WI no mikoyan mig-23 flogger

Khanzeer

Banned
That’s quite a qualifier. Outside of the US built fighters and the Mirage III, what else is there that was in plentiful supply to Cold War era combatants? No one is flying SAABs in combat during this time, for example. And what about Israeli fighters?

And what time period are you speaking of? There are lots of aircraft that can claim higher kills, Bf-109 for instance.
Also keep in mind very few times have the mig23M and ML actually seen combat with similar types i.e viggen ,F5E, F4E, mirage F1 etc and when they did they came out on top
And even against F16/ f14 most floggers have been the MS kind
MS is hardly representative of it's kind with < 300 built compared to >2500 M/ML built
 

MatthewB

Banned
@AdA you can’t omit the Mirage III and its Israeli clones when claiming success of the MiG-23. Though when faced against western pilots in the Falklands, the Mirage III did not have much success whatsoever. So perhaps it’s the pilot rather than the machine.
 
@AdA you can’t omit the Mirage III and its Israeli clones when claiming success of the MiG-23. Though when faced against western pilots in the Falklands, the Mirage III did not have much success whatsoever. So perhaps it’s the pilot rather than the machine.
I didn't. The Mirage was, thanks to its Israeli use, the most successful non US western fighter of the post WW2 era.
In the MiG-23 case, kills are almost irrelevant.
Most losses were inferior versions flown against more modern fighters operated by better trained pilots.
If compared to other fighters of its generation, the MiG-23ML is quite good.
But it's a late 60 early 70 fighter that got late to its party and only entered service at the end of the 70.
 
And makes it need a bigger runway. And the F-106 was just another pure interceptor; the Mig-23 was a multipurpose fighter.
F-106 was used in the Aggressor Program, as it had the maneuverability of the MiG-21, the best of any of the Century Series.

The Six was made to be an interceptor, so had over a ton of of electronics for SAGE integration, rather than that space and weight used for attack aircraft, like predicting bomb sight and terrain-following radar

And hardpoints are hardpoints
20120305030734-65c2f3a9-me.jpg
 
For purposes of discussion only.

IMO I'm not too keen on its (F-pole) characteristics in pure missile A/A combat turning combat for this aircraft, and much less with pure guns A/A engagement. Its engagement usage is properly as a gang-banger where it slashes through during a blow through attack and then escapes engagement via pure acceleration, combining a turn out with a climb as its Tumansky R-29 engine offers some zoom/boom advantage over its "western" contemporaries if it does not flameout on the poor pilot or blow up in reheat. The Mig 23 is very much a group effort bird. Slash in and down, from altitude, then volley missiles, and escape out and up using the afterburner. You dogfight with this bird especially against another plane with a better acceleration gamma and you are dead meat.

Explains why the Russians went with that dreadful cockpit look-out geometry, doesn't it? This is very much a GCI controlled ambush weapon system, perfectly in keeping with the Soviet air combat doctrine of the era. I regard it, using that doctrine, as an extremely dangerous air combat system. Cannot see its employment as intended without the supporting elements behind it.

It is a perfectly adequate ground attack platform as an ancillary. I do not see any other Russian bird in the Soviet fighter line exactly combining the two characteristics of employment as described. So what genuinely can replace it?
 
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Khanzeer

Banned
For purposes of discussion only.

IMO I'm not too keen on its (F-pole) characteristics in pure missile A/A combat turning combat for this aircraft, and much less with pure guns A/A engagement. Its engagement usage is properly as a gang-banger where it slashes through during a blow through attack and then escapes engagement via pure acceleration, combining a turn out with a climb as its Tumansky R-29 engine offers some zoom/boom advantage over its "western" contemporaries if it does not flameout on the poor pilot or blow up in reheat. The Mig 23 is very much a group effort bird. Slash in and down, from altitude, then volley missiles, and escape out and up using the afterburner. You dogfight with this bird especially against another plane with a better acceleration gamma and you are dead meat.

Explains why the Russians went with that dreadful cockpit look-out geometry, doesn't it? This is very much a GCI controlled ambush weapon system, perfectly in keeping with the Soviet air combat doctrine of the era. I regard it, using that doctrine, as an extremely dangerous air combat system. Cannot see its employment as intended without the supporting elements behind it.

It is a perfectly adequate ground attack platform as an ancillary. I do not see any other Russian bird in the Soviet fighter line exactly combining the two characteristics of employment as described. So what genuinely can replace it?
This article is heavily misleading to say the least
For starters it regularly confuses the characteristics of mig23S and MS with later generations and is filled with oversimplifications regarding its actual performance
4477th unit operated 3rd rate MS given from Egypt in questionable state given soviet advisors had left the country much earlier to use that to pass judgment on the most mass produced 3rd generation fighter is deliberate misinformation
Btw Yak forger was USSR worst operational fighter
 
@AdA you can’t omit the Mirage III and its Israeli clones when claiming success of the MiG-23. Though when faced against western pilots in the Falklands, the Mirage III did not have much success whatsoever. So perhaps it’s the pilot rather than the machine.

