Was the Bangladeshi MIG 29's necessary?

[desioptimist]

Oh Jesus *facepalm*

A war? Really? A war against whom? Who and why is anyone going to military invade Bangladesh? You haven't provided a single explanation for that other than your fanboy stuff.

Bangladeshis are still getting along with their lives in peace amidst all the problems at home for which only Bangladeshis are ultimately to blame themselves.

I never said Americans came and developed Japan after WWII. Read up W. Edwards Deming and you'll see what I mean.

The intention behind those MIG-29 purchases were simply to fill a few pockets during the Hasina administration. Nothing more. Maybe still is

You really have no clue as to the true nature of the affairs behind military purchases in Bangladesh. And there is an important reason why they are always kept a low profile among the public of Bangladesh. But I'll leave it to your ignorance.

I think you sir have a case of inferiority complex and low self-esteem.

Oh, and before you say I am a "witchdoctor", understand that my brother-in-law was in the army. He retired as a Colonel. My uncle once served in the air force during the Pakistan era. So you could say that I do have some knowledge in Bangladesh military affairs and military in general.

The main battlefield is in our own country and among Bangladeshis themselves. Not India.

I agree with you 100 percent. Defense procurement should be based on ones need and risk assessment, just buying to boost ones ego is criminal when you are a poor country(that applies to India too, which is a poor country).
This Mig thing is fishy for sure. Imagine how many anti aircraft guns, other medium and small arms could have been bought with that money.

 

[ProsperBD]

I agree with you 100 percent. Defense procurement should be based on ones need and risk assessment, just buying to boost ones ego is criminal when you are a poor country(that applies to India too, which is a poor country).
This Mig thing is fishy for sure.

If Bangladesh did not have any Army we would be controlled by some other country. Even though not being a Resource rich country as opposed to arab rich countries, But In my opinion we should not consider buying expensive jets but precautions must be taken we do need something for our military but only Bangladesh can speak for itself if it wishes to have a advanced well armed powerful army, then go ahead but before we do this we must and have to consider taking economy into account and if we cannot afford such equipment unfortunetly we don't have such money but as time moves and asia moves on we will surely have a powerful army as well as a rich economy. If Bangladesh keep up high growth for a few years then we will be there in no time but due to political instability this is why BD is prevented from attracting Foreign invesment from other countries. Although in my opinion this instability of BD is casual we must look into reinforcing better leadership, Leading BD to prosperity and happiness hopefully we can do this but as of now we see no change in politics I have seen how Khaleda Zia can do something about our desperate need of leadership. Inshallah all this will take place by time. Even though the two are demoralising our nation we must seek more Leaders to rebase our economy and economic reforms, to shape a better goal for our country from fighting poverty to advancing in technology, manufacturing and etc.

 

[desioptimist]

If Bangladesh did not have any Army we would be controlled by some other country. Even though not being a Resource rich country as opposed to arab rich countries, But In my opinion we should not consider buying expensive jets but precautions must be taken we do need something for our military but only Bangladesh can speak for itself if it wishes to have a advanced well armed powerful army, then go ahead but before we do this we must and have to consider taking economy into account and if we cannot afford such equipment unfortunetly we don't have such money but as time moves and asia moves on we will surely have a powerful army as well as a rich economy. If Bangladesh keep up high growth for a few years then we will be there in no time but due to political instability this is why BD is prevented from attracting Foreign invesment from other countries. Although in my opinion this instability of BD is casual we must look into reinforcing better leadership, Leading BD to prosperity and happiness hopefully we can do this but as of now we see no change in politics I have seen how Khaleda Zia can do something about our desperate need of leadership. Inshallah all this will take place by time. Even though the two are demoralising our nation we must seek more Leaders to rebase our economy and economic reforms, to shape a better goal for our country from fighting poverty to advancing in technology, manufacturing and etc.

I understand your point bro. I agree, you need to defend your country. I just dont think expensive jets are the best way to defend it. My own view is you should have a bigger army, which properly equipped and manned.

You should also have a better navy that can police and defend your waterways.

 

[IndianTiger]

if bangladesh wants to buy let them buy but india or other asian country not going to attack them.

 

[ProsperBD]

I understand your point bro. I agree, you need to defend your country. I just dont think expensive jets are the best way to defend it. My own view is you should have a bigger army, which properly equipped and manned.

