There’s no reason to compare a Mig-23 to the F-111 other than the variable geometry wing. The things you’ve compared it on, range and speed mean nothing. The F-111 was an absolute failure as a fighter but an excellent strike aircraft. Comparison with the Mirage III or equivalent would have made more sense. Instead you’ve drawn false equivalents with US aircraft that don’t compare.
I thought it was a bad comparison at first aswell but there was the Bomber Varients of the MiG-23/MiG-27. (The US Navy F-111 Version was more similar in role had it been adopted)A better swing wing aircraft to compare it too in role would be either the F-14A or the Tornado ADV.
@@BellicTaxi they were close air support aircraft, the F-111 isn’t close air support it’s a strike and interdiction aircraft. The Tornado isn’t that comparable, but it’s closest as a VG aircraft.
As you said, Mirage III or F1 would have been an excellent comparison, and maybe the Jaguar, to compare it the the Mig-27. Variable sweep wing is just a means to an end, it does not make aircraft comparable.
As a kid, the Flogger was perhaps, along with the Saab Viggen, the aircraft that intrigued me the most. I'd buy Airfix kits with my pocket money and amongst the completed kits that I kept the longest were these two aircraft. I remember that I rarely painted the models afterwards but I did paint the Flogger. The swing wing design is probably what interested me the most about it.
Same me pal,the first model kit i build as a child was an 1/72 AIrfix Mig 23..few after finish it felt a huge snow(not usual in Spain) and all my village was covered in white,so i decided paint my Mig in all-white scheme..man,this little plane was COOL with that red stars over the white,was 1985 and my parents joking i was a Soviet Spy...🤣
well the F-14's design was partly in response to the combat superiority the MiG-23 had over the F-4 Phantom (though the MiG-25's overhyped projected performance was more important to the Americans' design criteria for what would become the F-14 and F-15)
Calling the MiG-23 bad is fundamentally wrong. 23 wound was very mediocre due to childhood illnesses, but already starting from 23M it was a very worthy fighter / interceptor. Long-range missiles, good characteristics in terms of thrust-to-weight ratio and maneuverability, allowed him to utterly surpass all enemy aircraft. Starting from 23MLD, it was already a perfect 3rd generation aircraft, which could easily fight with any 4th generation of its time.
Not really. It was universally hated by pilots, because any exceed of flight limit was fatal, and limits were variable as function of actual wing angle. With fly by wire it and computer it would be a wonderful machine.
@@peceed Who are these pilots? Marii pilots consistently won aganist MiG-29s and Su-27s until the end of the USSR, using MiG-23ML/MLDs. The MiG-23 has an extremely good reputation with former USSR pilots.
@@peceed Arab pilots were given export models that were heavily downgraded, on request of the arab states themselves seeing no need for "expensive" RWR or countermeasure or CCIP. It didn't help that arab states had no GCI network nor understood the doctrine. Many of the MiG-23s were used by said states for low level bombing instead of doing anything useful.
If I recall correctly, Soviet pilots of the MIG-23MLD model were confident that they could take on the F-4E Phantom and early models of the F-16A Fighting Falcon. Soviet aggressor aircraft training also found that a MiG-23MLD could achieve favorable kill ratios against the MiG-29 in mock combat by using hit-and-run tactics and not engaging the MiG-29s in dogfights.
@@peceed Training exercises are scripted, that's why they're called a "training exercise". One side is always made to stick to a set narrative for the other side to learn tactics, they follow a script based on a theoretical enemy. They're not proof of anything.
Training is always interesting (has shown underdogs winning many times) but in the real world use is what always makes or breaks an aircraft. In foreign conflicts, mig23’s were always sent in inferior models, insufficient pilot training and against much better aircraft. Best performances I know of is Angolan conflicts.
My father was an Eagle Driver in the early 80's. I forget the exact numbers, but I remember he said the F15 and Mig23 could merge at like 300kts, the Eagle could go full burner and the Flogger could turn around and catch it within 10 miles (again, fuzzy on the numbers, but it was impressive). The Mig had like twice the turning radius of the Eagle, so in air-to-air it was no contest, but that plane was quick.
I actually flew the MiG-21 and 23 out of Indian Springs Nevada in the early 1980s (code name Constant Peg). The scenario your dad described was correct! The exact numbers were classified and I no longer remember them in detail but the point was made. The flogger was fast and that was about it. It was the Soviet answer to the F-105. While flying the MiG-21, I could level turn with the best of them (for one turn, then out of energy,) but with the Flogger, I had only one tool in my bag of tricks: Speed and acceleration. Notable: ground crews could do normal maintenance of the Flogger using F-4 Phantom parts (wheels, tires, some engine and fuel/hydraulic systems parts, etc.,) and one side of the aircraft was entirely compatible with NATO standard connectors and ports. The other was Warsaw Pact.
Yes, I heard that the Mig-23 was not very manueverable, which is odd. I would have thought the swing wings, fully extended would allow it to turn tightly at low speeds.
@@Thanatos833 It was very maneuverable, but also extremely easy to stall during it, so pilots didn't want to risk. This aircraft cried for fly-by-wire and computer control. 8.5 g limit and lower wing loading with optimal angle is no joke.
The 23s that the 4477th were early Floggers (M`s and S`s)that had sat in the desert for years. They were first generation. Later generation such as the MF were far better with the penultimate being the ML serries that was 1 ton lighter and had the efficient and powerful R-35-300 engine.
I absolutely do not think it's realistic to call it the worst. I don't even think you can truly call it bad even. Yes it was absolutely not great or even good, but it still managed to provide modern capabilities and a wide variety of mission roles. Essentially, it was designed during one of those times when noone had a really firm idea of what was needed for the future, it also suffered badly from trying to be everything at once, except a dogfighter, but aside from that, it was a highspeed, long range, missile platform, fighter, interceptor, ground attack, heavy platform, medium/light-ish platform etc etc... If it had been built 10 years earlier, it would have been designed completely differently. If it had been built 10 years LATER, its design might have ended up similar, but with a lot of adjustments and probably ended up a much better aircraft, because at that time, it was far more clear what was needed from this sort of concept. Also, USSR should have split the design into two differently focused models, a larger model somewhat closer to the F-111 or F-14, where the swing-wing design penalties were less notable, while they built something smaller without the swing-wing design with dogfighting at least a major part of the design. No, if you're talking worst ever SOVIET fighter, i suggest you look 1930s to 1940s, because there's some real whoppers during that time. And even if you just stick to fighters that went into serial production, the MiG-1, MiG-3 and the LaGG-1 and LaGG-3 are easy contenders, no matter how exceptional fighters may have resulted later on from those lines of development, like the La-7.
