July 2017 during MAKS-2017, Russian Deputy Defense Minister Yury Borisov announced that discussions were under way to create a new aircraft with vertical take-off and landing,
then in
December 2017 Borisov himself confirmed that work is underway to design a new vertical take-off and landing aircraft (V/STOL).
then last month, on a Russian forum appeared this photo with a high probability made in the (JSC) "A.S.Yakovlev Design Bureau".
after a brief search I discovered that it is not very recent, but it has been
taken by the user nick name
"ash" in
May 2017
here same month in another image the same YAK-141 still "parked"
and in the company of other dusty aircraft, before being loaded onto the trailer
therefore the study of the V / STOL project starting from the last creation of Yakovlev had actually already begun before the announcement of July 2017, and it is likely that Minister Borisov made that declaration in December 2017 having already available something concrete.
The Chinese interest in V / STOL aircraft has been discussed from several sides, so this impulse given by the Russians to the design of a new and advanced V / STOL aircraft could be part of a Russian-Chinese agreement.
recently, China has participated in the recent international military technical forum "ARMY-2018" held in Russia, where it has also presented models of some naval units, including a 20,000 ton LHD, to the Russian military authorities
although if you want the Chinese can offer something better, at least as a project, see Type-075 from +/- 40,000 tons, which should cost a little more Blush, but it would be ideal for the Yakovlev V / STOL, fantasy V / STOL that the Chinese put on the bridge in this pictorial impression
so if they can establish a real collaboration, where Russia with Yakovlev puts a decade and experience in the design and construction of V / STOL aircraft with the YAK-38 and with the YAK-141 for the design of a new aircraft, and China will participates with its spending capacity, I think that in
5 years you could have in the prototype that flies ,.
To balance the agreement, given the exceptional construction capacity of the Chinese shipyards, Russia could sign a contract for at least 2 LHD of 20,000 tons, better for the 40,000 type-075B.