Who cares? F-18E is a variant of the old design. Is it the product of 1983 or 1999?

True, then MiG-23 was brand new in 1970, and F-14 introduced in 1974. They aren’t exactly comperable too, aren’t they?

It was quite comperable to F-4D actually. fast but non-maneuverable, it was solely designed for BVR combat with 4xR-98 missiles; which has arguably similar performance with AIM-7E fielded that day.

In way, but “response” is not a good explaination of it.

US always led in this generation thing, they were the ones set the new standards, they were the ones to make the giant leap that made design criteria of legacy aircraft obsolete. Soviet side only responded to it by building equivalent or maybe slightly better aircraft.

2nd gen. aircraft were supersonic high speed aircrafts. F-100 was a distinctly better aircraft from previous F-86 or MiG-17, distinct enough to be called a new generation of aircraft. The most perfected example of the design philosophy is logically the one that came last; MiG-21.

3rd gen aircraft were high speed aircraft with BVR capability. This distinction started with F-4 and AIM-7 combination, responded by Su-11+R-98 in ~2 years. Su-11 is already an overworked derivative of Su-9, so subsequent F-4 modifications were countered by Su-15+R-98. Logically, the most advanced aircraft of the design philosophy of this generation was again the last one, being MiG-25+R-40; its a) fastest b)has the best BVR missiles c)has the best radar for interception.

4th gen aircraft focussed on dogfighting ability while keeping BVR capability. By no suprise US designs (F-14/15) were the first, but latest Su-27 was the best in this criteria.

5th gen made stealth priority, while keeping dogfighting and BVR capability. F-22 is introduced in 2005, we are in 2016 and PAK-FA is years away from being operational. But I don’t think any sane man -irrelevant of his nationalism or bias- would compare F-15SA, Su-35 or Typhoon with F-22 on overall combat capability, just because they became operational few years apart. Just like that, I don’t find comparing MiG-21 with F-4/5 is also fair.

Well the F-18E is a tough one. Theoretically it bears the F-18 name but physically it’s bigger, has difference intakes and other extensive physical changes. I.e., it’s a different aircraft altogether.

The MiG-23 doesn’t really have a direct comparison. Too soon before F-14, too late after F-4. 4 years is a little too much and I always saw the F-14 as being squarely aimed at the MiG-25 although slightly different. MiG-23 combat Pk wasn’t good though, in fact it’s twice as bad as the MiG-21s.

https://web.archive.org/web/20121031043534/http://www.militaryphotos.net/forums/showthread.php?180731-Modern-fighter-combat-records

The stats put the F-4 on top wrt wing loading, TWR and range. I would also say it’s difficult to say the R-98 would have performed as well as the AIM-7E, the AIM-7E had better range and much better speed, it had also been evolved through war. In the hands of Ritchie, the missiles he launched with lock inside parameters had a Pk of 50%. The R-98 was also quite a weighty, draggy load.

Well I think you’ve stumbled on the truth there. The only time the USSR and US planes were level was 1949-1953, after that the Soviets fell further and further behind until finally the response to the F-15 took almost a decade and 30 years later they’re basically still using that same design with updated avionics. Like it or not, in 1965 the MiG-21 and F-4 were what there was. You can throw in the Su-11 but how would it have changed things? The Soviets would have supplied it if they’d thought it would have changed the balance but it probably wouldn’t have. The vast majority of the kills were WVR – SRAAMs and guns. The Su-11 radar was also pretty poor, which doesn’t inspire confidence in BVR missile capabilities, which were generally bad at the time.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sukhoi_Su-11#Operational_history

Your generational labels are purely arbitrary. The MiG-25 was a beast no doubt, but I would say that technologically matches most closely with the F-14 and AIM-54 (or YF-12 + AIM-54 if they’d built it). The F-14 could dog-fight, okay, but that wasn’t a massive priority anymore than it was for a Tornado ADV and it wasn’t that great at it, let’s be honest, if those had been real MiG-29s on Top Gun, Maverick would have got stuffed unless he resorted to BVR engagement. The wing loading is poor, worse than a MiG-21, F-4 or Su-11 and the TWR is no better than an F-4’s. These distinctions are kind of random. I would say the F-14 and MiG-25 are the most closely matched and both were primarily interceptors. What else can you compare with an F-14? An Su-33 which arrived a quarter of a century later, just as the F-14 was being phased out?

