MiG-23MLDToday i recieved the latest MiG-25 book by Yefim Gordon i will give you my first impression without having had read it
Pictures:well it is a regular work slightly better than his previous Aerofax work about the MiG-25, some few new pictures but still worth it if you do not have his aerofax MiG-25/MiG-31 work.
Information:Well it seems it is not much better than his previous work, however it seems better than the Aerofax title, it details more the aircraft at least than his previous aerofax work.
Ranking: compared to this excellent MiG-31 work or his latest books about the Tu-160, Su-27 or MiG-29, i can not say it is his best work, however it is not a bad work since basicly i have seen few books about the MiG-25 and i would say still is one of the best books about the MiG-25 published in english.
Conclusion if you do not have his previous aerofax book well the book is worthed of buying, however if you have his first aerofax MiG-25/MiG-31 work well it is not very different from this book, but still he still has a good translation of Russians views about the MiG-25`s combat record, however do not expect a very different book in pictures but since i have not read it yet well it might be better than the Aerofax`s book since it has updated information.
MiG-23MLDMiG-23MLD !
” excellent picture book about the MiG-29 “
How many photos are in this 29 book from pre1990 era ?
Camoflaged MiG-29s that flown over Afghanistan ?
29s from ” Russian Top-Gun ” ?Nice MiG-29 photos after 1990 you can find on the Net.
You can find good pictures in Russian webpages and aviation forums and if you get some friends you will meet a few guys who will share pictures with you
MiG-23MLDMiG-23MLD !
I am talking about photos, that you can not find on the internet.
And can not find anywhere else.MiG-21SMT is a good sample:
If you will meet in your favorite bookshop before Christmas with a 250 pages book, with more than 20 nice colour photos of 21SMT with various weapons, Nuke…etc + 300 same photos of other SovietAF planes before 1990….I think, you will buy it on any high-price.In YG books are a lot of photos from the internet, and many photos that were published previously in other publications.
I always want to buy something “New”.
Man i will be honest, i am a regular guy, not rich, my wife who is Russian will get very mad if i buy ultra expensive books and leave my little daughter without food on the table, she will suggest me go to Irkutsk and take those picture by my self rather than buy those books, you have to see that Price is important, and the good think about his books is these are relatively well priced and in english, so still Gordon offers you a Russian book printed in english, well that is the main reason i have bouth his books if he saves me money in printer ink, he is a guy who attracts enough to buy his books instead of simply storing a picture in my documents files of my computer.
By the way in these days you can see really good pictures in the internet is not as difficult as it seems
MiG-23MLDAll Yefim Gordon books are published with poor photo material.
Welll….it is about before 1990 photos.
Old TASS,APN,Novosty photos, that were published many times in Russian publications (and most of them were published on the West in the 80s also) are NOT interesting, are NOT informative.
An author with YG background and connections must to research better photos from Cold-War era.MiG-21:
Where are the photos(good quality, never before published) of SovietAF MiG-21F-13, MiG-21SMT, MiG-21R ?
Colour photos of SovietAF camouflaged(or not) 21s from “combat-units” ?
SovietAF 21s with interesting weapon configurations, with bombs and so on…MiG-23:
Photos SovietAF MiG-23MS -23S -23BN in color ?
Photos of 23s in QRA with weapons, -23 -27 with Nuke and other rare weapon config., -23M in color…. ?And so on with other books…..
These good photos are available, but these are really expensive pics.
For example, a nice, colour, camouflaged SovietAF MiG-21SMT slide is more than 2000 Dollars for publication.
All of these and hundreds of more are in my private collection.
I was airframe-engine technic on MiG-21, Su-17 in the 70s 80s.
The photographing was prohibited, but I have a lot of photos…..and my friends have too.
I know many photographers, pilots in Russia, who has really good pics from those times.
I think, Yefim Gordon knows these people too….But YG(or his publisher) do not want to pay the price for the really good photos.
Because, you buy these books without good pics…
It is so simple.
Man first let us put some facts clear
What is a good aviation book?
in my opinion this is relative, everything depends in what you are looking.
I have for example an excellent picture book about the MiG-29 has it good pictures yes it has, has in depth information saddly it has not.
Has Yefim Gordon broken cultural barriers? yes he has for example i have two japanese books about the MiG-23 and MiG-31 and both books have quoted or taken Yefim Gordon`s pictures and texts and both books give credits to Yefim Gordon
Why i like his books? well he is the only author that has let me have a real good book about the MiG-23 and MiG-31.
A book not only is a picture or a bunch of pictures but also information and price, Gordon`s books are relatively well priced for developed countries such as Germany Japan or the US.
in general the books i have bought that he has written have not let me down in fact his books about the Su-24 both from polygon and Aerofax i consider them jewels of my personal library.
