Seems unlikely. They had their window of opportunity when they had an active Western marketing arm, Russia wasn't a sanctioned nation, COMAC was barely getting started and the early reports of the Superjet were quite positive. Suffice to say the airlines that passed on the opportunity aren't regretting it and the couple that bought them did regret it.
I disagree with you about the effect of sanctions. Their result was that airliners became a strategic priority rather than something Russia was happy to buy overseas forever.
Furthermore, the sanctions demonstrated that there is sovereign risk associated with purchasing Western airliners.
Finally, IIRC the airline's regrets were largely related to the poor early reliability of the French-built parts, specifically combustors, for the Superjet engines. It remains to be seen how the new Russian engines will perform.
Demand for Russian built airlines in Russia /= them being competitive with Boeing and Airbus. The USSR built airliners as a strategic priority for the domestic market for decades: their track record of being terrible was one of the reasons behind scepticism of the Superjet
And airlines in most countries have far more to worry about buying aircraft whose maintenance depends on a faraway pariah state and that are not certified in Europe than they do about US sanctions targeting them. And even if they do, still not necessarily more difficult to circumvent the sanctions (as Mahan Air did with wet leased 747s) and access a worldwide parts supply and MRO market than rely on being able to maintain and sell on your Russian aircraft at reasonable price and timeliness...
It would also be surprising if the new Russian engines were competitive on performance with new Western engines, and likewise with other components they've had to switch to domestic manufacture for.
And most of the companies that'll get parts shipped to you and do your maintenance, especially when you consider getting UAC MRO certifications isn't exactly an exciting opportunity for companies from China, the Middle East or Latin America either. And doing business with Russian aerospace companies was a PITA when you had access to easy international payments and didn't have a risk of becoming a sanctioned company yourself
The sanctions have almost entirely shut down Russian airliner production. They have only managed to deliver a handful of complete aircraft since 2022, and those largely used parts already on hand. Much of their supply chain is just gone and will take years to rebuild. When they eventually do get the complete production system up and running again their engines will still be less fuel efficient: airlines live and die by fuel efficiency.
They are producing MC-21 without engines waiting for the PD-14 to be ready. We will see in a couple of months if the engine's problems have been solved.
Probably the sanctions will be greatly reduced or eliminated this year or next, and the sanctions are great marketing to other countries that fear being sanctioned—which, following Vance's speech in Munich, probably should include Romania, Germany, Sweden, Denmark, and maybe even the UK.
Last year Ukraine wasn't particularly worried the US would cut off military aid, Romania wasn't particularly worried the US would paint it as a poster child of failed democracies, and Denmark wasn't particularly worried the US would annex Greenland. The world is unpredictable.
Nah, Ukraine knew Trump had an excellent chance of winning and was likely to cut off military aid, and the rest of the world was well aware that a Trump return would mean more moronic threats and trash talking.
Trust me, we're not rushing out to buy shitty Russian aircraft as a hedge.
Yeah, waiting to see if the current iteration of PD-14 engine[0] is finally up to the task. Two years ago UAC tested them and found to be in the need of improvement.
It will be interesting to see if UAC emerges as a serious competitor to Boeing and Airbus (and COMAC) in the near future.