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THE WEST THOUGHT THE MIG-25 WAS A DEADLY, AGILE SUPERFIGHTER. WHAT THEY LEARNED WAS SURPRISING.
1430 Hrs. Local, September 6, 1976. Sea of Japan near Hakodate Airport, Hokkaido Prefecture.
Jet fuel burned faster than he calculated as he pressed lower under the overcast, down to the gray black waves only 150-feet above the Sea of Japan. He hauled the heavy control stick left, then corrected back right in a skidding bank around a fishing vessel that came out of the misty nowhere in the low afternoon cloud cover. White vapor spiraled long “S”s from his angular wingtips in the violent turn nearly touching the wave tops.
That was the second fishing boat he had to bank hard to miss at nearly wave-top level. Rain squalls started. The huge Tumansky R-15 jet engines gulped more gas by the minute. This plane was not made to fly low and subsonic. It was built to fly supersonic in the high altitude hunt for the now-extinct American B-70 Mach 3 super-bomber that was never put into service.
The book "MiG Pilot" is a good one; I used it in ROTC as a reference for a research paper I had to do regarding the training differences between NATO and Warsaw Pact pilots.
Viktor Belenko thought that a lot of what he was seeing in the Falls Church area of Virginia was staged... supermarkets with shelves full of goods, and no one in a line. A colonel driving a small Chevy while a junior NCO drove a Buick. Then he went out to an aircraft carrier and saw the launch and recovery action, and realized that could never be staged. It convinced him that there were things gravely wrong with his former home, and that while not perfect, the West was "very right".
The book "MiG Pilot" is a good one; I used it in ROTC as a reference for a research paper I had to do regarding the training differences between NATO and Warsaw Pact pilots.
Viktor Belenko thought that a lot of what he was seeing in the Falls Church area of Virginia was staged... supermarkets with shelves full of goods, and no one in a line. A colonel driving a small Chevy while a junior NCO drove a Buick. Then he went out to an aircraft carrier and saw the launch and recovery action, and realized that could never be staged. It convinced him that there were things gravely wrong with his former home, and that while not perfect, the West was "very right".
A great read for everybody. Three other things that stick with me are the mechanics drinking the alcohol based hydraulic fluid, taking the entire base manpower, including the pilots, to pick potatoes when the crop was ready, and Belenko's amazement that a black man owned a bar.
A great read for everybody. Three other things that stick with me are the mechanics drinking the alcohol based hydraulic fluid, taking the entire base manpower, including the pilots, to pick potatoes when the crop was ready, and Belenko's amazement that a black man owned a bar.
And when the husband and wife with whom Belenko was staying were arguing over the 1976 elections - she liked Carter, he liked Ford - he asked "But doesn't the government simply TELL you who you're voting for?" That and the planting of trees along the road to the base; after they died because they were planted in winter they were painted to impress the Politburo member who then cancelled his visit. The latter isn't unique to the Soviet military, as a lieutenant I worked a weekend painting a room at the squadron before Gen. Russ, commander of Tactical Air Command, arrived on-base.
A traitor is a traitor. No matter how "noble" it is painted afterwards.
He certainly betrayed the Soviet state.
But then, it was a repugnant country that had continually betrayed - and deceived and abused and murdered - its people for many decades. For this reason, the Soviet state deserved no loyalty whatsoever.
And since Belenko is Ukrainian, his nation was one of those (basically, every non-Russian nation) that was singled out for extra oppression and subservience to the Russian chauvinism of the Soviet state. He may not have been noble (I have no idea his motivations behind his defection) but there is no wrong in fleeing a state that holds its citizens captives.
Even though the circumstances were different, this revived memories of the Clint Eastwood movie “Firefox”. New advanced Soviet jet(MiG 31 in the movie) that the USA sent Eastwood to confiscate. The actor also had to fly close above the water to avoid detection.
A great read for everybody. Three other things that stick with me are the mechanics drinking the alcohol based hydraulic fluid, taking the entire base manpower, including the pilots, to pick potatoes when the crop was ready, and Belenko's amazement that a black man owned a bar.
I remember his escort talking about drug and alcohol problems in the US.
"I am sorry to say alcohol and alcoholism is a big problem here?"
"What is your definition of an alcoholic?"
"Someone who is addicted to alcohol or whose daily life is negatively affected by drinking."
" Well in that case, about three-quarters of Soviet men are alcoholics."
Is MiG-25 among the earliest using the two vertical tail fins? That type of designs dominated later. If one puts a large heavy radar equipment at the front head, then tail stabilization and large rudder area are needed.
Is MiG-25 among the earliest using the two vertical tail fins? That type of designs dominated later. If one puts a large heavy radar equipment at the front head, then tail stabilization and large rudder area are needed.
The twin tails had nothing to do with weight balance and everything to do with high-speed stability. The twin tails of the American designs aided in low-speed maneuverability as well. Subsequent Russian designs have included two vertical stabilizers for the same reasons. There are examples of aircraft with large radars and one vertical stab... F-4 and SU-15 for example.
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