You should also have a better navy that can police and defend your waterways.

All of the following you have mentioned will be done in phases, be patient and watch. It will take a bit long but navy will start to develop it is already being done and so will the ground forces as well as police force it is all in a matter of time expensive jets will not be procured but maybe after when economy becomes more strong and is much more eligible to get fighter jet/air superiority. All will be done in phases and is currently underway.

 

[ProsperBD]

if bangladesh wants to buy let them buy but india or other asian country not going to attack them.

Bangladesh can do what she wishes, to fufill the needs of the army and people. I agree with your statement and I know it is very unlikely to happen but we must have a good defence force no matter what. We all are not certain about whom will attack Bangladesh and I cannot give you any reasons why.

 

[Zabaniyah]

If Bangladesh did not have any Army we would be controlled by some other country. Even though not being a Resource rich country as opposed to arab rich countries, But In my opinion we should not consider buying expensive jets but precautions must be taken we do need something for our military but only Bangladesh can speak for itself if it wishes to have a advanced well armed powerful army, then go ahead but before we do this we must and have to consider taking economy into account and if we cannot afford such equipment unfortunetly we don't have such money but as time moves and asia moves on we will surely have a powerful army as well as a rich economy. If Bangladesh keep up high growth for a few years then we will be there in no time but due to political instability this is why BD is prevented from attracting Foreign invesment from other countries. Although in my opinion this instability of BD is casual we must look into reinforcing better leadership, Leading BD to prosperity and happiness hopefully we can do this but as of now we see no change in politics I have seen how Khaleda Zia can do something about our desperate need of leadership. Inshallah all this will take place by time. Even though the two are demoralising our nation we must seek more Leaders to rebase our economy and economic reforms, to shape a better goal for our country from fighting poverty to advancing in technology, manufacturing and etc.

Khaleda is spineless. Hasina is insane. I agree, we need strong and much less corrupt leadership to address the nation's challenges.

There are more pressing issues in Bangladesh than a few expensive jets.

Expensive jets vs. Poverty alleviation? It is not a hard decision. In fact, it is common sense.

Bangladesh has a very long way to go to even benchmark Thailand. Many new toys will be developed by God knows who in the future ahead.

A little off-topic:
They should do something about Biman (Bangladesh's national air carrier) too. It is in a really sorry state. Been making loses for a long time.

The DC-10 costs $15,000/hr to operate

Just a thought: buying a few Boeing-777s to replace the aging DC-10s would be a good investment. Also, reset the way Biman is managed. Too much politics there at the moment.

 

[InFn-0]

Biman should be sold to some private entrepreneur. No other way to keep it alive.

 

[TopCat]

Well, when we need soldiers, we REALLY need them. Of-course, why should we give corridor to a foreign military. Although, I could care less about Sino-Indo hostilities.

My point was that the MIGs were a poor investment decision back in the 90's and it was riddled with corruption. They were just bought to fill some AL pockets.

We bought Mig-21 back in 1973 which needed to be upgraded to 3rd generation fighters and was long due. China did not have any 3rd gen at that time and Migs were the only option available. Because we bought Mig-29 back then, we are thinking of 4th generation now.
There were no proof of money squandering but that was a bad deal as BD did not know the after service cost of those planes as they never flew ones before. As they know it now they are shopping around and see whats best for them. I dont think a purchase of 8 planesa were a bad investment, at least to gain some experience on how big daddys works.

 

[UKBengali]

All of the following you have mentioned will be done in phases, be patient and watch. It will take a bit long but navy will start to develop it is already being done and so will the ground forces as well as police force it is all in a matter of time expensive jets will not be procured but maybe after when economy becomes more strong and is much more eligible to get fighter jet/air superiority. All will be done in phases and is currently underway.

Agree with everything you are saying.

Buying a high(100+) number of high-performance fighter jets is currently financially possible. The 120 billion Bangladeshi economy(now growing at 7% a year) will be able to pay for it but there are massive numbers of people in Bangladesh that are literally not getting enough to eat. Better make sure that everyone is well-fed before BD can think of creating a top-class military. In the meantime BD can buy a couple of squadrons of these jets which will give the airforce invaluable experience and then when the economy is much larger(by the next decade), then the government can order large numbers of jets, tanks,ships and missiles. In the long run(2030 and beyond) BD needs to have a top class military that will allow the country to maintain a high-degree of autonomy and independence.

