To be fair the thing bought by China was a license/ownership to use the Flanker airframe to make their own fork in the Flanker family.ALH/Dhruv is a death trap.
The delusion in India regarding Technology Transfer is that they have an expectation that once they get blueprints/technical assistance, they will automatically become experts and basically make any aircraft or aircraft engine they want. It is the similar to the delusion that Americans have towards China, that everything is copied/reverse engineered just because they bought something or hacked some computers.
Didn't India have a more generous deal with Su-30MKI vs. China's Flankers? China never had any technical assistance with the Al-31, but India had parts production set up. Russia did not expect China to produce Flankers domestically as soon as they did. The fact that China could master the production of the Flanker and perform subsequent upgrades/modifications (including variants that have no Russian counterparts) shows a clear leap in technical and industrial capabilities relative to India which decades later can still only produce "about half" of the parts of the Su-30MKI domestically.
I have no insider knowlege, but logically the Chinese enterprises are simply better organized and thus able to actually absorb the fundamentals of aircraft design and manufacture. With the opening up and declassification of past history, we see that China had attempted many aircraft designs that failed in various stages due to industrial immaturity, the cancellation of these projects allowed resources to be reallocated more efficiently. Meanwhile, Tejas and Kaveri have been plodding along for 40 years. They are blaming GE for non-delivery of engines, but the deal was only signed in 2021 for the engines! This is for a plane that supposedly has operational clearance in 2011.
According to @Denio (Haven't had a chance to read his book though, might have more details), the contract terms technically did not include making their own variant, nor did it include terms to put in Chinese electronics. It was a shock to the Russians and considered a violation that China ceased to buy CKD kits and certain components. In fact, the Russians had prepared an upgraded N001 radar called "Panda", which from the name was assumed to be aimed for sale to China.To be fair the thing bought by China was a license/ownership to use the Flanker airframe to make their own fork in the Flanker family.
So Russia absolutely did expect more to be made. It didn't come with much ToT because the idea was for China to put its own stuff on it.
Later China did get other Flanker variants for opfor evaluation etc. In accordance with sale agreements, China did not start producing those.
Oh okay as far as what I've read online it just says China obtained the right to make Flankers from the USSR. It was no normal sale as USSR sent only 3 aircraft as preview for a whole line to be setup 100% under Shenyang.According to @Denio (Haven't had a chance to read his book though, might have more details), the contract terms technically did not include making their own variant, nor did it include terms to put in Chinese electronics. It was a shock to the Russians and considered a violation that China ceased to buy CKD kits and certain components. In fact, the Russians had prepared an upgraded N001 radar called "Panda", which from the name was assumed to be aimed for sale to China.
I guess that does make sense, the early Russian government was really cash strapped. Good on China for not enabling them.Reading elsewhere, the Russians were not naive, it was expected that China would go their own way at some point, but it was sooner than anticipated. The lack of ToT was also in the hopes to sell whatever they could for as long as they could.
Is there a statement like this by the Russian government? I can only find angry vatniks from time to time complaining but nothing from Kremlin.All the Russian public statements on the Sino-Flankers are that they are unlicensed and violations of Russian IP.
However, it is commonly believed (meaning we don't have any actual proof), that there is at the very least a mutual understanding that China would not pursue external sales for the Su-27 family. Otherwise the Russians probably would not have sold the Su-35.
That all being said, as it relates to the Indian experience, it's not like India did not expect to integrate their own technology into their Su-30, for example they integrated the Brahmos. A video of the Astra AAM was shown test-fired from a Su-30. There was talk of using a larger version of the Uttam radar from Tejas for the MLU of the MKI. However, due to the state of the Indian industry, these things simply are/were not ready. As I said, just simply a gap in capability. Ironically, if you fit the latest J-15 with a TVC WS-10, it is basically what the IAF wants in a "Super" Su-30MKI upgrade.