Android-Target is not being overrided

As specified in https://cordova.apache.org/docs/en/latest/config_ref/

android-targetSdkVersion(integer) can be used to configure the target SDK. This means that after you generate the project, it will build with this targetSDK.

However, this is not the case.

As a result, the ability to override the gradle files via either

gradle.properties
cdvCompileSdkVersion=23
cdvBuildToolsVersion="23.0.3"

build-extras.gradle
ext.cdvCompileSdkVersion = 23
ext.cdvBuildToolsVersion = "23.0.3"

does not work. It will always try to use the hard coded target which is android-25 to build the project. It will try to download the SDK and then build it.

Details
-----------------
In the CordovaLib/project.properties it hardcodes a target target=android-25. As a result, in CordovaLib/cordova.gradle

String doGetProjectTarget() {
def props = new Properties()
file('project.properties').withReader

{ reader -> props.load(reader) }

return doEnsureValueExists('project.properties', props, 'target')
}

will always return android-25.

What this means is that in the CordovaLib/build.gradle

ext {
apply from: 'cordova.gradle'
cdvCompileSdkVersion = privateHelpers.getProjectTarget()
cdvBuildToolsVersion = privateHelpers.findLatestInstalledBuildTools()
}

The target will always be 25.

You can see this if you add the gradle task to the file

task cdvPrintPropsSubTest << {
println('buildsdk=' + privateHelpers.findLatestInstalledBuildTools())
println('target=' + privateHelpers.getProjectTarget())

println('cdvCompileSdkVersion=' + cdvCompileSdkVersion)
println('cdvBuildToolsVersion=' + cdvBuildToolsVersion)
println('cdvVersionCode=' + cdvVersionCode)
println('cdvMinSdkVersion=' + cdvMinSdkVersion)
println('cdvBuildMultipleApks=' + cdvBuildMultipleApks)
println('cdvReleaseSigningPropertiesFile=' + cdvReleaseSigningPropertiesFile)
println('cdvDebugSigningPropertiesFile=' + cdvDebugSigningPropertiesFile)
println('cdvBuildArch=' + cdvBuildArch)
println('computedVersionCode=' + android.defaultConfig.versionCode)
android.productFlavors.each

{ flavor -> println('computed' + flavor.name.capitalize() + 'VersionCode=' + flavor.versionCode) }

}

The workaround is to modify the generated files, but this defeats the purpose of being able to regenerate the code without having to worry about custom modifications to it.