Totally agree, the MiG-23/27 wasn’t ideal, but it was an awesome aircraft and really, really fast, which made it perfect for the role the Warsaw Pact had in mind for both the fighter-bomber (MiG-23BN/MiG-27) and the interceptor (all other models)…
I feel like we're being way lenient on various Sukhoi designs of mid-60's vintage if we're just gonna say the Flogger is THE worst fighter the Soviets produced during the Cold War
What about the MiG-9? When shooting its guns the gases from the guns would enter the air-intake and shut down its engines...lol I would say the MiG-23 and 27 were far from the worst...
not to mention that all major problems were solved in 2nd generation of MiG-23 (except view of the pilot). It got much of its bad reputation due to 1st gen of MiG-23 that had similar avionic suits to then MiG-21,yet cost more and couldn't be worked on in the field like MiG-21. And not to mention with angle of attack and yawn issues,which again,were solved with 2nd generation of MiG-23. First generation was bad,not doubt,but 2nd was pretty damn good.Israeli pilots tested it against F-16A and their results said quite a lot. Another few factors that ruined the reputation of MiG-23 were badly trained pilots and poor strategy or tactics(for instence,most of the Middle East trained mostly for simple interception tactics until mid 70s,thou this was done in 60s by Soviets as well). When one disects air battles and other equipment used there and how it was used,Israeli did not win just on equipment bases.Israel had superb tactics,some of the best pilot training,extremely well thought of strategy with accurate information about their opponent. Aside from that,MiG-23 was complimented by Lazarus link,that wasn't just simple radar tracking from the ground. And finally,people forget that later those MiG-23s(more 1st gen than 2nd) faced 4th gen fighters and in case of Iraqi war,far more in numbers even and with EW and good ECM capabilites(both lacking on Iraqi side). As for retirnment of MiG-23 after fall apart of USSR,it was no wonder,as they did not have the funds to keep such large airforces anymore.That is why at first they were in storage and they stayed as possible reserve. They even reduced orders for MiG-29s and Su-27,including did not finish the full plan of expanding production capacities for MiG-29 due to those same reasons.
Always worth remembering that many Soviet aircraft operated in harsh conditions at home and were operated by poorer countries abroad. Its easy to complain about an asset when your military doesn't have the money for maintenance, good airstrips, regular combat training and so on. Its not always just about the aircraft.
@@liquidgoose1518 OK, if I am mistaken, I will delete the comment. I thought the Russians still held the grass field landing and takeoff standard as their modern standard.
@@phil4986 There is still Su-25 which is the only remaining modern Russian combat jet capable to take off from grass runways Edit: Did some research myself and MiG-29 is indeed capable of operating on dirt runways, so I was wrong. However, nobody usually does that because landing 29 on a proper runway is hard enough
Russia copied so much shit from the F-4 its so embarrassing. Those who say I'm wrong....obviously haven't done just 5 min of research lol and will show how biased and ignorant you are lol and the reading it sucked so bad was because Russia had no idea what they were copying for what it exactly was for. Lol
At 1:20 you say "MiG were looking for a replacement for the old MiG-23 model". Judging by the footage you show, I think you meant a replacement for the MiG-21.
Fun fact is that MiG released very interesting experimental YE-8 design in early 1960s. It was MiG-21 derivative, but it featured new nose cone for a powerful radar, belly ram air intake, canards and extremely powerful engine (which gave this aircraft more than 1:1 TWR). But it was abandoned after prototype crash, and swing-wing MiG-23 was chosen as it seemed like superior design this time.
In retrospect, the Russians should have stayed with the Ye-8, which was probably going to be easier to fly in the long run. The Ye-8's powerful radar and high thrust-to-weight ratio would have made it a formidable fighter until the arrival of the F-15 in 1974 and F-16 in 1979.
My grandfather was a test pilot in the USSR air force and was certified on the migs 17-29 And of all the models he hated the 23. They had a huge flaw (among others) that's the vertical fin was made of laminate plywood. After a few too many flight hours the wood could swell and peel the skin off. At max take off speed the tail disintegrated. **Edit: the trailing edge of the control surfaces were made of a honeycomb type structure under metal skin. That swelled up because of bad weather and a drippy hangar. His right elevator disintegrated not his fin. His second time was the automatic control system failed and caused a yaw oscillation when sweeping the wings**
No ding dong the American f-111 is the first swing wing aircraft 1964 ........the stoldviets copied the f-111 and created there crappy f-23 ding dong .
Referencing a recent “Paper Skies” docco, if I’m not mistaken the cadre at the Soviet “top gun” program at Marii used Mig-23’s and consistently owned their students, even those equipped with the Mig-29’s and SU-27’s. That suggests to me that this aircraft in the right hands was more than effective and that it’s poor reputation is perhaps not a good measure.
Part of that reputation came because of a bad combat record (kills/shot downs). But most of this record came from middle east where pilots have historically bad record with any fighters, including some conflicts where they used US-made planes.
Russia copied so much shit from the F-4 its so embarrassing. Those who say I'm wrong....obviously haven't done just 5 min of research lol and will show how biased and ignorant you are lol
Its only significant advantage over its predecessor was its supposed bvr capability, which didnt arrive when it first flew, only with its 74 upgrade package, by which point it was facing F14s. In indian service the MiG21 outlasted it by thirty years. This was not a good aircraft.
Well there’s 2 different MiG-23s - the poverty pack export models & the later MLs,, especially the MLD. 2 F16 experts, an Israeli & a Dutchman, both with thousands of hours, flew the MLD extensively & agree it was better than contemporous F16 in every parameter but one. They esp liked the radar HUD
The MiG23 was not a bad plane. It's made to outperform the F4, and it is. It is discredited because of the "Arab" versions without serious radar and medium-range missiles. In the war against Israel, the Syrians did not use the newer versions in the most correct way. And the Israelis themselves had superior organization and intelligence, information processing and military thinking, and they would still win even with older aircraft. Then in Israel there were already the new generation - F15 and F16, which are logically superior to the older design. An analogue of the MiG23 with the same level of technology and time is the MirageF1, which is weaker than the MiG23. Also the latest versions of F4 (again weaker).