If you are willing to pay a fortune for a really ultra expensive book about the MiG-21SMT well buy it, however i won`t buy a book when there is internet and believe me i won`t buy a book that will cost me excesively and is an ultra expensive book just to see a few pictures that i can see in the internet.
Gordon also offers good price and he is not as foolish as to make books that won`t sell, making a book is also a risk and many publishers know it, so if Yefim Gorndon offers me good price and a good book i will still buy his books as i have done in the past.
MiG-23MLDMy complaint, specifically directed at the WarbirdTECH fiasco, is that he is merely reprinting, verbatim, what he previously published. He added a few new pages and a few new images at the end and sold it as a new book, advertised as being “up-to-date”, which it most clearly was not.
Which makes them no more accurate. Go back and re-read the part of the MiG-23 book, you should see what I mean. It’s not even so much his account of the events, but rather his tone of phrase and select wording.
Which never happened. Now, when he published the first Airlife book on the MiG-29, the story about the SA_3 battery commander had not been made public yet, so he was free to speculate.
If he is pulblishing things that are 100% untrue merely because it makes the topic of his book seem that much more appealing, what does that say about him? That goes for any author, not just Gordon.
SOC
Yefim Gordon does write books for Russian publishers, Polygon is one of them, you can not expect the Russian publisher to swallow the western versions as a fact, why? well Western publishers support western versions, if you read Mike spick books he says all Migs are crap, cannon fodder, if you read other authors few will mention details or even give pictures of western aircraft shot down, their accounts always favor western aircraft and always minimize their weaknesses.
What Yefim gordon does is simply publish in the West what the Russians sometimes claim, is up to you if you believe or not, but do not expect Yefim Gordon to write to Russian readers and tell them they build crap.
see his books from polygon
MiG-23MLDThe main problems with Yefim Gordon are his lack of attention to detail and his fervent anti-Western bias.
In the former category, he fails to identify the Su-30MK2 images as such in his new FLANKER book, he has apparently totally ignored the R-27P/EP ARMs, he has consistently gotten the export users wrong regarding the FULCRUM and FLANKER series, he propagates the disproven myth that a MiG-29 shot down the F-117A over the Balkans…etc.
In the latter, it almost seems like he’s writing for Pravda in some cases. Pick up the Aerofax book on the MiG-23 and read his account of the Libyan FLOGGER shootdown by the USN.
Then there’s the fact that he continuously recycles old information. Look at his FLANKER and FULCRUM WarbirdTECH volumes. The text is lifted right out of his old Airlife books published many years before.
He does have a lot of good stuff though, so if you pick up one of his books with a clear mind and an awareness of his faults, you’ll get a lot more out of them. His Tu-144 book and his Tu-160 book are first-rate and represent the authority on those two programs at this point in time. The MiG-31 FRA book is very well done as well, although some of his Tomcat comparisons could use a little more work, and you have to wonder why there are no Kazakhstani FOXHOUND images as he is clearly not above liftng images straight from the internet (look at the PLAAF FLANKER images in his FRA FLANKER book).
I think the observations you point out are true up to a level, he does take earlier works and rehash them, however he includes new parts.
Also many of his books give a Russian view, yeah many won`t agree specially in the west where it is common to belittle russian aviation as second to the west.
The so call “myths” or “Pravda reports” are in contradiction to what many westerners want to hear.
yeah it is true the Russian defence minister acknowledged only one F-117 as positively confirmed as shot down but also said a few others were damaged.
However i guess he was leaning to a possible MiG-29 and F-117 combat.
If he is right or not in what he reports is up to the reader up to a degree to believe it because any way the only thing he does is include Russian reports that usually appear as combat accounts of their aircraft.
MiG-23MLDI agree…absolutely !
+ YG books are coming out with very-poor photographic material.
Good sample the MiG-21 book.
How many new, never before published photos are in ?
Great buy….:))
you can not same about his books about the MiG-23, MiG-31, Su-24 and Tu-160 even his books about the MiG-29 and Su-27
MiG-23MLDI agree to the fact that a good book is not easy to write and believe that YG does not have this quality. :D. Like Fishbedfan states : “either his books or nothing”. That does not make him a good or even the best writer its makes him the only writer in this field……..:(
Yefim Gordon write good books in fact he writes for russian publishers, has books written in Russia and even has been aided by important personalities in the Russian aviation, this shows he is a good writer with good sources.
Before Yefin Gordon there were few books that dealt with russian aviation as it was western aviation, Mike Spick is one example, he has excellent books about western aircraft but he treats russian aviation as if it was less important and inferior to western aviation.
Yefin Gordon is not like that his MiG-31 book for example is the best book about the subject has exellent pictures and good information.
