During his trip to Astana on November 1, President Macron called for an “acceleration” of the partnership between France and Kazakhstan, a country rich in natural resources, in particular uranium and critical materials for the ecological transition, such as: B. rare land.
But beyond the economic aspects, the tenant of the Élysée Palace also wanted to welcome Kazakhstan’s “refusal” to follow the “path of vassalization behind a few powers” in a thinly veiled allusion to Russia […] in a world in which great powers want to become hegemonic and in which regional powers become unpredictable.”
However, this distancing from Moscow does not mean that Astana is about to radically rethink its alliances to move closer to the Western model… However, it was reported that Kazakhstan would consider supplying Rafale fighter-bombers to France. Such a prospect was unthinkable until recently, largely due to the country’s Soviet past. In addition, this would require a radical change in the doctrine of the country’s air force, without ignoring the need to make fairly large investments in infrastructure, appropriate ammunition, training of pilots and technicians, etc.
In addition, for a sale of military equipment of such great importance [car il s’agit de nouer un partenariat sur plusieurs décennies, ndlr] comes to the conclusion that good economic and trade relationships are not enough: there must also be common strategic interests between seller and customer. And that is not yet the case between France and Kazakhstan.
This Central Asian country is already one of the founders of the Collective Security Treaty Organization, along with Russia. [OTSC] which, like NATO, provides for a collective defense clause between its members. We can always imagine a departure from this structure, as Armenia is considering… But at the moment there are no signs in Astana in this direction.
In addition, Kazakhstan, whose population is almost 20% Russians, is home to the Baikonur space center… And it is unlikely that Moscow will agree to give up on it. Finally, the Kazakh Air Force has already begun modernizing its combat aircraft fleet, notably through the acquisition of Sukhoi Su-30.
Furthermore, she does not intend to choose a different type of device. This was stated on November 30 by Colonel Ershan Nildibayev, head of the Main Armaments Directorate.
“I’m telling you now: I will disappoint you. No negotiations took place on this issue [l’achat de Rafale, ndlr]. There are no such projects. It’s a beautiful plane…but it’s expensive. Therefore, we believe that for us the Su-30SM is the best choice in terms of price-performance ratio,” Colonel Nildibaev said during a press conference, according to the KazTag agency.
For his part, the head of the Kazakh Air Force, General Dauren Kosanov, emphasized, reports the same source, the “increasing role of drones” and therefore the need to develop “new methods of combat.”
In any case, there can be no question of questioning the current equipment programs. When he ordered transport aircraft from Airbus [deux A400M et des C-295]Kazakhstan expects primarily Russian equipment, such as the Mi-35 and Mi-171SH helicopters and the Su-30 SM [six lui seront en principe livrés en 2024] and Tor-M2M/K air defense systems.