It makes me wonder how well the MiG-23 would have performed in a real first-class air force like that of the Indians. I know it wasn't particularly well-liked, and its derivative, the MiG-27 was much more popular with the IAF, but they're so much more capable than the Arab operators that they probably could have gotten a lot more out of the airframe.
This plane could not have been exported to the Czech Republic during its production, because, at the time, that country was part of Czechoslovakia. The Czech Republic did not appear until many years later. It's a similar story Zimbabwe, I think.
Well tbh here the MiG 23 had a bad reputation during its service cause it took part in conflicts against way more advanced western aircraft such as F16,F15,F14 etc which are 1 generation ahead of the MiG 23 variants they fought against (MF.M,BN etc). Also the pilots which operated these MiG 23s during these conflicts were much much less experienced and flying with much more outdated tech compared to the Western pilots which also explains why they had so many MiG 23 losses. If they fought soviet pilots with thousands of flight hours and more advanced and improved MiG 23 versions such as the MLA and MLD Ι doubt if the feedback would ve been the same.
Don't spread lies mixed with excuses. Typical russian who never accept real truth eh? Between mig23 and F15 introduction is only 6 years. Thats pretty short time. And about soviet pilots. I don't thing they been good. Just a reckless barbarians mentality, which not changed for ages. War in Ukraine shown that.
I think also western ignorance tends to ignore facts and choose the myth of "American superiority" - There' countless evidence from both Syrian, Israeli and Soviet reports to suggest that exported Migs were responsible for downing Israeli F-15's and f-16's in the 1982 Lebanese conflict
You have to remember it was made in the USSR. So it immediately has the disadvantages of being made in a poor country with forced labor, that often produced inferior copies of superior European and U.S. designs.
@SA-ks3ex Yes. Forced labor. In the USSR. In the 70s. I'm sure you might remember the Berlin Wall existed and that people were shot escaping to West Germany because the living conditions in East Germany were horrible.
@@SA-ks3ex I don't make things up. The Gulags may have "officially" disbanded, but they've still been operating since the 1960s. Where do you think the NKVD and KGB put political dissidents they still needed to question? It's sad you seem believe everything your government told you. I don't trust my government. And neither should you.
It's nice to see the video contain footage of an actual Mig-23 rather than of aircraft completely unrelated to the subject of the video as has been the case in your past videos. Keep this up!!
the problem with the mig-23 was precisely its novelty for the Soviet Air Force. It was a completely different fighter in terms of technology. This made itself felt, as well as the quality of production of these aircraft at some factories. The MiG-23 took root with difficulty, but in the end the pilots fell in love with it. You have touched very superficially on the variations of the aircraft. The MiG-23M and ML versions are completely different in their characteristics, the M was exactly the aircraft whose shortcomings you described to this family. ML is a pretty good fighter, which has improved maneuverability, reduced weight, as well as a built-in system that helps pilots not to go to critical angles of attack. A new radar and new missiles will be installed. The MLD version, in fact, is the absolute maximum of this design, an aircraft that competed with 4th generation fighters. Experienced MiG-23 MLD pilots defeated young MiG-29 pilots in aerial combat. And I personally talked to the person who piloted both planes, and he liked 23 more, in the usual daily routine. The poor view from the cockpit is due to the fact that the aircraft began to be developed in accordance with the old doctrines, where the pilot was only the one who would deliver the aircraft to the position where it would fire missiles and return to the airfield, exactly the same doctrine was used by American pilots. But Vietnam (for the Americans) and the Middle East (for the Soviets) have made their own changes in tactics But reputation is very important. And in ordinary circles, even in Russia, there is a stereotype about this plane. And the beginning of the plane's life eventually passed with him his whole life. Bad planes are not built in a series of more than 5,000 copies.
Russia copied so much shit from the F-4 its so embarrassing. Those who say I'm wrong....obviously haven't done just 5 min of research lol and will show how biased and ignorant you are lol and the reading it sucked so bad was because Russia had no idea what they were copying for what it exactly was for. Lol
Russia copied so much shit from the F-4 its so embarrassing. Those who say I'm wrong....obviously haven't done just 5 min of research lol and will show how biased and ignorant you are lol and the reading it sucked so bad was because Russia had no idea what they were copying for what it exactly was for. Lol
@@moneyisking777 because learning about your potential enemies capabilities is obvious and smart. Not knowing that obvious fact is the opposite of smart.
I got to see one up close and personal in 1981 (at an undisclosed location) in the US. I remember thinking they were more like farm equipment compared to our fighter's of the time. They copied the air intakes from the F4, except they weren't adjustable. Pretty awesome thing to see at 23.
It ain't that big of a deal anymore, an old Army buddy of mine from back in the 80's bought one a couple years ago. The ironic thing is were were both air defense gunners (Vulcan) back then, after he bought it I figured it was a good enough time to visit him so I jumped on a motorcycle and rode from PA to Amarillo TX to see him and check it out, when we walked into the hangar where it's kept I looked at him and said "Gimmie your gun, I feel like I should be shooting it full of holes!!!". After walking over to it I told him "Never in my wildest dreams back then did I ever imagine that one day I'd be this close to one of these things unless it was dropping bombs on me". What amazed me about it was how massive it was for being a single engine aircraft, I mean it was BIG, looking into the engine's exhaust was like looking into a cave, then I climbed into it's cockpit and was amazed at how cramped it was for being such a massive aircraft, I only had on jeans a t-shirt and a ball cap and it was tight, I just couldn't imagine being in one of things for hours with a flight suit and helmet on, that had to be uncomfortable.
Friend of mine from high school went in the air force in the 80's and they tracked a mig23 as it flew from Poland over east Germany then entered west Germany. When fighters were scrambled they observed it had no pilot ( he had ejected but the plane kept flying). It ended up running out of fuel and crashing into a house on the border of France and Belgium.
