’s Telegram page. Several posts from August 17-18 showed Su-30s bearing bort numbers 51-54, and Scramble reported that red 55 and 56 have been spotted as well, making for an apparent delivery of six jets.
With this latest batch, Kazakhstan has now received at least 30 Su-30SMs since it first began purchasing the jet in 2014. The first set of 12 Su-30SMs were delivered from 2015 to 2018, while another group of 12 jets arrived from 2019-2020. (One later crashed during a training exercise in April 2021.) The new entrants to the Kazakh Air Defense Forces are stationed with military unit 55652 at the 602 airbase in Shymkent, replacing the MiG-29s that previously flew out of the base.
Kazakh officials have never sketched out the total size of the combat aircraft requirement, but in 2019, Russian media began reporting that Kazakhstan was aiming to acquire at least another 12 fighter jets, to bring the fleet up to 36. It took years for this order to manifest, a period coinciding with the COVID-19 pandemic as well as Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine. Defense spending fell in 2020, as the government responded to the public health crisis, which may have prompted a delay to the follow-on fighter jet purchase.
The war in Ukraine, meanwhile, has driven a political wedge between Astana and Moscow, offering in-roads for other countries, such as France, looking to cultivate influence in Kazakhstan as well as Central Asia more broadly. Various Western sanctions on the Russian defense industry, moreover, make it potentially politically and economically hazardous for Astana to buy from Russia, although these sanctions have been applied selectively in practice.
While most of Kazakhstan’s military procurement has focused on Russian products, the country has shown willingness at times to buy from other, even Western, suppliers. On September 1, 2021, for example, Airbus announced the sale of a pair of A400M transport aircraft to Kazakhstan, building off of earlier deals for C-295s and H145 helicopters. With an eye thus on the open Kazakh fighter jet requirement, French President Emmanuel Macron toured Central Asia in November 2023, reportedly pitching Dassault Aviation’s Rafale to the Uzbek and Kazakh Air Forces. The advertising campaign has worked elsewhere – Serbia selected the Rafale earlier this year – and Paris has a positive record in Kazakhstan.
But the French sales pitch ultimately fell flat, with Kazakhstan instead choosing to continue filling its fleet with Su-30SMs. Kazakh Deputy Air Force commander Yerzhan Nildibayev shot the Rafale idea down in an interview weeks after Macron’s visit, telling media that negotiations had not been held on the Rafale. Nildibayev commented that the Rafale “is a very expensive aircraft, so we choose Su-30SM by the quality-price ratio,” adding that six Su-30s would arrive in 2024.
As was the case with the previous Su-30 orders, details of this latest contract have been kept quiet, likely in part to avoid sanctions scrutiny. Nildibayev stated in late 2023 that 10 jets were on order, which would suggest another four for delivery in either late 2024 or more likely 2025.
Military markets analyst, covering Eurasia, Middle East, and Africa.
