u/WorkerChance

Bit of a rant. I’m Indian and a huge jet enthusiast, and this genuinely bothers me.

Today I saw another IAF Su-30MKI photo and had the same thought again: why do so many of our jets look dusty and worn, with faded paint, exposed fasteners and patchy-looking panels?

I understand the USAF and PLA have vastly larger budgets, but even PAF, Turkish and Indonesian aircraft often appear much cleaner despite operating with far smaller overall defence budgets. That honestly gets embarrassing.

The contrast bothers me most. The IAF projects itself as an extremely prestigious institution and is incredibly competitive to get into, yet the image its aircraft present to the outside world consistently seems completely at odds with that prestige.

Maybe there are perfectly valid technical or operational reasons for this that I’m unaware of. I’m genuinely curious to hear from people who understand military aviation and aircraft maintenance better than I do.

Image credits:
IAF Su-30MKI: Firstpost
IAF Su-30MKI: Militarnyi
Indian Navy MiG-29K: Times Now
IAF SEPECAT Jaguar: AirPra/Medium
HAL LCA Tejas: Fly a Jet Fighter

[Album] Why do IAF jets look shit in almost every photo of them?