It was a Soviet MiG-23M that took off from a Soviet airbase in western Poland. Soon after take-off the pilot experienced sudden power loss and ejected. The plane then sabilised the flight and kept flying on autopilot untill it ran out of fuel and crashed, as you mentioned, killing an 18-year-old house occupant in Belgium. I remember that accident from the news back then.
Russia copied so much shit from the F-4 its so embarrassing. Those who say I'm wrong....obviously haven't done just 5 min of research lol and will show how biased and ignorant you are lol and the reading it sucked so bad was because Russia had no idea what they were copying for what it exactly was for. Lol
I remember reading a story about intercepted radio conversation over Angola during the Bush War. An inexperienced Angolan pilot in a Mig23 being mobbed by SAAF F1s, and panic setting in; then a Cuban voice comes over the radio, and calmly tells the pilot to point his nose up and open the throttle. No way the Mirages could keep up with that... I have no idea if it's true or not, it's just a story I read.
@@99bimmer Constant Peg, 4477th TES. And their pilots HATED the Flogger. Some actively avoided flying it. Red Eagles by Steve Davies is a good read on the US MiGs. 11,0000 built? What bullshit is that? The total of Mig-23s is a bit over 5,000. Now the MiG-21 production was a pube hair above 11,000.
The MiG-23 was more about altitude and speed. It had respectable (and robust) Beyond Visual Range Capabilities in its day, only beaten by the MiG-25, but it lacked the ability to turn and burn with an F-4D/E (which was not particularly agile either). USAF pilots seem to suggest that the turn performance of the MiG-23 was 'somewhere between' an F-104A and F-4C but I am assuming it could match either at climb or altitude. The MiG-23 was really a BVR-interceptor.
F4 is very comparable to mig23 , The problem is that the mig 23 also came in attack version which are essentially useless in Air combat and when counting kills they are included in the total
@@thefridgeman Possible but doubtful. The MiG-23LMD really took it to the next level. One wonders if a full avonics upgrade could have made it a "poor man's Su-27" much as the Shenyang F-8IIM was supposed to be: but neither did and the MiG-23 is pretty much retired from service everywhere. You'd think Ukraine might have replenished some stocks but they did not.
@Emily It didn't make sense what was told in the video, because when this plane was made and sold, the Czech Republic didn't exist, only Czechoslovakia existed at that time. Regards from Prague.
This plane stands nearby my house, in a military museum (wings fully swept). Seen it up-close many times. It might be a failure, but still looks pretty bad-ass :)
The plane is only part of the equation. The pilot is the majority of the equation. This plane in the experienced pilot can take on the F-15 and F-16 which it did and damaged and an F-16 in combat over Syria before sadly being shoot down in return. Israel denies it but it happened so this is A BADASS plane.
The MiG-23 was one of the best aircraft of its time. It made its first appearence in 1967. One shouldn't compare it with the later adversaries like the F-15 and the F-16. It was made to win the F-4 Phantom and it achieved this goal splendidly. In the skillful hands of the Soviet pilots it was a formidable Phantom-killer.
Nice video !! Any way : Mig 23 was not as bad as it is portrayed here. The Soviet doctrine was radically different from US. / NATO doctrine The Mig 23 was planned to function for 1 or the most 2 flight sorties at the maximum. The Soviets knew real good that it couldn’t survive in a hostile environment agains US aircraft. Also , all the samples sold/ given to Warsaw Pact countries were diluted or downgraded versions of the real Soviet Mig 23 ( at the exception of East Germany). In Syria they didn’t perform that bad and the tally is not exactly against them. Factor in there poor if not dubious maintenance also the poor if not scandalous pilot skills of the Arab countries ( Iraq and Syria) and I’d say it performed quite well. It’s short comings were. -1 single engine - 2 very hard and complicated maintenance -3 extremely poor radar for export variants. In overall it was not a bad plane to fly especially if you had to go in huge numbers against NATO you’d still have a chance to come back in one piece.
@@johnbennett951 sure. Sure. But the Flogger was a good plane , and even today with updated avionics and a reliable engine would do well against more modern craft
I think the complicated maintenance (especially on the engine) was not improved on export models as if the USSR had to go head to head with a client country, they knew that within 2 to 4 weeks the opposing airforce would be down just due to maintenance issues. And a friendly client country would get immediate backup in spares from the Soviet Union, so it was also a political lever…
finally a comment that isn't shitting on "putler" and nitpicking on every little issue of the flogger and instead is actually giving constructive criticism. and if it truly was awful, why did they make upgraded variants and even the Mig-27 which was actually a converted Mig-23 suited for ground pounding.
I remember reading a US training team had acquired a mig23 and it was insane in acceleration. Slower than an F-14 but killed it off the line with acceleration. The engine had to be limited or else it would go too fast in a straight line
Ward Carrol talked about that recently on his channel. The 23 engine had so much power they were afraid the plane would disintegrate so they never found a top speed.
@@LuvBorderCollies And please remember tat it was the early S model that earned the bad reputation for the 23. The next gen M models are 8g capable, and the MLD 8.5G, unlike the early S model, which was limited to 5G. The 23 easily outaccelerated about anything of its time. The fact that its turbojet engine can go from idle to full afterburner in less than 3 seconds is mindboggling in itself.
@@DrittAdrAtta yes and a lot of the god awful combat performance came from nations/ pilots that were so bad they would lose even having a better plane. MLD is a true beast, the best this airframe was capable of
Just one addition to make, the ML, P and MLD remain to this day one of the fastest accelerating combat aircraft in history, absolute king until the latest generation. Also the speed limitation, like for many contemporary top tier Russian interceptors is an airframe limitation, not a performance limitation. They will go much higher and much faster than listed maximums but neither aircraft nor pilot will survive. Even the MiG21 is like this and doesn't give inherent speed or altitude limitations in pilot manuals, it gives operator limitations for systems management, off the top of my head it's something like a stability related maximum Mach and that governs your alt but you can exceed. The MiG25 is infamously worse, with a 2.5M nominal engine limitation except with special permission and then a 2.8M airframe limitation before the canopy starts melting, but it can go much faster. The Flogger, perhaps not the downgraded versions since they had basic engines but the Russian service ones certainly experience this same story again. It will basically keep climbing or accelerating until they break, not such a good thing but it is an impressive thing, since the listed maximums are already extremely high performance. American aircraft tend to be the opposite way, actual flight performance is always quite a bit less than the listed maximums and in service they generally can't get anywhere near those figures by a long shot, no matter what you do with pilot management. There are various reasons for this and it's not really about propaganda or something, it's kind of a can of worms to explain but that's a loose summary. Russian cold war jets are really over the top in performance, you have to be impressed by them. American ones, exquisite quality and fantastic tech, I mean safety protocols doesn't even allow them to be quite the same bull in a china shop.