 

[Zabaniyah]

Biman should be sold to some private entrepreneur. No other way to keep it alive.

Nobody is going to buy it with the current state of things - guaranteed.

We bought Mig-21 back in 1973 which needed to be upgraded to 3rd generation fighters and was long due. China did not have any 3rd gen at that time and Migs were the only option available. Because we bought Mig-29 back then, we are thinking of 4th generation now.
There were no proof of money squandering but that was a bad deal as BD did not know the after service cost of those planes as they never flew ones before. As they know it now they are shopping around and see whats best for them. I dont think a purchase of 8 planesa were a bad investment, at least to gain some experience on how big daddys works.

The training behind operating a MIG-29 is a lot compared to other jets of its class. That also means higher costs. But yeah, I can say that the experience with the MIG-29s was worthy.

There was something fishy about the MIG deal.
26 testify in MIG-29 corruption case | Bangladesh | bdnews24.com
UNBconnect... - All 6 accused in Mig-29 corruption case acquitted

Otherwise, there would not have been any prosecution regarding the MIG deal in the first place. Of-course, the defendants, including Hasina were acquitted since the AL is currently in power.

IN is now buying another hi-tech aircraft which even the USN doesn't have
http://www.defence.pk/forums/india-defence/113257-indian-navy-new-killer-machine-p8i.html

 

[ProsperBD]

Nobody is going to buy it with the current state of things - guaranteed.



The training behind operating a MIG-29 is a lot compared to other jets of its class. That also means higher costs. But yeah, I can say that the experience with the MIG-29s was worthy.

There was something fishy about the MIG deal.
26 testify in MIG-29 corruption case | Bangladesh | bdnews24.com
UNBconnect... - All 6 accused in Mig-29 corruption case acquitted

Otherwise, there would not have been any prosecution regarding the MIG deal in the first place. Of-course, the defendants, including Hasina were acquitted since the AL is currently in power.

IN is now buying another hi-tech aircraft which even the USN doesn't have
http://www.defence.pk/forums/india-defence/113257-indian-navy-new-killer-machine-p8i.html

Good for India, How are they going to allevate poverty? Bangladesh should not be following same direction as our neighbours. We need to learn from their mistakes there is no point in buying hi-tech equipment, most of Indians economy is in swiss banks and who is going to be the person to stop this. There are people whom are starving out there happily living their lives in slums. Tear continously drops when I see these sort of things, I do not wish my fellow Bangladeshis to be in this hardship, Govt. is responsible for those who cannot find food to put on their plates Inshallah our problems with poverty will be solved and gone/dusted we need better programs for education in order to build our workforce into highly patriotic, hardworking people, I'm guessing our people already are what I mentioned but indeed we need to Advance in economy and military our country will not forsaken our economy has much potential, we would have sored above the skies.. fellow patriots we will see a brighter day when we see our country with no poverty, better quality of life. Inshallah we will achieve greatness.

 

[integra]

Don't understand whats the sudden fuss over some migs.
Why was it not good for BAF and for what reasons seems a bit fragile to me. Think about it, those are air superiority fighters and what we had back then were only interceptors. F-7s that we had and still have are just copy mig-21s with the recent ones having better airframes and precise cnc cad cuts and the obvious Radar upgrades. Mig29 has some resemblance to earlier migs when it comes to ergonomics. Gave our pilots better training and back then scare off burma.

The air force pilots are always proud of those birds specially the 8 Sqn (for migs)under Wg Cdr Hasan Mahmood Khan as OC . Its a privilege for those pilots and the juniors to dream.

The problem is the political filter that some of you sees the deal with(which is ofcource justifiable). Its because of this sort of ignorance pardon me but BNP did try to sell off those migs including the newly procured(back then) highly advanced frigate from Korea with the lame excuse of excess platform. But I support the procurement of F7-BG under BNP which was quite wise specially for our engineers.

