MiG-17PF Fresco-D: radar-equipped model (RP-5) also fitted with VK-1F afterburning engine

Pardon my ignorance, and I don’t mean to change the direction of the thread, but where exactly do you install a radar on a MiG-17? Isn’t the whole nose area occupied by the intake?

See the picture again and you will see it is far too flat to be a MiG-29 canopy

Yeah, I see the lack of curvature now. My mistake.

compare this picture and that looks like the rear cabin of an F-4 on one of the pictures i attached

I don’t know if you have a date/location for that small pic on the far right, but it looks a lot like a MiG-29 canopy to me.

First of all, I give props to Flogger for owning up to his mistake and admitting his error. Many people (including some in this forum) wouldn’t have done that, they would have simply slunk away and avoided the subject.

While I agree that sometimes people are so eager to find evidence to support their viewpoint, that they see what they want to see in dubious photos, I don’t think that Flogger is the “misguided” person here. As Impi said, it’s human nature sometimes. To me, the truly misguided, truly obsessed person is the one who altered the photo and misrepresented it in the first place. Whoever that person was, he/she redefines the word “obsessed.” He/she was so intent on believing in the absolute superiority of Russian aviation, this person decided to crudely manipulate an existing photo and pass it off as evidence of (what would have been) an impressive achievement.

Hopefully, this will end up being a lesson for Flogger (and indeed all of us) to be more objective when examining evidence of combat actions, before jumping to an immediate conclusion just because it’s an attractive one.

of course it has some degree of propaganda, but see that every body loves their own plane

Kudos to you, MiG. That’s the first time – I swear I’m not kidding – the first time I’ve seen any Russian aviation fan on this forum admit that there was even a little propaganda involved in pro-Russian videos/articles/etc. This may sound like I’m being sarcastic, but I’m dead serious. There seems to be this overriding attitude from some posters that while any pro-US info is dripping with venomous lies, any pro-Russian info is the Gospel Truth.

Yes, pro-US and pro-Western stuff is sometimes guilty of propaganda, too. And it’s refreshing to hear someone from your side (finally) own up to it as well.

I never can across a specific US Navy evaluation of the F-16 vis-a-vis the F-18.

Someone on this forum, about a year or so ago, posted an article written by a Navy F-18 pilot who did an exchange tour in the F-16. I remember his callsign was Toonces. Obviously, it wasn’t an official Navy evaluation, but it was a superbly written comparison of the two machines’ strengths and weaknesses against the other. Very informative.

Hopefully, someone has it on file somewhere, or perhaps it can be found in the archives. All I have is a hard copy of it – I don’t want to retype it, but I’ll do so if no one else can locate it (and if anyone wants to read it, of course).

Reading the report posted by distiller it says alot more “than things in earth orbit are vital to U.S. interest and that the U.S. will do what it takes to protect their interests.”

It effectively says the things allowed into earth orbit will be controlled in accordance with US interests.

That bold bit is worrying, and:

But, as Distiller also pointed out, the policy described in the statement is essentially the same policy the US declared under Saint William of Clinton, and no one seemed to have much of a problem with it then. That fact alone suggests (to me, at least) that the current outcry from the Russians, Europeans, et al, has little to do with a genuine concern about the policy’s ramifications — and much more to do with a “let’s oppose everything the US says or does” mentality.

Just my opinion.