flightglobal.com
Training aircraft/helicopters
Country Active fleet Share
1 USA 2,835 24%
2 Pakistan 513 4%
3 Russia 496 4%
4 Japan 427 4%
5 Egypt 387 3%
6 China 366 3%
7 India 359 3%
8 South Korea 298 3%
9 Turkey 276 2%
10 UK 241 2%
Other 5,589 48%
Total 11,787 100%Transport
Country Active fleet Share
1 USA 945 22%
2 Russia 424 10%
3 India 250 6%
4 China 224 5%
5 Brazil 126 3%
6 France 121 3%
7 Iran 84 2%
8 Turkey 80 2%
9 Colombia 76 2%
10 Germany 71 2%
Other 1,864 43%
Total 4,265 100%Combat helicopter
Country Active fleet Share
1 USA 5,471 27%
2 Russia 1,481 7%
3 China 903 4%
4 South Korea 803 4%(^5) India 721 4%
6 Japan 637 3%
7 France 555 3%
8 Turkey 468 2%
9 Italy 402 2%
10 Germany 366 2%
Other 8,682 42%
Total 20,489 100%
WORLD AIR FORCES
Directory
10-16 December 2019 | Flight International | 31
Flight International’s annual World Air
Forces directory uses Cirium fleets data,
abridged by editor Craig Hoyle for our
listings format. Fleet analysis is provided
by FlightGlobal’s Antoine Fafard.
Fleet information is divided into these
categories:
Active: Aircraft in day-to-day use. For
some Soviet-era types where only
summary information is available, this also
includes some non-operational platforms.
Ordered: Aircraft on firm order. Others
which are pending purchase approval or
contract signature are marked with an
asterisk. This category includes current
planned order totals, which may be
subject to future revision.
Abbreviations
AEW = airborne early warning
Comms = communications
ELINT = electronic intelligence
EW = electronic warfare
MPA = maritime patrol aircraft
Recce = reconnaissance
SAR = search and rescue
SIGINT = signals intelligence
To download your free copy of our directory
for 2020, visit flightglobal.com/waf from
10 December
Explanatory notes
rise, taking its total capability to 4,284 aircraft.
Increases were made in both the combat and
training aircraft categories.
No change was recorded in the Asia-Pacific
region or in Europe, where their total fleets
stand at almost 15,000 and just over 8,600 air-
frames, respectively.
REGIONAL DIVIDE
Africa and North America both experienced
a 1% contraction to their fleets, while the
biggest reversal affected the Latin America
region, which encountered a 130-unit
reduction, to stand at 3,321. However, this
was almost entirely a consequence of the
removal of some piston-engined models
from our data.
Our annual snapshot shows that once com-
bined, Asia-Pacific-region nations have in-
creased their lead in total fleet size to 1,346
over North America’s 13,651: of which, the
USA owns 97%. But as noted in previous
directories, while the 28 Asia-Pacific nations
listed here can call on 5,038 combat aircraft,
some of these – such as North Korea’s assets –
are vastly less capable than the 2,657 flown by
the US services.
Notable exclusions from our annual fleet
review include those fixed-wing aircraft and
helicopters Cirium records as held in storage,
also counting those involved in or awaiting
upgrade. Assets categorised as dedicated to
performing VIP transport duties, or as flown
by military-operated airlines, are also not in-
cluded. We do not list platforms permanently
assigned to supporting research and develop-
ment or experimental activities, among them
aircraft employed by France’s DGA defence
procurement agency, the UK’s Qinetiq and
Germany’s WTD 61 test unit.
Other categories not included regard those
airframes tasked with specialist support du-
ties such as calibration or mapping, firefight-
ing, satellite tracking, skydiving, surveying,
target towing and weather reconnaissance. ■
Dassault
India and Qatar both received their first Rafale fighters from Dassault during the year