The F-4 had teething problems as well, and it took enduring a lot of losses over Vietnam to figure out where the flaws were, and what needed to be changed to make the F-4 a dominant aircraft. The MiG-23 never really got a similar chance. By the time that Arab air forces flying downgraded export models got their butts whipped in the late 1970’s and early 1980’s against aircraft like the F-14 and F-15, the Soviets had already been developing the MiG-29 and Su-27 for several years. So the MUCH-improved MiG-23 MLA and especially the -MLD variants were never really tested against peer aircraft, as customers switched to the newer 4th Gen aircraft. A parallel would be if the Vietnam War had ended in 1967, and later F-4 variants never got developed, leaving it with a poor win:loss ratio against the vastly cheaper and simpler MiG-21, for example. There were NATO pilots who flew against the later variants of the MiG-23 flown by East German, Czech and Polish pilots who regarded it as a formidable aircraft.
When the MiG 23 appeared it had an engine of approximately the same power as the F 16 with 50% more mass than the F 16. The instruments were not ergonomically arranged and required constant monitoring due to the manual change of the wing angles, so that the pilots had little time to take care of the situation around the aircraft. In order for the pilots to see the situation, they would have to look between their legs. That is where the radar screen was located.
@Vat RW This is not a story about an engine, but about an airplane. If they had just put the wings from the Su-15D, the weight would have been over 4t less. The confirmation for that is IAR-95.
The stats seem to had lifted from the MiG-23MS evaluated by the US. All other mass produced MiG-23's variants had more powerfull engine and no radar screen whatsoever. As for the cockpit instrumentation while it might be convoluted and somewhat unintuitive it had the advantage of following a very similar layout to other Soviet planes, making re-training very easy.
I've been watching this bloke for years, his narration has changed so much. I think now is perfect, very polished and professional, the kind of voice you'd expect to hear in a quality TV documentary. Excellent channel, cheers :)
The Mig-23 wasn't quite the "dud" claimed in this video. One has to remember that in the middle east conflicts, the Mig-23 was going against much more advanced aircraft like Israeli and American F-15s and F-16s. Those F-15s and F-16s weren't "monkey" versions of the aircraft like the monkey versions of the Mig-23 that were exported. Also, when the Mig-23 went up against more evenly matched aircraft like the Mirage III and Mirage F1, the Mig-23 dominated them as evidenced by the Angolan/Cuban war against Apartheid South African aggression in the late 1980s.
The video is ludicrously biased, which is typical. Comparing stats like fuel capacity of 20-ton MiG-23 to those of 45-ton F-111 is just lowbrow - not to mention F-111 was a total failure. MiG-23 has order of magnitude better safety record than F-16: every 7th F-16 already crashed. Now, that's what you call "questionable safety record".
Back in H.S. in the early-mid 80's those Floggers were THE symbol of Soviet influence. They were all over the media. Never struck me as a bad airplane but more of an overly ambitious one. Cramming all that new sophisticated design / tech into one airframe was bound to have operational real world issues .. and it certainly did. If you lived through the height of the Cold War back then though it was and remains an icon.
Man the Flogger probably has the worst luck when it comes to all the main soviet fighters throughout the years. Such a cool aircraft and yet it's the forgotten middle child between the Fishbed and Fulcrum, and thats not mentioning the large amounts of misinformation surrounding it too.
I always found the MiG-23 to be an intersting aircraft. Also I really just love the way the thing looks. It looks like if you built a fighter jet muscle car. You look at it and the whole thing looks like just the most engine in the least airplane in order to be the fastest. I don't know if it was good to fly, considering I've never even flown it in a video game (and actually, come to think of that, where are my MiG-23s in games? The MiG-21 is always there, then they jump straight to the MiG-29 and SU-27). What I do know is that the thing looks fast as fuck and dangerous too.
@@axelmiranda2001 Yeah War Thunder is the only game I know of with the MiG-23 in it, but the issue with that is a 2 part problem, excluding the grind which would 100% be an issue for me. #1 - War Thunder's high tier jet battles with missiles look stupid AF. #2 - I would have to be playing War Thunder.
Everyone be shitting on the MIg 23, kind of sad I do like the design of the jet and plus I flew it when I was serving in the east German Air Force. and I really liked it… Sad to see that the title of worst fighter jet belongs to it. 😢
MiG-23, the Soviet Union's answer to the F-4 Phantom. Fun fact with the MiG-23 is that it copied the F-4 Phantom's engine intakes. So much so they even kept the blades between the intakes/fuselage meant to prevent landing nets from an aircraft carrier causing unnecessary damage to the aircraft. People often claim the intakes were not copied but it's odd the MiG-23 would have features that the F-4 had specifically for carrier landings when the MiG-23 wasn't a carrier aircraft. This heavily implies the engineers working on the MiG-23 copied features from the F-4 without knowing exactly what those features were for. To me it makes it quite obvious that they took the F-111 and married it with the F-4 Phantom and ended up with an aircraft that was barely better than the F-4 Phantom. Problem with this aircraft though is, is that it was quickly made obsolete within only a few years of service. It was barely an upgrade over the MiG-21 when it entered service, and once more modernized versions of the MiG-23 came about it was already too late, as far more advanced western designs had already entered service. I'd argue comparing the MiG-23 to aircraft like the F-16, F-14, and F-15 shouldn't really be done. To be honest, it's more comparable to the F-4 particularly the E variant than other American aircraft. For how much older the F-4 is. That doesn't bald well for the MiG-23 in my opinion. What I'm saying is, the MiG-23 is basically as I said before a Soviet F-4 Phantom literally. They have nearly identical performance wise with the F-4E actually having a maneuverability advantage. So it mostly comes down to weapons, electronic suites, and pilot training. To be blunt. By the time the MiG-23 came out the concept of Super Sonic Fighters being relevant was already going the way of the dodo. They're still relevant only in the context that they're fast. It's the only advantage a F-4E or MiG-23 would have over say something like an F-16 or MiG-29 and that is if they're modernized versions. Put it this way, within a year or two the F-16 and F-15 would exist. Meanwhile the MiG-23 was considered barely an upgrade by most pilots from the MiG-21. As I said. MiG-23 should be compared to the F-4E Phantom. It's the closest aircraft performance wise that the US Air Force had to the MiG-23 even if the MiG-23 was slightly better in some areas.
