Topic: Venezuela buying French helo's ?

rock45

Just read this article I'll attached it below and was wondering would France sell Rafale's to Venezuela? It says helicopters but gives little detail really and was wondering why not Rafales right? Would be a good hi/low mix with there Su-30 MK2 Flankers. When Chavez's Vipers started increasing there down times because of the lack of spares why didn't Venezuela go French then? There AF has Mirage 5/50 types a little under 20 bought many years ago. In fact one crashed in training about a year ago. I would have thought with oil money that Mirage 2000s or Mirage 2000-5s might have been bought years back does anybody know why not. I didn't know Venezuela was in the market for French helicopters, don't recall seeing that at anytime. Are there problems with the Russian helicopters just delivered? Did the US pressure the French to stay away at some point?

The story I found
http://english.eluniversal.com/2007/...A1167079.shtml