If you can write better books about the MiG-23, Su-24 and MiG-31 and get them published in Russia i will buy them, in the mean time stop whining just for a single book;)
MiG-23MLDTo me Yefim Gordon is no historian, no serious researcher and his books should not be used as hard reference. He (or the guys that write under his name perhaps…) is too productive and I always have a feeling of uncompletness when I read his books. It’s true that there are quite a few errors in them but the choice is simple: it’s either his books or nothing. I’ll buy the FRA MiG-21 book even if it’s not the definitive work on the plane. I’m afraid there will never be one.
Yefim Gordon is a historian, however you can not ask perfection to a human, some of his books might not satisfy some people but at least some of his books are definitively the best in their aircraft subject.
In the West his MiG-23/MiG-27 book is the best one i have seen, same i can say about his books dealing about the Tu-160, Su-24, S-47/MiG-1.44 and MiG-31.
His books about the MiG-29 and SU-27 well? uhmmmm they are not bad and probably are still among the best you can find on the market.
Is he the only writer? no i have 2 books about the MiG-23 for example the best one is his.
i have 3 books about the Su-24 and his is the best.
I have 3 books about the MiG-31 and his latest one is the best.
I have several books about the MiG-29 and still his is the best at least for a small margin.
Same i can say about the Tu-160 his is the best, no other book i have about the Tu-160 is better.
So definitively i think you are just judging him for a single book but i can tell you that in russian modern aircraft he is the best author you can get in english
MiG-23MLDI have to admit the Panavia Tornado is one of the aircraft i like the most, i am glad some one asked about this aircraft.
source http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=RDp690HyBQE
But perhaps this Vidoe shows that at the end the classic fighters of the Luftwaffe are not the Eurofighter nither the MiG-29 but the FW-190
MiG-23MLDI agree. :diablo:
I do not understand what you did really mean, or if you agree or not but even despite some of his books are rehashing previous ones, he always brings more pictures and more updated information, from my humble opinion he is one of the best writers around.
I have bought several of his books i would consider the vast majority of his books are superb and i would rank him as one of the best writers because his books are written in russian as well as in English
MiG-23MLDYefim Gordon a good book ?? In my opinion a contradiction in termino. :rolleyes: Just commercial crap…..
he has good books, write a book is not easy, he writes good books i guess his MiG-31 book is one of the best ever
MiG-23MLDHello.
Is Gordon’s new book worth buying specially if one already owns the MiG-25/31 Aerofax ? I’m asking because it seems like Yefim Gordon recycles his material in his various books.
Thanks.
I have just bought it and i will recieved in few day or perhaps weeks, it is a mail order but once i recieve it, i promise to tell you however each book also has more pictures and more information that is the reason i bought it
MiG-23MLDwhat the heck? who is talking about China trying to invade Russia here? Only the Russians have this kind of weird paranoia.
That is just a hypothetical event, taking in consideration the Chinese have several disputes with some of their neighbours, among them Japan, Russia the Philipines and Taiwain.
The only thing i am saying and the british report says is there is some degree of hypothetical conflict between Russia and China, in 1968 there was a brief border war, and is possible that if China would try to expand is possible it might have some degree of conflict with Russia if tries to get some Russian territories.
MiG-23MLDIndia should be far more concerned that China is no longer buying Russian equipments.
paranoia, China already resolved its borders issues with Russia. For the forseeable future, China’s focus is on Taiwan, US and Japan. China needs Russia and vice versa.
During the cold war, third nations were fighting wars for the Superpowers.
In the years ahead China could try to do something like that however the main problem is Taiwan, Taiwan by it self could create a nuclear war, the only way China can take Taiwan is if the West does not react to a Chinese invasion of Taiwan.
if Taiwan is effectively taken and annexed by China then what can assure the Chinese will stop there? they still have territorial disputes with several neighbours, if China invades Taiwan and later takes by force other countries, china would need to avoid direct confrontation with Russia and the US, even if these nations are like England and France when Germany took Czekoslovakia and Austria, an Asian Poland will mean nuclear war and the combined nuclear stocks of Russia and the US are capable of wiping out China.
At this moment China can not take Taiwan, the US prescence in Asia and the Russian miliatry are capable of defeating China.
Russia does need troops to stop China, Russia olny needs TOPOLS and ICBMs.
In 2007 Russia has enough power to assure China won`t invade Siberia by military means.
In 2007 Russia only is uncapable of stoping illegal immigration however China won`t be able of taking Siberia by those means too, illegal immigrants have no political power and Russia simply can opt for never legalizing those illegal immigrants and simply deport them will be the best strategy to fight Chinese encroachment over the russian siberia.
The best strategy for China is foster the economic conditions that can create an economic link strong enough to assure globalization will erease the racial and cultural differences with Russia in a way the economic integration of both nations leads to a social and political integration as Europe did or even NAFTA is supposed to do
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