as far as European U(C)AVs go, France and the UK have agreed on designing a MALE UAV (like the Reaper), not a stealthy UCAV (like the Phantom Ray)

Apparently you haven’t heard about BAe Taranis and Dassault nEUROn

Dj, is the ‘Phantom Ray’ competing with NG’s X-47B, or will the US procure both types (as opposed to ‘land-i-fying’ the X-47B)?

The USAF walked out the J-UCAS competition, and after the US Navy awarded NG with the contract for further research and testing of an UCAV. Phantom Ray is actually the looser in the competition with X-47B, but Boeing chose to develop it regardless – smart move, as it keeps them in the loop in this field and they might get foreign contracts for Phantom Ray’s descendants – or even USAF if they change their mind regarding stealthy UCAV usage later down the road, while USN gets X-47B’s offsprings.

More Yermeni bis refurbished in Ukraine:
http://flanker-aviation.com/
go to Industries>Europe>Ukraine>SE OdesAviaRemService>MiG-21bis
(there is no direct link)

others at
http://spotters.net.ua/search/?q=Yemen+-+Air+Force&sort=added_desc

also check in Google Earth for Panoramio pictures in and around Odessa Central airport

Romania deployed C-130B serial 6166 and C-27J serial 2702 on Malta. The Hercules made 4 flights to Tripoli, the Spartan 2. They evacuated so far a total of 322 civilians from Tripoli to Malta and then on to Bucharest – mostly Romanians, but also from other EU countries, US, Ukraine, etc.
Some pictures here:
http://www.mapn.ro/fotodb/20110225?page=1

A bit of a distorted memory there. It was a Yugoslav MiG-21 flown by a Slovenian pilot, and it landed at Klagenfurt. I think the aircraft ended up at some Austrian gunnery range.

The pilot was Croatian – Rudolf Perisin, who landed his MiG-21R at Graz.
The aircraft was preserved:
http://www.airliners.net/photo/Yugoslavia—Air/Mikoyan-Gurevich-MiG-21R/0280543/M/

Who owns these upgraded Mirages? I presume they were upgraded for AdA. Are they in storage?

They were not upgraded, AdA has only regular Mirage F1 CT/CR – some stored, some in service. They will be taken from AdA service and upgraded only if Iraq chooses them.

Wow great series, thanks Tempest II, very interesting to see what appears to be a Mig-23MLD there.:eek:

Angolan MiG-23ML were overhauled in Ukraine a few years ago, in the process they received the wing glove root “dogtooth” which is characteristic for the MLD (maybe some other features too).

Using only SAMs doesn’t work.

Apart from the issue of peacetime QRA brought up by Fedaykin, there are several more:

– conflicts involving airpower are not always disproportionate (USA+NATO against Serbia or Iraq). Many countries face potential conflict with comparable enemies (it happened in 1995 Peru vs. Ecuador, 1999 Ethiopia vs. Eritrea)

-there’s also the need for ground attack, COIN operations, which can’t be effectively taken up entirely by SSMs, UAVs and choppers – see A’stan

– for a SAM system to be effective one needs a very good early warning radar network. There are ideal places such as Bangladesh or Hungary – very flat, but most countries have numerous blind spots in their radar coverage, especially at lower altitudes due to the terrain – you can’t put a radar in every valley and on every ridge