[Husker24]

Looks as stealthy as a brick. Is that the best theyve got. The Russians have come up with some beautiful aircraft, this isn’t one of them.

[Snickering Hound]

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soloviev_D-30

I’d be interested if the Russians have been able to get any new engines for the Mig-31 this century.

[PLMerite]

"The Russians have come up with some beautiful aircraft, this isn’t one of them."

I've always thought that the MiG-3 had nice lines:

[steve86]

Our A-10 isn’t too pretty either. But deadly in its mission.

[rdcbn]

This is old school technology and the high speed dictates the shape but that does not mean it's not deadly effective.

Russia has a unique solution to the problem of how a bankrupt ex Super Power can maintain military relevance in a high tech world.

Their solution is ominous and poses a very realistic threat.

They minimize development costs by up grading existing high speed, high altitude platforms like the Mig 31 and Backfire Bomber Tu-22 as bomb trucks for hypersonic missiles carrying small, low yield, battlefield tactical micro nuke warheads .

Very unsubtle but potentially very effective and difficult ( and expensive) to defend against