Aircraft In 2000

[Vespers War]

One potentially useful place (and one that raketenjagdpanzer should be familiar with) is Kermit Weeks' Fantasy of Flight. Kermit inherited a bunch of money from an oil explorer grandfather and decided to spend a bunch of it on preserving warbirds, with an emphasis on keeping them in flying condition. He has the only remaining flyable Martin Marauder and Short Sunderland, as well as an F4U Corsair, a Spitfire Mk.16, a pair of P-51s (one C and one D), and a B-25 Mitchell. For more utilitarian flying, there's a Curtiss Robin, Ford Tri-Motor (the same one from Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom), Stinson Tri-Motor, and the last airworthy Sikorsky S-39 flying boat.

As I'm writing this, I think it may have been brought up before with some question of whether the New America enclave near Tampa could have gotten there with the damage and hostile parties described in canon.

[RN7]

Despite the effects of EMP I think there are quite a few aircraft of all types still about in T2K for the reasons already mentioned by natehale1971 and others.

I would say that both the U.S. and Soviets still has hundreds of them in T2K, but very few are still operational outside of the still oil rich Middle East. The reason for my thinking is a reference to French airpower in Going Home SB on page 30.

"French units in the dead zone are in constant radio communication with their base. If they get into more trouble than they can handle alone, they can call for and receive support in the form of airstrikes or airmobile reinforcements (unlike their opponents, the French Army still has a small quantity of functional aircraft and the fuel to run them). Avgas does not grow on trees,
however, and the platoon who calls for aviation help had better have a good reason for doing so.

Reaction Force: This consists of a helicopter-borne patrol (generally Elite, but often Good) carried in three Puma transport helicopters, and two Gazelle helicopters (one ground attack and one anti-tank version!. It is dispatched against threats which the foot patrols have encountered, but feel are too large for them to handle."

This only references French Army aviation, but if the French Army is still operating a force of helicopters on the border with Germany and the Netherlands then I would assume that the French Air Force still has some operational combat and support aircraft in Europe. Although France sat out the war in Europe until it moved on the Rhineland in 1998 to defend its borders, France is in Europe and would also be affected by EMP from nuclear detonations across Europe. The main difference between France and the other powers in Europe is that the French have aviation fuel to keep an air force of off unknown size flying.

[Legbreaker]

My thoughts are EMP probably effected them as much as anyone, but France still has relatively intact industry to build replacement parts and electronics (after those industries themselves have been repaired of course).
What France doesn't have are slag piles where cities and infrastructure used to be.
So yes in 2000 they have helicopters and probably a few fixed wing craft too, but they're just the handful they've been able to return to service so far (explaining why calling for it is reserved for emergencies). Give it another few years and their airpower would likely be back to full strength again (provided they've got the pilots).