4 ms·

They were quite early supersonic fighter jets, designed for very high speeds and high altitudes and made long before many of the most important lessons had been

They were quite early supersonic fighter jets, designed for very high speeds and high altitudes and made long before many of the most important lessons had been learned. That they were deadly, even to highly trained pilots, seems a logical consequence. What I would be interested in is a comparison to it's Rival, the MiG-21, which outlasted the F-104. Did the Russians struggle just as much? Also, these things are absolutely awesome to see in real life. If you ever get the chance, you should take it.

flohofwoe 2y ago
> Did the Russians struggle just as much? It will be hard to get reliable numbers from behind the Iron Curtain during the Cold War, this seems to be an attempt to list the known incidents of just one (out of 6) "Jagdfliegergeschwader" in the East German airforce: https://home.snafu.de/veith/verluste1.htm https://home.snafu.de/veith/verluste1.htm, after 1966 most crashes are Mig-21. Here's the list of airplane types and numbers in the East German airforce (all in all East Germany operated 567 Mig-21, more than any other type): https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liste_von_Luftfahrzeugen_der_Nationalen_Volksarmee https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liste_von_Luftfahrzeugen_der_N... The Indian air force apparently lost over half of their Mig-21 built between 1966 and 1984 to crashes, but maybe because of poor maintenance (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mikoyan-Gurevich_MiG-21 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mikoyan-Gurevich_MiG-21).
- alxlaz 2y ago
  Make of it what you will, but Mig-21s used to be nicknamed "flying coffins" in some places behind the Iron Curtain. They were notoriously unsafe.
  - flohofwoe 2y ago
    Yes, but was the Mig-21 better, worse or roughly the same as the F-104? That's surprisingly hard to figure out because crashes in socialist countries were usually swept under the rug.
    - alxlaz 2y ago
      Oh, I know. I took the "did the Russians struggle just as much?" question qualitatively, as in, yes, the Mig-21 was also notoriously unsafe and the Russians struggled with it, too. Their track records would be very difficult to compare even if detailed operational history were available. Figures from some external operators are comparable. For instance, slightly less than half of the CF-104s operated by the Canadian Air Force ended up in some accident or another, slightly more than half of the Indian Air Force's Mig-21s were lost in crashes. I'm specifically mentioning the Canadian Air Force's experience because their CF-104s flew longer hours than just about any other F-104 variant. However, that's almost twice as bad as the figures Federal Germany got (just south of 300 out of their 900-something aircraft). Thing is, Mig-21s were definitely flown to smithereens (hence the relevance of the CF-104s operational history, because CF-104s were also flown to smithereens). Money was tight beyond the Iron Curtain so most airplanes stayed in service forever, planned economy (even in the carefully-regulated defense industry) frequently resulted in supply shortages so maintenance was difficult, maintenance wasn't always top-notch due to personnel and supply management issues, so it's not always easy to say which side of the neglect border each incident was. It's hard to decouple these things from the design, too, maintenance complexity is itself a design trade-off. The F-117 has a better safety track record than the Mig-21, but if they'd been handed a squadron of F-117s, the vast majority of the Mig-21's (former) operators would've ran them into the ground in a matter of weeks.
tgv 2y ago
It may be worth noting that there was more than a "whiff of corruption", as the article states. The Dutch prince-consort was found guilty, and only escaped prosecution because the queen threatened to abdicate. It's more than likely that other parties were bribed too.
- spookie 2y ago
  Really? Threatening to abdicate? And that worked?
  - tgv 2y ago
    It did. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_bribery_scandals#The_Netherlands https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_bribery_scandals#The_...
thisislife2 2y ago
Like Germany did from the US for the F-104, India too got nearly full tech transfer to assemble the MiG-21 from Russia. The Indian Air Force has operated around 1200+ MiG-21's (some of them with indian customisations) and has recorded 400 crashes, 200 pilot and 50 civilians deaths due to it. > Danvir Singh, a military veteran and defence expert, points out that the Russians had designed the MiG-21 in order to intercept American surveillance aircraft. “They are basically manned missiles; their wingspan is narrow, and landing and take-off speeds are very high,” says the retired colonel. “We had no intermediate trainers initially, so our pilots had to jump into a supersonic aircraft. A majority of the accidents earlier happened because of lack of training. They’re still happening because of high speed, low manoeuvrability, and an old platform the maintenance of which has been a big issue.” (Chequered history: Why the MIG-21 came to be called 'the flying coffin' - https://www.business-standard.com/india-news/chequered-history-why-the-mig-21-came-to-be-called-the-flying-coffin-123050900553_1.html https://www.business-standard.com/india-news/chequered-histo... ).
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
p_l 2y ago
The main difference was that MiG-21 wasn't pushed as low-altitude aircraft with strike mission, like what was involved with F-104G. It had quite explicit history related to the Uragan project (networked interception system with ground control against US bombers), but while it could be pushed into low-altitude attack role, it wasn't really sold as one. A lot of the remaining issues were essentially shared across both sides due to how early the technology base was, not just on the fighter jet, but for example because you might have to land a high approach speed plane in low visibility using only 2xNDB system (which essentially just gives you correct heading, you have to use dead reckoning for altitude adjustment - an ex-21 pilot said that landing without visibility often involved prayers till you felt tires hit the runway).

