oh no! the attachments arnt working! :S

edit: ok, thats a lil wierd the post dissapeared

the first pic kinda looks similar to this:

hiya

this is still verry much a work in progress so bear with me 🙂 there is an acig article around, but (can i say this?) its a bit ‘loose’ 😆

su-7BMKs and UBK?s were delived to Afghanistan under Daouds govt around 1969. these were natural metal finish at this stage and were based at bagram at this time along with MiG-21PFs.

The bagram based Su-7s are notible for attacking the presidential palace in 1978 (with Daoud in it) with rockets (120mm) and cannon fire during the coup by the PDPA

later on it seems the the su-7 were redeployed to shindand as part of the 321 Fighter-Bomber regiment; as the attack regiment based at bagram recieved newer su-22s.

Aparently these aircraft were active during the soviet war in afghanistan, though its kinda questionable: shindand was aparently offlimits to afghans during the soviet occupation (what that specificaly means is still a mystery!) and the soviet union supplied large numbers of the superior Fitter family.

it seems the DRAAF relocated atleast some of its training duties to the south, though im not sure what happned(if anything) to the air force training academy in Mazar-I-sharif during this time, though aparently that area did defect away from the Govt later on. By the 1980s most aircraft were camoflauged in either a 2 tone brown scheme, or a 3 tone brown/tan/green scheme.

The su-7s of afghanistan occupy the 400 range of serials going as high as 489 and seem to be painted in a red colour. the DRAAF roundel is similar to the mig-17s in that it features a skinnier star and narrow bands, quite different to the markings found on the majority of MiG-21s from further in the north.

Alot of the Su-7s still reside at Shindand AFB in a fairly intact condition, wearing DRAAF markings: seeming to indicate they were in an inoperable condition around 1992 (if not significantly earlier as they carry what i consider to be earlier markings) an exeption to this is a baremetal Su-7 found at Bagram wearing (for ease of sake) “northern Alliance” markings, indicating atleast a couple of these aircraft were operating after 1992 stage.

another interesting su-7 is the gate guardian in the Herat area, from what i remember its got a 060 serial (which inless made up would indicate it possibly is a early delivered example as 2 digit serials are unique to afghan mig-21PFs and early Sukhois) and wearing 2 Atoll missiles (only time ive seen an AAM on an afghan aircraft) and a rather fiticious paint scheme.

other notible su-7 events are in 1983 an afghan Su-7 defected to Dal Bandin AB, Pakistan, as did another su-7 at an unknown time. one of the su-7 defectors was a Capt. Mohammed Nabi Karinzai defected with his su-7 in ’86

sorry the aboves a bit of a mess, havent had time to sort it all out from what ive accumulated!!!

hope that helps somewhat, if u have questions let me know, the above info is subject to change as corrispondance comes in 😉

regards
Raymond

hey fabe! ausome pics! 😀 😀 do you have more? Im really after sukhoi and mig pics!

Thanks in advance! 🙂

ps (jsut checked out corbis, cool site!)

my vote is an-2 first flight 1947

(asuming droping paratroopers as ordinance counts it as a combat ac 😉 )

Hiya!

thanx for the pics lika, though ive had them for awile, there from Bagram ’02 i believe, certianly earlier on, as several of the migs have poped up in other places over the junkyard in different condition! note the spine cannibalised and added to another plane!

i sypathise curahe: its verry annoying when ppl take photos then resize them down to almost usless sizes!! esp when hunting for afghan AF pics which is indeed verry time consuming!

hiya

There was talk earlier of operational il-28s at shindand, afghanistan and a photo…I just found one from another angle inside the junk yard…i thik we can rule out any of those il-28s flying! LOL nice is mig-15uti too 😉