1. It was developed in order to cover the USSR borders vs. incoming F-111s and F-4 Phantoms. * The far north and the freezing-far-east were covered by Mig-25 and some Su-15. 2. Compare it to F-14 . . . also a radar-centric weapons-systems defensive-interception platform. 3. The Mig-21bis from 1972 onwards was revised in the 1990s thanks the to drastic miniaturization of electronics from the 1960s to the 1990s. 4. The shift to the ML version of 1978 included: 4.1 ~10% lighter air-frame. 4.2 ~10% more powerful motor. 4.3 Helmet-mounted sight for close-in IR missile dogfights. 5. The abysmal failure of the original Mig-23 might have been the cardinal issue, which broke the back of the Egyptian pro-Soviet camel, which was desperately looking for an answer to the F-4 Phantom II on the Israeli service (and its indigenous missiles). 6. It might have still scored an Israeli F-16 in a hit and run attack early on June 1982.
1. Wrong, it wasn't. It was not an exclusive VPVO plane, like the Flagon. For example, it was deployed in East Germany, far away from USSR borders. And it was not developed as an interceptor, more like a multirole. 2. Wrong again. The radar in the MiG-23 (except the later MLA and MLD) was pretty much useless and actually, the planes was designed to be used under guidance from the local air defense radar operator (GCI) and there was no RIO. The F-14 huge radar and long range Phonenix for fleet defense, vs point defense in an interceptor under strick CGI control. 3. The MiG-21bis was only "revised" by other states, outside of the old USSR. Because they couldn't afford new planes. 4. Wikipedia, lol. 5. Wrong, again. The Egyptians broke away from the Soviets because of other reasons (more to do with geopolitics and their desire to get Sinai back), it was the Syrians that got their ass whipped over the Beqqa Valley and still stayed with the Russians/Soviets. Maybe open a book instead of learning "history" from War Thunder or internet.
@@thefridgeman Mig-23 is interception only in nature - absent of FoV and large AGMs, with a few lame bombs underneath optionally to dupe African customers in the 1970s. Mig-27 was the ground-attack variant. Although USSR succeeded only with large airborne radars like the Mig-25/31. Syria got the Mi-21bis complete - nobody upgraded Mig-21outside of USSR, only outside Russian Federation in the late 1990s - by Western contractors. Syria also got Mig-23 ML + Mig-25 and later also Mig-29. Egypt simply needed the US money while not finding utility in the 1st gen of Mig-23 thus feeling crappy. Syria had no stress since it was busy occupying and plundering the Lebanon (dope, many workers, it did the 'civil' war ). By now it does it in partnership with Hezbollah. Mig-21bis was developed for a gap-stopper because between 1967-1972 all were rightfully skeptical about the Mig-23 first gen.
If you read the book, "Red Hats", about the secret squadron in Nevada, they had their own unique experiences with the MiG-23... None of them good, oddly the 23 was too aerodynamic and passed a certain speed which compressed the control surfaces it didn't want to slow down , which meant the pilot was just along for the ride for a while and was hopefully in level flight when it occurred. The F-111 and F-14 had a system that automatically set the wing angle.... The MiG-23, the pilot had set it manually, other assessments stated task load on the pilot was heavy, not good for a dogfighter. It had fuel stashed everywhere, including 50 Imperial Gallons in the Vertical Stabilizer... It looked like hitting it anywhere was going to turn it into a match, being compact and important components packed everywhere didn't help either. That said, during the Angola vs South Africa conflict the South African Pilots in the early variants of the Mirage F-1, were reportedly not to anxious to get into a fight with MiG-23s.
Inthe 1970s I was involved in sourcing the components and building the "Flogger". We had problems getting the wings to swing back and stay on when required. Ok it came in a cardboard box at 1/72 scale without glue, but it was a challenge!
How the Russians built 11,000 MiG-23/27's still bewilders me considering how woefully flawed that airplane was. No wonder the Russians started to pour money by the late 1970's into what became the MiG-29 and Su-27, both vastly superior planes.
The issue with the MiG-23 isn't that it was a bad aircraft. It did what it set out to and was a distinct improvement over the aircraft that preceded it. The issue with the MiG-23 is that it came out shortly before the F-15, an aircraft with an undefeated record in air to air combat. Shortly followed by the F-16 and F-18, aircraft which are also exceptional compared to everything that came before. The Mig-23's biggest flaw is that it was an incremental improvement that came at a time when the opposition was advancing its designs by leaps and bounds.
As for the issue with the Holes in the splitter being the same as the F-4, they ARE NOT the same. Similar function but intake, BLC on the splitter and dimensions are different from the F-4.
MiG-23 was significant memory of my childhood. Been watching them with my parents during landings. And they were very often flying over our heads. The weird silhouette and long afterburner flame with rings were realy interesting thing to rememeber.
Some Flogger tidbits. The intakes were copied from the F4 to the extent that they had inboard netcutters (which served no purpose for the a/c whatsoever). Its fire detection system (and this a/c had significant fire risks) was optical, rather than smoke-sensing; so the pilot only got an alarm if there was already a fire large enough to trigger an optical sensor. The ventral fin had to be included because of high speed instability (a common feature of Soviet fast jets). It retracted when the gear came down, meaning the pilot was looking for "four greens" rather than three. And even with it retracted, the clearance at the stern of the fuselage was tiny enough that landings had to be at a very precise AoA. It had serious problems with stores. The Sovs couldn't figure out how to copy the F111 or Tornado's swivelling pylons, so the Flogger, at least early models, was limited to fuselage or wing glove hardpoints only. "Worst" is a bit subjective, but for those who describe the MiG23/27 as "awesome", I suggest you look again.
Westerners in 1970s-early/mid1980s were familiar with MiG-23MS, downgraded export version if MiG-23MF. The latter versions - MiG-23ML/MLD could fight well against the F-16s and Mirage2000.
