China can certainly absorb whatever sanctions are put on it from the US. It can even turn around and sanction the US with it's tremendous worldwide economic clout, not to mention how much the US imports from China and the ginormous trades between the two countries. Let's be honest, as strong-minded as Egypt has been, it really can't afford too much of an economic war with the US. Neither does the US want to anger Egypt as we well know since it would much rather have Egypt as a content partner in the ME. So it's a bit complicated.
I also think that the Trump administration and Pompeo (whom the latter was the one who brought up the issue of the Su-35s and offered the F-15 in return) were much more pragmatic towards Egypt than this Biden administration which made it clear during the presidential campaign and before even being elected that there would be "no more favors for Trump's favorite dictator."
Aside from the disgusting insult that was, it's very clear as to the Biden admin.'s view towards Egypt and its military relationship with the US. I think the Trump admin would've been much more easy going and give in a little easier than this current one.
Ma3lesh what does "fortiori mean? I can tell you that they could've easily told Egypt to end it and they would keep it out of the news. We haven't even seen any more pics out of Russia like we were seeing before. Remember we saw the satellite pic of 11 or 12 fighters in Russia ready for delivery? Assuming 5 were already delivered the Egypt that makes 17 at the most. So where are pics of the remaining 13 in Russia still? Something is not right.
The aid is not tied to these purchases. The partial aid stoppage was due to human rights activities. The Democrats are well known to play the human rights card and favor the good treatment of the MB. So the Su-35 and CAATSA would be via economic sanctions or separate deals with the US, not the military aid.
This fella did an excellent video about the possible co-production of South Korean military equipment in Egypt that you posted in the SK/Egypt thread and that was where he made it abundantly clear that the KAI KF-21 Bormae has an Israeli radar and the entire avionics package was also full of Israeli crap. But
@Indos doesn't think so and says differently, while Wiki mentions there is a lot of Israeli influence in the radar and avionics. I think I'll take Indos' word since Indonesia is 20% stake in that aircraft and probably has better first hand knowledge.
Either way, I don't think that jet is suited for Egypt which is why the Su-35s are so important. They open the door for the superb Su-57 which will work very well for Egypt.
Although, this is one of my pet peeves about the entire Flanker line that they've been also inundated with Israeli CRAP. The Algerians had their first batch of Su-30MKAs and after a few years of operating them and ready to perform an overhaul, they opened the spine and cockpit guts only to find the star of David stamped on half the crap lmao! How they didn't know this before hand is just as surprising. This, I guarantee, would never happen to anything purchased by the EGY military.