flohofwoe 2y ago

> Did the Russians struggle just as much? It will be hard to get reliable numbers from behind the Iron Curtain during the Cold War, this seems to be an attempt to list the known incidents of just one (out of 6) "Jagdfliegergeschwader" in the East German airforce: https://home.snafu.de/veith/verluste1.htm https://home.snafu.de/veith/verluste1.htm, after 1966 most crashes are Mig-21. Here's the list of airplane types and numbers in the East German airforce (all in all East Germany operated 567 Mig-21, more than any other type): https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liste_von_Luftfahrzeugen_der_Nationalen_Volksarmee https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liste_von_Luftfahrzeugen_der_N... The Indian air force apparently lost over half of their Mig-21 built between 1966 and 1984 to crashes, but maybe because of poor maintenance (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mikoyan-Gurevich_MiG-21 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mikoyan-Gurevich_MiG-21).

alxlaz 2y ago
Make of it what you will, but Mig-21s used to be nicknamed "flying coffins" in some places behind the Iron Curtain. They were notoriously unsafe.
- flohofwoe 2y ago
  Yes, but was the Mig-21 better, worse or roughly the same as the F-104? That's surprisingly hard to figure out because crashes in socialist countries were usually swept under the rug.
  - alxlaz 2y ago
    Oh, I know. I took the "did the Russians struggle just as much?" question qualitatively, as in, yes, the Mig-21 was also notoriously unsafe and the Russians struggled with it, too. Their track records would be very difficult to compare even if detailed operational history were available. Figures from some external operators are comparable. For instance, slightly less than half of the CF-104s operated by the Canadian Air Force ended up in some accident or another, slightly more than half of the Indian Air Force's Mig-21s were lost in crashes. I'm specifically mentioning the Canadian Air Force's experience because their CF-104s flew longer hours than just about any other F-104 variant. However, that's almost twice as bad as the figures Federal Germany got (just south of 300 out of their 900-something aircraft). Thing is, Mig-21s were definitely flown to smithereens (hence the relevance of the CF-104s operational history, because CF-104s were also flown to smithereens). Money was tight beyond the Iron Curtain so most airplanes stayed in service forever, planned economy (even in the carefully-regulated defense industry) frequently resulted in supply shortages so maintenance was difficult, maintenance wasn't always top-notch due to personnel and supply management issues, so it's not always easy to say which side of the neglect border each incident was. It's hard to decouple these things from the design, too, maintenance complexity is itself a design trade-off. The F-117 has a better safety track record than the Mig-21, but if they'd been handed a squadron of F-117s, the vast majority of the Mig-21's (former) operators would've ran them into the ground in a matter of weeks.

tgv 2y ago

It may be worth noting that there was more than a "whiff of corruption", as the article states. The Dutch prince-consort was found guilty, and only escaped prosecution because the queen threatened to abdicate. It's more than likely that other parties were bribed too.

spookie 2y ago
Really? Threatening to abdicate? And that worked?
- tgv 2y ago
  It did. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_bribery_scandals#The_Netherlands https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_bribery_scandals#The_...

thisislife2 2y ago

Like Germany did from the US for the F-104, India too got nearly full tech transfer to assemble the MiG-21 from Russia. The Indian Air Force has operated around 1200+ MiG-21's (some of them with indian customisations) and has recorded 400 crashes, 200 pilot and 50 civilians deaths due to it. > Danvir Singh, a military veteran and defence expert, points out that the Russians had designed the MiG-21 in order to intercept American surveillance aircraft. “They are basically manned missiles; their wingspan is narrow, and landing and take-off speeds are very high,” says the retired colonel. “We had no intermediate trainers initially, so our pilots had to jump into a supersonic aircraft. A majority of the accidents earlier happened because of lack of training. They’re still happening because of high speed, low manoeuvrability, and an old platform the maintenance of which has been a big issue.” (Chequered history: Why the MIG-21 came to be called 'the flying coffin' - https://www.business-standard.com/india-news/chequered-history-why-the-mig-21-came-to-be-called-the-flying-coffin-123050900553_1.html https://www.business-standard.com/india-news/chequered-histo... ).

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

p_l 2y ago

The main difference was that MiG-21 wasn't pushed as low-altitude aircraft with strike mission, like what was involved with F-104G. It had quite explicit history related to the Uragan project (networked interception system with ground control against US bombers), but while it could be pushed into low-altitude attack role, it wasn't really sold as one. A lot of the remaining issues were essentially shared across both sides due to how early the technology base was, not just on the fighter jet, but for example because you might have to land a high approach speed plane in low visibility using only 2xNDB system (which essentially just gives you correct heading, you have to use dead reckoning for altitude adjustment - an ex-21 pilot said that landing without visibility often involved prayers till you felt tires hit the runway).