I believe it's hard to compare Russian airplanes, when operated by russian pilots in Russia, and the same planes operated by foreign pilots in foreign countries. (ex: the Mig 21 in Vietnam)
Russian pilots flew against the IDF in the 70's. The Egyptian pilots were getting shot down a lot and the Russian advisors were mocking them for being bad pilots. The Egyptians got mad and told the Russians to go out and prove they are better. The Russians met the same fate. The IDF shot down a number of Russian piloted planes in the Sinai. Some Russians didn't make it out but others who did were captured or bodies found later. Same thing happened during the Korean War with Chinese and Russians.
@@LuvBorderCollies I believe not many Russian Pilots were shot down in Vietnam.Those Migs that were shut down weren't piloted by Russian pilots.Russian Pilots did shot a lot of American planes.
@@pedroleal7118 The US bent over backwards to not hit soviet and chicom missile troopers and advisors on the ground. There's no evidence that soviet pilots participated like in Korea though.
I had a version of Mig23 body on my University campus which was gifted by the Indian airforce and was one of the coolest thing on the campus. It was hollow from inside so one day me and the bois in dead night went through its engine outlet and stuck our heads out of its cockpit. Fun days.
My father was The commanding officer for Mig 23BN/Mig 27 squadrons He always said that was the only aircraft which gave him a hard time when it came to instructing his juniors....
It was built for a war that was never fought ie: a conflict possibly nuclear in central Europe where airbases would have been probably wiped out early on - in this context we would have been left with the Harrier as the champion of the West… at more or less the same time Dassault was developing the F1 with a strong reinforced undercarriage…to operate from hastily prepared runways…
The first time I saw an F1 making a low pass in the cold, grey French air was in '84, when there was much anxiety about the Cold War heating up. I got a little panicky since the Dassault hotrod's empennage, when viewed from below, looks so much like the MiG-23's!
The requirement was not for a shorter take-off run - but rather the ability to meet the performance requirements with the larger (heavier) radar, weapons and fuel requirements, while still being able to operate from the airfields then operating MiG-21s it was designed to replace. Scaling up the MiG-21 would mean scaling up the take-off run. Hence, the swing wing. It was an interceptor first. Not a dogfighter. The comparison to the F-111 is ludicrous. It did what it was designed to do.
Almost all you wrote is wrong. 1) requirement was lower take off and landing speed 2) yes, larger radar was a requirement 3) scaling up would not scale up take off run, that is not how aircraft work 4) it was not an interceptor first, it was a front-line fighter by every bit, and outperformed the phantom (which it was designed to counter) in every category except the amount of ordnance carried 5) but yes, comparison to the F-111 is just stupid.
@@19Koty96 Scaling up weight wise definitely affects take off run - not necessarily 1 to 1, but I never claimed that. Lower take-off and landing speed shortens takeoff and landing run
@@someoldguyinhawaii4960 youre scaling up engine power and wing area too, which is mainly why i say it makes no sense. the bigger su15 generally had very similar takeoff and landing params to 21, despite being twice the size
Having been a weapon system mechanic/loader on the F111 in the 80's. With the terrain following radar, the F-111 was a high-speed low level all weather medium bomber. While in it's initial design including the Navy model, it was probably thought of being useful as a fighter which as you know the mission changed once the Navy got out of the program. Although it did have a 20 mm gun in the weapons Bay, I believe that was to meet the numbers game by allowing it to be a tactical aircraft instead of a strategic aircraft. I did learn that the F-111 was used in ground support much like the A10 because of its ability to fly slow with the wings forward. Imagine if that weapons Bay had been fitted with a 30 mm. Only half of the weapons Bay was used for the 20 mm gun and it's magazine drum.
But by the F-105 the AF was already saying "we're not risking an expensive jet to strafe a truck". The F-111 did "low and fast"+ "one pass, haul ass" + "speed is life" air support. Low and slow with wings forward? Nope.
Dark skies at 4:00 can you please include footage of a mig-23 in an airshow? I want to hear the pure sound or the roar of the engine instead of having to search one. Like the comment so he can see this message.
Despite being a problematic aircraft, the MiG-23 family is just cool looking! The Russians have a knack for creating pretty planes. (Su-15 and MiG-19 are a couple of my favorites too.)
I always enjoy your videos. But l did think this one a little harsh. The F111 Aardvark mentioned in comparison was in itself a poorly executed design and hanger Queen. But l enjoy the camaraderie and good manners in the posts.
I have also never heard of the Mig-23P...last versions were the 23MLA and MLD. These were VERY capable aircraft. The 23s were retired not only for budget cuts but to enable the Mig-29 to come online.
The Russian mig 23 was a decent jet for its time. It is also one of the fastest accelerate aircraft and can also out run f16 it is also the powerfulest single engine fighter with 28,660lbf of thrust for its time
But it's engine was still unreliable and had a short lifespan. Outruning an F-16 was no good when the F-16s were still shooting them down...And shooting them down with ease....
Western people think the MiG-23 is the worst Russian combat aircraft? Interesting, I thought otherwise. For instance, I’ve heard the Israelis felt the Flogger was a much better air combat performer than the later and far more advanced MiG-25.
Thank you so much for mentioning this. I just find it funny how people (internet geeks) always try to overhype the mig 25 while the plane was basically a shithole and even now I still think the Soviet lied about his top speed
@@16rumpole initially there were fears the 25 was quite maneuverable. It looks like it should be on paper. Turns out it was incredibly heavy which affected it’s ability to maneuver.
@@kwharrison6668 if you had a look at its lift/drag and mass properties, its actually really not that bad; it just has severe limitations put on it due to thin wings, after all, dogfighting was not its purpose, the 25 _was_ (unlike the 23) a pure bred interceptor. And it was amazing at that role.
