Those bumps have earlier been seen on a Russian Il-76. CCCP-86721 (still with CCCP when i saw it in 1996) also has a small circulair fairing below the rear fuselage, and the gun turret replaced by some sort of radome.

Not seen on 86721 were the two fins/antenna on either side of the gunner’s (sic, it doesn’t have any guns) position. There are also two rather large antenna sticking out halfway the vertical fin. I don’t know what these antenna are for, but this array is similar to a set on the 976 (so that’s the non-AWACS Il-76-with-saucer used for range telemetry and space tracking), which has all four blade antenna on it’s tail.

I seriously doubt these modifications have anything to do with a tanker modification: adding UPAZ pods to make an Il-76 into an Il-78 does not require adding bulbs and antenna as seen on Ken’s picture. While the purpose of 86721 is unknow, it is assumed to either be an ELINT machine (when i saw it, it was at Staraya Russa which is an eletronic warfare base) or an electronic testbed of some sorts. I’m thinking along the same lines for this machine.

Ken, do you know if anyone else in the group managed to get a few shots from this one? You have really triggered my curiosity… good you make it exciting like this 😉

Crobato, stop the namecalling.

Mojo Nixon did a decent cover of ‘Girlfriend in a coma’. But Morissey himself? His whiney voice would make a mighty fine country singer. Perhaps i’d even like him then.

Gee, i haven’t read any post on the last two pages which even tried to be objective! The anything-Russian-is-bad-and-the-Soviets-screwed-China-over against the China-ain’t-worth-dung-without-it’s-commie-brethren crowd.

Sheesh.

Some issues:
– Mao willfully entered the Korean War in 1950, and did so DESPITE warnings from Stalin not to do. Read Volkogonoff’s biography on Stalin, read ‘Inside the Kremlin’s Cold War’, read “The day the Chinese attacked”. Mao didn’t want a potential second front against Taiwan, so he needed at least a North Korean buffer against the US. After the war turned into a stalemate to 2 1/2 more years, Mao demanded Soviet aid (material + aircraft + aircrews) because of Communist brethrenship. When the war was running, Stalin didn’t mind being part of it, but he surely did not provoke it or ‘force’ the PRC into the Korean conflict. It is definately the other way around.

– Soviet help for the PRC was actually very generous. The MiG-17, MiG-19 and Tu-16 were all cleared for license production at the same time they were cleared for Soviet operational service, and actually prior to other license agreements. Especially Khrushchev was really trying to become close allies with the PRC, but it was Mao who rejected it. Despite Mao trying to follow an independent course in Communism after his Great Leap Forward debacle, Soviet assistance continued for some time (the post-GLF rebuilding of China’s industrial basis was almost 100% thanks to Soviet efforts), the Soviets did try to keep relations bearable until Mao definately broke with the USSR in 1960. Of course the Soviets had ulterior motives (as China would take care of the Eastern Front, giving the Soviets the chance to focus on the West), but Crobato and GD’s downplaying of Soviet importance in the PRC of the 1950s is very much flawed.

– The two-engined Ye-152A was only a development project and definately not something which the Soviets would have transferred, either officially or unofficially. While similar in layout, the J-8 or J-8I are most definately not derived from the Ye-152A. Just look at the way the intakes of both are adjusted: moveable cone in the J-8s, a moveable intake lip in the -152.

– The radarless J-8 did enter small scale production, and did see ‘operational’ service with the 2nd regiment of the FTTC. It’s the radarless J-8s (which you can recognise by the MiG-21F-style clamshell canopy) which were rebuilt into JZ-8 recce birds. They were a lot more than prototypes, but rejected by the PLAAF for full operational service because of their lack of radar.

– There is no J-2 or J-4. The J-2 was the Chinicised name for the MiG-15 for some time (when it was appearantly inappropriate to refer to them as Soviet-built machines), and the “J-4” is a misnomer for the J-5, the Chinese MiG-17.

– Vietnam didn’t use MiG-21MFs against the US, they were delivered too late.

– Vietnam was extremely weary of both Chinese and Soviet instructors during the war, since expecially China was distrusted immensely. The suggestion that Chinese instructors could have come close to MiG-21PFMs is totally absurd, since neither the Soviets nor the Vietnamese would have allowed that to happen.

-Soviet support to Vietnam reached that country by ship, either directly to Haiphong or via Shihanoukville in Cambodia. The idiot who thought the Soviets would have sent their most modern MiG-21s through the PRC by train should be pee’d upon for stupidity. Anyone who bought that story should at least scratch his/her head.

