Re: [GZG] [Real World] Russian Mig 29 shoots down Georgian UAV

["Jason Weiser" <jason.weiser@xxxxxxxxx>]

Sorry guys...It looked like a 29 to me. Twin stabilizers, fuselage
flairs out with upward facing intakes, and distinctive engines hanging
slightly below the level of the fuselage.

  Jason

On 4/28/08, Phillip Atcliffe <atcliffe@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
>  Тимофей Потапенко wrote:
>  I think, I can answer about those two questins
> 1/ Nationality of the fighter. You can definitely notice two vertical
> stabilisers. So, there are only very several types of planes of that kind
> there: American F-15 or F-14, as far as I know no one posess that planes in
> that region; Russian (or ex-Soviet) MiG-25, MiG-29, MiG-31, Su-27, Su-30,
> Su-34, Su-35. Su-30-35 are VERY rare planes, and MiG-31 exists in a very
> small numbers, so that is definitely not one of them. MiG-29 or Su-27 can be
> seen there, and there are surely no those planes in the airforce of Georgia
> or Abhasia, you can see only Russian "29th" or "27th" there. As to MiG-25 --
> it's relatively old interceptor, which was also almost as expensive as F-15,
> so it wasn't wide-spred in Soviet AA-force, but there were squadrons of
> them, based in Caucasus, and some of them could be in Gerorgia. That's
> another questions, that Georgians in 1990s didn't have any good fighter
> engineers and repairing facilities, so they can hardly make any of MiG-25
> fly. So, for me, it was no
>  doubt, Russian plane.
>
>  I think we can be fairly sure that it wasn't a MiG-25 or -31 due to the
> high-mounted cockpit. Since, as you say, the Su-30+ variants of the Flanker
> are rare (and the -34 is predominantly an attack aircraft rather than an
> interceptor), that leaves the MiG-29 and Su-27. Those two aircraft look very
> similar from the front and, at the range we see the attacking aircraft, the
> only real way to tell the difference is by estimating the size of the
> aircraft, the Flanker being somewhat larger than the Fulcrum -- but, of
> course, that's not possible because we don't know how far away it is. If we
> could get a good look at the underside, we might be able to determine which
> aircraft it is from certain subtle differences, and if we could see the rear
> end properly, we'd know from the presence or absence of the Flanker's
> characteristic tail "sting" which type it was, but the BBC clip is too small
> and taken from the wrong angle for me to tell. The accompanying story says
> it was a MiG-29, so I presume that someone, somewhere, either knows what the
> V-VS has stationed in that area or could get a better look at the attacker.
> I'm not arguing.
>
>
>  2/ Whose airspace was it.
> The answer is: Abhasian. Georgians claim Abhasia as there (Georgian)
> territory. Abhasians don't think so, they want independance, and they almost
> have it: there are no Georgian army, Georgian police, or Georgian law on
> there territory. Now Georgians are trying to take the land back by armed
> hand, Abhasians are preparing for defencive war, but Russians don't want to
> have any wars next to there border, so, they do what they can to stop
> Georgian military preparations by any means (let's say shooting down
> Georgian recon-planes over Abhasia). What is also important -- many
> Abhasians in Abhasia are citizens of Russia, and need protection in case of
> Georgian invasion; Abhasia is very friendly towards Russia, while Georgia is
> hostile; after Kosovo get its independance from Serbia (in complenely the
> same circumstances) Russian government consider more or less possible for
> them to recognise independent Abhasia and Southern Osetia (by the way if
> there were a referenda in S Osetia, they
>  would choose to reunite with Northern Osetia, which is a part of Russia,
> rather than being an independant "banana republic").
>
>  So Russia is acting in its usual role of "protector of the Slavs"? Shades
> of a century ago... plus ca change, plus ca meme chose....
>
>  Phil
>
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