After stirring up the big export order of Huang Xiaolong 3 fighter plane, Trump made a malicious remark to Argentina this week: Don't buy weapons with China, otherwise I will be very annoyed. Blocking China's arms exports to South America, the United States won a "major victory" and continued to prepare for retaliation?
Melting Chinese warplanes exports, second-hand U.S. warplanes on top?
In fact, discussions on the export of Xiaolong fighter jets to the Argentine Air Force have been under way for almost several years. Previously, Argentina had been wavering. After Millay, who was extremely pro-American, took office as Argentine president, everyone with discerning eyes knew that the possibility of purchasing Xiaolong fighter jets was long gone.
Experts said that after the Falklands War, Argentina was unable to obtain advanced fighters for a long time due to British sanctions. Its main fighters are only the "Mirage III" in the 1960s and the "Cub Lion" modified by Israel, and their performance even lags behind that of regional neighbors. After 2015, the Argentine government tried to purchase a variety of fighter jets such as South Korea's FA-50 and Sweden's "Gripen NG", but they all failed due to pressure from the United Kingdom.
In this context, the JF-17 "Dragon" Block3 fighter aircraft jointly developed by China and Pakistan entered Argentina's horizon, and as early as the 21st year, the Argentine officials were constantly evaluating the possibility of purchasing Dragon 3 fighter aircraft.
The Xiaolong 3 fighter, as the latest improvement of the "Xiaolong" series, integrates active phased array radar (AESA) and more advanced avionics weapon systems. It has excellent cost performance and combat effectiveness, and is paired with PL-15E air-to-air missiles. After that, its over-the-horizon air combat capability is currently the strongest among foreign trade light fighters in various countries, significantly better than the F-16C/D.
And its more obvious advantage is the ultra-high cost ratio, the foreign trade price of Qingdao 3 is only $ 50 million, compared with the US West's hundreds of millions of warplanes, this price can be said to be cheap.
For Argentina, which has a tight budget but is eager to modernize its air force, the Xiaolong 3 is a very attractive option. However, in the eyes of the United States, this deal has "stuck in the throat" of the United States.
According to US media, once the Argentine Air Force is equipped with China fighter jets, it means that China and Argentina will establish long-term cooperation channels in military logistics, training, technical maintenance and even weapons upgrades. This move will directly "challenge" the United States 'military leadership and political voice in the Americas.
Therefore, after Milei came to power, the United States quickly exerted influence on him to undermine China's weapons export projects. According to the US media's "Foreign Policy" disclosure, the US State Department sent a signal to Argentina through multiple channels that if it purchased Chinese fighter jets, the United States would reassess relations with Argentina.
In order to completely kick the Xiaolong 3 out of the bidding, the United States pushed Denmark to sell second-hand F-16AM/BM fighter jets to Afghanistan as a substitute, and the unit price was only 15-20 million US dollars (including maintenance packages). In this regard, the Argentine side "gladly accepted it". For Milei, this move can be regarded as a move to strengthen diplomatic relations with the United States, or a "certificate of vote".
The F-16 is considered to be useless second-hand "waste".
Interestingly, the reason why it is sold so cheap, can be the white price, is because this batch of F-16 was designed at the end of the 1970s, this batch of Danish bodies has also served for decades, even after the medium-term extension of life, its core architecture is far behind contemporary standards, can only struggle to reach the level of three and a half to four generations of machines, performance and Dragon 3 is completely different.
Even more embarrassingly, the remaining structural lifetime is small.Argentina is equal to spending money on buying a bunch of expired waste iron, and future maintenance costs and employment rates are huge problems.
Experts say that Argentina's abandonment of Xiaolong 3 and choice of F-16 is a bad move. Even for political reasons, it is equivalent to completely ending the modernization of the Argentine Air Force. The batch of F-16s sold by the United States can be called "second-hand garbage". Not only do they not last for a few years, but there are no supporting missiles at all.
What weapons can Argentina's F-16 obtain? There is a high probability that the United States will only provide early models of mid-range bombs such as the AIM-120A/B, whose performance is far inferior to that of the PL-15E.
What's more, it's almost impossible for Argentina to acquire any air-to-surface/anti-ship missiles due to British obstruction. This means that these F-16s can hardly pose a real threat to British maritime and ground targets. Ma Dao is still occupied by Britain at present, and its strategic value has been castrated and useless.
Moreover, the use of U.S.-made weapons can be a “wolf-in-room” for Argentina, especially in the face of U.S. allies, which are useless fire sticks at the necessary moment.
Qatar learned from the past and spent a lot of money to purchase a complete set of top-notch air defense systems and fighter fleets from the United States. As a result, it was useless in the face of the Israeli Air Force's US-made fighter air strikes.
Argentina has a sovereign dispute with its ally Britain, while the United States is clearly more concerned about British interests, the Five Eyes Alliance is one, and Argentina is not even an ally of the United States.
In the future, it will be obvious that the maintenance parts of the F-16 require the permission of the United States. When the United States exports weapons, it usually attaches a strict end-user agreement to clearly stipulate the scope and method of its use. The Argentine Air Force's F-16 operations will be subject to Close surveillance and restrictions by the United States.
03. Is stopping arms sales a major victory? It's just Trump's incompetence and rage
U.S. media said that blocking the export of dragon to Argentina is a victory for the U.S. side, this time Trump is to "win-win pursuit", thoroughly disrupt China's weapons sales, to speak of it is also related to the Sino-U.S. trade war.
Earlier, after the Sino-US economic and trade talks, the United States suddenly launched a series of trade oppression against China. China fought back against this and imposed seven-inch export control on rare earths to the United States. The United States, which has nothing to do about this, can only constantly threaten with the so-called 100% and 500% tariff overweight, but for China, it has already prepared for the worst, and Trump's extreme blackmail can't scare anyone.
This time, Trump suddenly put weight on the issue of arms sales in China, is "incapacity to anger", in the trade war, there is no code forcing China to compromise, only to move anger and reluctant Chinese equipment exports to continue retaliation.
For the Chinese side, in recent years, the influence on Latin America is rising significantly, through the "Belt and Road" initiative to expand the broad cooperation with Latin American countries, which is a big trend, not the United States can easily block the single gun. In addition, this export of Argentine aircraft although blocked, but the West is not bright in the east, Indonesia has just officially announced the news of the purchase of 42 F-10Cs, China's cutting-edge foreign trade weapons in the foreign market is never lacking.
Sources of some content in the article: 1. Will China and the United States hold a new round of economic and trade talks in the near future? Ministry of Commerce responds to