The Yakovlev Yak-43 was a Soviet VTOL (vertical takeoff and landing) fighter designed as the ground-based version of the ill-fated Yakovlev Yak-141, which failed to reach production. Like the Yak-141, the Yak-43 did not reach production.[1] The Yak-43 would have been the third-generation VTOL/STOL fighter, to follow and eventually replace the Yak-141.[2] [3]
Like the Yak-141, the Yak-43 would have had only a single main engine, as well as two dedicated vertical-lift engines. The main engine would have been based on the Samara NK-321 three-shaft augmented turbofan with a takeoff rating of . This same engine is used to power the Tupolev Tu-160 Blackjack bomber. The engine would have had a large air bleed leading to an auxiliary combustion chamber located in the nose, though a separate lift jet would have been retained.[4] A new integral layout use stealth technology which is a single whole of the fuselage with the wing. After the Yak-43 project was unsuccessful, another attempt was made for a supersonic VTOL aircraft. But also the successor, the Yak-201 never left the drawing board.