Anyone of you should visit teknaf or saint martins island to see how our migs constantly harass the Burmese border(I don't support it though). Its quite lame to be like a sitting duck with some inferior hardware. Burma knows what we are and thats why they stay where they should stay. Now what if India attacks? Who knows 3rd world war or whatever political sellout, is it possible for them to engage with all of their jets and tanks? Such a small country we have they would just bang with each other anyways(fluid dynamics anyone?). We would just cut off their chicken neck (just 60kms I guess) ask the Chinese to progress and voila! north east gone. Anyways theres also UN and other stuffs including our own army engaging in guerrilla warfares The complete AIR DEFENCE coverage within the next few years and we'll be quite safe to defend ourselves atleast for six months.

Our National Educaion budget is several billions of dollars so I don't think there is a lack of fund management skills. The two Begums aren't that bad either, their bitching on one another made us progress for the last 20 years. The GOV(BNP or AL) will not develop the country its the common people who did it as far. Theres no point in blaming the begums unless someone else comes with better alternatives.

 

[desioptimist]

Good for India, How are they going to allevate poverty? Bangladesh should not be following same direction as our neighbours. We need to learn from their mistakes there is no point in buying hi-tech equipment, most of Indians economy is in swiss banks and who is going to be the person to stop this. There are people whom are starving out there happily living their lives in slums. Tear continously drops when I see these sort of things, I do not wish my fellow Bangladeshis to be in this hardship, Govt. is responsible for those who cannot find food to put on their plates Inshallah our problems with poverty will be solved and gone/dusted we need better programs for education in order to build our workforce into highly patriotic, hardworking people, I'm guessing our people already are what I mentioned but indeed we need to Advance in economy and military our country will not forsaken our economy has much potential, we would have sored above the skies.. fellow patriots we will see a brighter day when we see our country with no poverty, better quality of life. Inshallah we will achieve greatness.

While I don't feel great about spending so much on defense, we face higher risk than you think. Our defense spending(as percentage of GDP) is among lowest in asia. Also, we have too big coast to protect. We have fought 4 wars, the risk is real, not imaginary.
If we can buy peace by investing less than 2 percent of GDP, why not. That is the price we have to pay, unfortunately.

And no, poverty wont go if we stop spending on defense(thanks to mismanagement of funds), rather it will expose us to uncertainty and lower growth rate.

 

[desioptimist]

Don't understand whats the sudden fuss over some migs.
Why was it not good for BAF and for what reasons seems a bit fragile to me. Think about it, those are air superiority fighters and what we had back then were only interceptors. F-7s that we had and still have are just copy mig-21s with the recent ones having better airframes and precise cnc cad cuts and the obvious Radar upgrades. Mig29 has some resemblance to earlier migs when it comes to ergonomics. Gave our pilots better training and back then scare off burma.

The air force pilots are always proud of those birds specially the 8 Sqn (for migs)under Wg Cdr Hasan Mahmood Khan as OC . Its a privilege for those pilots and the juniors to dream.

The problem is the political filter that some of you sees the deal with(which is ofcource justifiable). Its because of this sort of ignorance pardon me but BNP did try to sell off those migs including the newly procured(back then) highly advanced frigate from Korea with the lame excuse of excess platform. But I support the procurement of F7-BG under BNP which was quite wise specially for our engineers.

Anyone of you should visit teknaf or saint martins island to see how our migs constantly harass the Burmese border(I don't support it though). Its quite lame to be like a sitting duck with some inferior hardware. Burma knows what we are and thats why they stay where they should stay. Now what if India attacks? Who knows 3rd world war or whatever political sellout, is it possible for them to engage with all of their jets and tanks? Such a small country we have they would just bang with each other anyways(fluid dynamics anyone?). We would just cut off their chicken neck (just 60kms I guess) ask the Chinese to progress and voila! north east gone. Anyways theres also UN and other stuffs including our own army engaging in guerrilla warfares The complete AIR DEFENCE coverage within the next few years and we'll be quite safe to defend ourselves atleast for six months.

Our National Educaion budget is several billions of dollars so I don't think there is a lack of fund management skills. The two Begums aren't that bad either, their bitching on one another made us progress for the last 20 years. The GOV(BNP or AL) will not develop the country its the common people who did it as far. Theres no point in blaming the begums unless someone else comes with better alternatives.

I think every perceived Indian threat thread should customarily closed with chicken neck + china theory. Somehow pakistanis missed that brilliant idea, and gave up.