The Argentinians were constrained by the need to reach at the limits of the plane's tactical endurance time aloft. That limits a pilot's options severely. (no fuel reserve at all and no reheat time available at the engagement zone. A Harrier will eat it alive under those conditions.)

This article is heavily misleading to say the least
For starters it regularly confuses the characteristics of mig23S and MS with later generations and is filled with oversimplifications regarding its actual performance.
4477th unit operated 3rd rate MS given from Egypt in questionable state given soviet advisors had left the country much earlier to use that to pass judgment on the most mass produced 3rd generation fighter is deliberate misinformation.

Btw Yak forger was USSR worst operational fighter


Maybe, but I am not convinced it is that far off in the true description of the plane's strengths and weaknesses. Please read the performance limitations cited for SOVIET aircraft cited for what I mean.
 
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MatthewB

Banned
This article is heavily misleading to say the least
For starters it regularly confuses the characteristics of mig23S and MS with later generations and is filled with oversimplifications regarding its actual performance
4477th unit operated 3rd rate MS given from Egypt in questionable state given soviet advisors had left the country much earlier to use that to pass judgment on the most mass produced 3rd generation fighter is deliberate misinformation
Btw Yak forger was USSR worst operational fighter
Was the Soviet Air Force spec MiG-23 ever tested in combat?
 
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Khanzeer

Banned

The Argentinians were constrained by the need to reach at the limits of the plane's tactical endurance time aloft. That limits a pilot's options severely. (no fuel reserve at all and no reheat time available at the engagement zone. A Harrier will eat it alive under those conditions.)


Maybe, but I am not convinced it is that far off in the true description of the plane's strengths and weaknesses. Please read the performance limitations cited for SOVIET aircraft cited for what I mean.
I think your description of the bird is more accurate than the article you quoted
Nobody is claiming it was anywhere close to a 4th generation aircraft but it is definitely got some bad press in the west due to heavily biased accounts
 

Khanzeer

Banned
So soviet sources confirm 2 mig23 lost to pakistani f16 ?

Negative. The citation says 1 Mig 23 crashed on return to base and 1 was lost in air combat with the PAF near the Afghan border. The PAF were standing F-16 patrols at the time. These are the two Mig 23s of the 4 alleged, I accept as mission kills and plane losses. The Russian, Markovskiy, does not say a Pakistani F-16 damaged the RTB crasher. In fact he does not exactly give a stated cause for loss except "operational action". Could be ground fire or a flameout for all I can state for it. Could also be a short exploded missile in air combat as the PAF claims. I just don't know.
 

Khanzeer

Banned
Negative. The citation says 1 Mig 23 crashed on return to base and 1 was lost in air combat with the PAF near the Afghan border. The PAF were standing F-16 patrols at the time. These are the two Mig 23s of the 4 alleged, I accept as mission kills and plane losses. The Russian, Markovskiy, does not say a Pakistani F-16 damaged the RTB crasher. In fact he does not exactly give a stated cause for loss except "operational action". Could be ground fire or a flameout for all I can state for it. Could also be a short exploded missile in air combat as the PAF claims. I just don't know.
So 1 mig23 was shot down by PAF according to russian source ? Did they say by which aircraft?
 
Why all the heat for MIG-23 ? It scared the hell out of us in the NATO-WARPACK scenarios we discussed in the 1980s. It was often the quantity , not the quality , that scared us.

The actual performance in individual small scale battles is mostly determined by pilot quality not the jet fighter they fly.
 

MatthewB

Banned
Why all the heat for MIG-23 ? It scared the hell out of us in the NATO-WARPACK scenarios we discussed in the 1980s. It was often the quantity , not the quality , that scared us.

The actual performance in individual small scale battles is mostly determined by pilot quality not the jet fighter they fly.
They only produced 5,000 of them from 1967–1985, that’s less than the F-4 Phantom II. Not exactly apples to apples, but it’s not as if there were 10,000 MiGs fighters ready.

Of course the Phantom production was over three US air arms, NATO exports, Israelis plus the Japanese and UK production.

49cfb7e24d3566da7430d520a3ab5757.jpg
 
That pic of the F-106 was a mock up, they never flew them with bombs.
Could have blind bombed with them, just like Fighter Pilots did in WWII and Korea before all the fancy predicting targeting aids came into fashion.
but yes, it was done as a gag for a visiting General.
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been posting these here for years.
 

Khanzeer

Banned
They only produced 5,000 of them from 1967–1985, that’s less than the F-4 Phantom II. Not exactly apples to apples, but it’s not as if there were 10,000 MiGs fighters ready.

Of course the Phantom production was over three US air arms, NATO exports, Israelis plus the Japanese and UK production.

49cfb7e24d3566da7430d520a3ab5757.jpg
Between 1973 to 1982 , 4500 are produced and by end of 1982 over 2000 fighter versions most of them based close to eastern Europe while equivalent western fighters were nowhere close in number [ 600 F4 mirage F1 approx by 1982 in europe ]
But by 1985 mig23 threat as receded as larger numbers of F18 and f16 join NATO forces
 
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