-Considering the US losses over Vietnam are known and publicly available, i’d like to hear any excuse for the overclaiming we see in Crob’s list. Topersztver’s figures all come from North Vietnamese official sources (his original and most used contact was a former PVNAF attaché at the Vietnamese embassy in Budapest), but these are pretty well known to have double claims, as i already pointed out.

That one is no dispute. But you also forgot to add that the -F model has a low polar mass (CG to back, little weight on the nose), that makes the plane less stable to fly. Planes that are less stable (meaning less inclination to go straight like an arrow) also tend to be more maneuverable, because they have less inertia that keeps the plane flying straight. So yeah, the -F can be a little tricky, the -PF series less so (a bit more balanced design). But as the nose gets heavier, the plane becomes more stable but less eager to maneuver as with the later series. As the plane becomes more stable, it is easier to hold its course at high speeds, hence why supersonic flyers and interceptors must choose highly stable layouts (at least before the age of FBW).

That’s nonsense, Crob. The centre of gravity issues with all late MiG-21s has been exactly because the centre of gravity was too far backward, not forward. Also, the addition of blown flaps from the MiG-21PFS onwards did improve low-speed handling immensely over the older variants.

3000kg of internal fuel is a little hard to believe for a plane of this size and weight. An F-16, which carries more internal cavities, is about 3,000kg of internal fuel. So doese a MiG-29.
The Gripen, a plane of slightly larger size and more weight, carries only 2260kg of empty fuel.
2300kg is more believable.

The MiG-21MF has an internal capacity of 2650 litres (Belyakov’s MiG, 50 years of secret aircraft design), so that would be more than 3000kg. The -MT and -SMT increased that to 3250litres internally.
“More believable” doesn’t cut it when you’ve got the figures at hand 😉

Also, some other stats from the horse’s mouth so you can stop bickering about them:
– – – – – – MiG-21F-13 – – MiG-21MF – – MiG-21bis
empty: . . .4980kg. . . . . .5350kg . . . . .5450kg
MTOW: . . .8625kg. . . . . .9400kg. . . . . 9800kg
g-load: . . .7g. . . . . . . . .8.5g . . . . . . .8.5g
max thrust:5740kg st. . . .6490kg st. . . .9900kg st (3min. Khrezvichayniy Rezhim).
int. fuel: . .2280 l . . . . . .2650 l . . . . . .2880 l

Copied to the Historic forum, for all the Piston People. Besides, there’s more Flying Legends than just Flying Legends 😉

there is no doubth about the f16, but maybe youre confusing f15a with f15c

The difference in maneuvrability between the F-15A and F-15C is minimal, the original 7.33g limit for the -A was changed to 9g for the -C by software only, and didn’t entail any hardware mods. Besides, if you take an F-15A MSIP and an F-15C and compare them…

Also, you and Flogger are overly obsessed by G limits of an aircraft. While it nicely indicates how hard you can pull a fighter through a curve, it doesn’t say anything about the actual speeds/velocities at which such maneuvres are made, let alone about the amount of energy spent during such a maneuver. If you’ve pulled a MiG-23 through an 8g maneuver chances are you have little or no energy left in your airframe for a follow-on maneuver: you need to gain speed first before you can start using the full scope of your control stick again. Other fighters (bar the F-104 and other speed-optimised slashers) lose far less energy and can keep maneuvring. That maneuvring is what a dogfight is all about: two fighters dancing around each other, both trying to get a firing solution.

This is NOT the way to use a Flogger, and the ‘Aide-Mémoire’ (Aleksander, since i think you’re the one who revealed that wonderful piece of information: what is the actual Russian name of the document?) stresses that. It explains how you can use the strong points of the Flogger (speeeeeeeed with enough energy for a single breakup maneuver, but little more) against Western fighters. The document only gives the conditions in which the flight characteristics of the MiG-23 compared to other fighters put the Flogger in a better position. It does NOT say “the Flogger is the better aircraft.” That’s a level of dumbing down which completely destroys every debate.

As Flogger said, trials with former LSK/NVA ML’s and Israel’s captured Syrian machine confirmed what the Aide Mémoire stated.

Dropping dumb iron bombs is not something you need an F-16 for, and dropping bombs on the last structures of Osirak after Iranian Phantoms had done their part doesn’t make the F-16 a good strike platform. A Skyhawk or Jaguar with CCIP aiming wouldn’t have been any less effective.

He’s not happy, he’s just explaining the guard why it is of the utmost importance that he gets to take a look on the forward bulkhead in the nose gear well. Facial expressions are very helpful when explaining something like that.