Well dude, war isn’t fair. It’s the date of service entry that matters, it’s not about a gentlemanly pairing of equivalent aircraft once one party finally catches up.

Well, maybe it was not developed as a purely PVO interceptor, but I think some MiG-21s were delivered to the PVO from the very beginning of its service?
BTW the Su-9 and Su-11 were notorious for their poor operational range as well – possibly no better than the MiG-21?

It stopped pilots defecting.;)

I was not getting into that. I’m just responding to your MiG-21 comparison and pointing out that the Su-11 was a bomber interceptor so it had a different set of requirements to fulfill compared to the contemporary MiG-21 (like longer range, bigger radar set, longer ranged BVR weapons, etc.).

But, why are you putting the emphasis on the dogfight? The MiG-21 was not that useful as a dogfighter to the Vietnamese (as their pilots were not that trained and they used MiGs 17/19 for that), but as a GCI guided interceptor which would sneak in behind the large USAF formations, close up, launch IR guided missiles and quickly disengage. AFAIK, this is how the most of the losses to the 21’s went.

That’s how most of the losses in general went, hence the study that later led to stealth. The NV weren’t as bad at dog-fighting as people make out and many of the pilots were Russian.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Vietnam_War_flying_aces

Could missiles have changed things? Well that depends on how good the missiles were. The US missiles were just good enough to be useful but unfortunately there’s no combat data on early Russian AAM, however the Pk of the SA-2s doesn’t inspire confidence. The NVAF MiG-21 did have IR AAMs on their MiG-21s anyway, the AA-2 was said to have o better performance than the AIM-9B that it was a cloned copy of though.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mikoyan-Gurevich_MiG-21#MiG-21_aerial_combat_victories_in_the_Vietnam_War_1966.E2.80.931972
https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=FW_50wm8VnMC&pg=PA422&lpg=PA422&dq=K-13+AA-2+atoll+combat+kill+probability&source=bl&ots=ShgKwZve4L&sig=n6rEVClGt4TRdS3w6EqxL6F5wFg&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjGwu3VkPPOAhXlI8AKHQjnCRYQ6AEIMTAD#v=onepage&q=K-13%20AA-2%20atoll%20combat%20kill%20probability&f=false

Except I was not asking about whether Russians were involved in Korea and Vietnam, everyone knows that.. Show me those one million dead…

Both Russians and Ukrainians were involved as instructors, there are no indications of them being a part of aerial combat. According to their accounts, most of them refused to fight as they could have encountered a former colleague or college pal from the past.. On top of that, both Eritreans and Ethiopians have promised horrendous torture and death for any shot down enemy pilot, that makes one think twice before getting strapped in a seat..

I do not recall where I read it, it came up on MP.net one time I think.

http://www.acig.info/CMS/?option=com_content&task=view&id=138&Itemid=47

Nevertheless, the EtAF – and its Russian mercenaries – could now finally show the worth of all the money spent for them.

Ethiopians, whose Russian mercenaries and own fighter pilots were still in training for the forthcoming operation, pressed their old An-12Bs in service as bombers, and couple of night attacks, undertaken by those planes, were reported as flown against the Eritrean positions in the hills around Badme.

Nevertheless, the operations over the Mereb-Setit front were continued, and on 24 March – as well as on 11 June 1999 – the Eritreans claimed to have shot down more Mi-35s. According to Ethiopian oppositional sources, the situation surrounding one of these two losses was quite chaotic: a Mi-35 flown by two Russian mercenaries and transporting a group of Tigrean militiamen was underway along the Mereb-Setit front, near Badme, when the pilot became disoriented because the Tigreans could not properly read their maps.

It remains unknown what happened to the two Russians subsequently; as mentioned, the Eritrean President promised to behead any captured Russian mercenary.

Highly interesting were also reports which appeared at this time that during the fighting in those days, Ethiopians deployed two Ka-50 helicopter gunships, supposedly recently delivered to them by Russia and also flown by Russian mercenaries.

http://www.cuttingedge.org/news/n1389.cfm

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/280273.stm

F-5A first flew in 1959, MiG-21F (1st Gen) in 1957..
F-5E first flew in 1972, MiG-21MF (3rd Gen) in 1968.
Can’t see how they are not directly comparable just because it doesn’t fit your narrative..

I said you can’t compare an F-5E with an F-15A just based on service entry date because the F-5 as a whole, is an older design.

F-4 first flew in 1958, so yes the MiG-21 and F-4 are contemporaries.