Gomig-21
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Similar instances have happened several times before, though. It even happened in the middle of the 24 F-16 block 52 delivery from Obama himself. Of course at the behest of the rest of the Democrats in congress. However, the Republicans currently control the majority of the branches and if Trump is happy, he can easily influence things to go the other way and reinstate the funding. That's why I mentioned the Trump/Sisi relationship and if the fight on terrorism is center stage, and it would be something that pulls Egypt away from its recent EURO/Russia trend and re-introduce US jet fighters to Egypt, all of this could sway the pendulum in that direction.
I also think that the whole Rafale endeavor was greatly influenced by the fact that the F-16's run was coming to an end as well as the weapon's restrictions and of course, the F-35's unavailability to us by any stretch of the imagination. So the French fighter was literally the next best thing and not so much an end to US purchases.
The US does have a tendency to come back around after doing their bitching thing, and don't forget they signed the CISMOA and Bright Star is back in play. A similar example of that trend.
Patrick Leahy has always done this. It's his job to find these situations and make a stink out of them (and rightfully so), but notice how it says "cutting aid to Egypt AND Israel"? I don't think it will stick and eventually the few hundred million $ end up back in the mix.
That's definitely not happening I agree. I think the main thing is how the Egyptian brass handles all these issues. Coming up with compensation to the injured American and all those other restitution issues shouldn't be a problem at all, and they should do them. Giving the US full access to Sinai and what essentially mounts to military inspections is a whole other problem which I doubt Sisi will allow. We'll have to wait and see how they deal with that.
Either way, if they try and it doesn't work, the whole weapon's package is a big issue, to me, anyway. And with the exorbitant cost of the Rafales (and seeing that they should end up with 48 aircraft is amazing in of itself), having reentered the Russian domain with those 50 MiG-35s and no issues with getting the R-73/77s, it makes all the sense in the world to go with the Su-35s. Just like @The SC has been touting for over a year now and I gave him a hard time about that, but he was spot on! Sorry, SC, bro.