Mig-23 was 3d generation jet-fighter and it's supposed to counter 3d generation planes of nato countries. And nato had 2 of them - american F-4E Phantom II and French Mirage F1. And among them Mig-23 was the best and was superior that was proven in all conflicts.. But Mig-23 had bad luck, because of few circumstances and it was forced , mostly to counter American 4th generation jet fighters - F-16, F-15 and F-14 and it most cases Mig-23 was of export versions, driven by 3d world countries pilots and terribly outnumbered. Though, Mig-23 had worse characteristics it managed to be more or less even and managed to get a few victiories against 4th generation jet fighters. In some areas it outperformed F-16 and managed to give real fight to F-15.
and other geometry and dimensions anyway, it would be very abstract if they had the same essentially the same air intakes, they must be adapted to the engine, not the other way around, so copying the intake from f 4 would not have any sense but whatever
@@Woodland_Warrior have you seen them side by side? because if so, the second question, sorry but are you blind? I've never understood where this theory comes from and how someone is able to believe it, even apart from the fact that the intakes on the mig-23 are almost half the size of those on the f-4, even looking at them for more than a second is hard not to say that these are two different constructions, one is rounded along the entire length and the other is straight-on with only rounded corners
@@tonieistotne9471 Sorry, it isn't correct to say 1:1, but it is pretty damn close. The designs are *nearly* identical. In fact, you highlighted one of two differences. First, you're correct, the F-4's intake is rounded all the way whereas on the Mig-23 it is only rounded on the edges, but this isn't a big difference... at all. The second difference is an add on the Soviets engineered which was a movable ramp to help regulate airflow into the engine. Beyond these two things, they are almost identical, and vary only slightly in size.
he said that the 23 was the only Soviet wing fighter; that's just not true, the Fencer was a swing wing plane. This guy needs to do his research better. Granted the Fencer was more of a fighter bomber and strike aircraft.
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There’s no reason to compare a Mig-23 to the F-111 other than the variable geometry wing. The things you’ve compared it on, range and speed mean nothing. The F-111 was an absolute failure as a fighter but an excellent strike aircraft. Comparison with the Mirage III or equivalent would have made more sense. Instead you’ve drawn false equivalents with US aircraft that don’t compare.
Funny! You went right for the jugular!
I thought it was a bad comparison at first aswell but there was the Bomber Varients of the MiG-23/MiG-27. (The US Navy F-111 Version was more similar in role had it been adopted)A better swing wing aircraft to compare it too in role would be either the F-14A or the Tornado ADV.
@@BellicTaxi they were close air support aircraft, the F-111 isn’t close air support it’s a strike and interdiction aircraft. The Tornado isn’t that comparable, but it’s closest as a VG aircraft.
As you said, Mirage III or F1 would have been an excellent comparison, and maybe the Jaguar, to compare it the the Mig-27.
Variable sweep wing is just a means to an end, it does not make aircraft comparable.
The reason comparing the MiG-23 to the F-111 is a bad idea is the fact that Russia made a near exact copy of the F-111 called the Su-24
As a kid, the Flogger was perhaps, along with the Saab Viggen, the aircraft that intrigued me the most. I'd buy Airfix kits with my pocket money and amongst the completed kits that I kept the longest were these two aircraft. I remember that I rarely painted the models afterwards but I did paint the Flogger. The swing wing design is probably what interested me the most about it.
Same me pal,the first model kit i build as a child was an 1/72 AIrfix Mig 23..few after finish it felt a huge snow(not usual in Spain) and all my village was covered in white,so i decided paint my Mig in all-white scheme..man,this little plane was COOL with that red stars over the white,was 1985 and my parents joking i was a Soviet Spy...🤣
I'm a bit older, but when I briefly took up the hobby again in my 20's, those two models were my favourites, along with the A-10 Warthog.
@@LittleNalayes,the hog was another "must" to build...other times, better IMHO
I was fascinated with the Viggen. It is almost a jet biplane with those canards.
There's actually a very unknown American plane that could also sweep its wings, the F-14 Tomcat
When you order a f14 off wish
BURN UNIT 🔥 🔥 🔥
Yes comrade
Nahh…Banggood version of the B1-b🤷🏻♂️🤣🤣🤣👍🏻
There is no mitigating the despair of waking up on Christmas morning to find THIS, not the f14 you wanted, under that Christmas tree of despair.
well the F-14's design was partly in response to the combat superiority the MiG-23 had over the F-4 Phantom (though the MiG-25's overhyped projected performance was more important to the Americans' design criteria for what would become the F-14 and F-15)
Calling the MiG-23 bad is fundamentally wrong.
23 wound was very mediocre due to childhood illnesses, but already starting from 23M it was a very worthy fighter / interceptor.
Long-range missiles, good characteristics in terms of thrust-to-weight ratio and maneuverability, allowed him to utterly surpass all enemy aircraft.
Starting from 23MLD, it was already a perfect 3rd generation aircraft, which could easily fight with any 4th generation of its time.
Not really. It was universally hated by pilots, because any exceed of flight limit was fatal, and limits were variable as function of actual wing angle.
With fly by wire it and computer it would be a wonderful machine.
but the problem is MLD came too late. I feel very sorry for MiG 23.
@@peceed Who are these pilots? Marii pilots consistently won aganist MiG-29s and Su-27s until the end of the USSR, using MiG-23ML/MLDs. The MiG-23 has an extremely good reputation with former USSR pilots.
@@Nothing_._Here It was capable, but extremely hard to master. Arab pilots had huge problems for sure.
@@peceed Arab pilots were given export models that were heavily downgraded, on request of the arab states themselves seeing no need for "expensive" RWR or countermeasure or CCIP.
It didn't help that arab states had no GCI network nor understood the doctrine. Many of the MiG-23s were used by said states for low level bombing instead of doing anything useful.
If I recall correctly, Soviet pilots of the MIG-23MLD model were confident that they could take on the F-4E Phantom and early models of the F-16A Fighting Falcon. Soviet aggressor aircraft training also found that a MiG-23MLD could achieve favorable kill ratios against the MiG-29 in mock combat by using hit-and-run tactics and not engaging the MiG-29s in dogfights.
Polish Mig-23 demolished F-16 during first trainig (vs. american pilots).
@@peceed
Training exercises are scripted, that's why they're called a "training exercise".
One side is always made to stick to a set narrative for the other side to learn tactics, they follow a script based on a theoretical enemy.
They're not proof of anything.
Training is always interesting (has shown underdogs winning many times) but in the real world use is what always makes or breaks an aircraft. In foreign conflicts, mig23’s were always sent in inferior models, insufficient pilot training and against much better aircraft. Best performances I know of is Angolan conflicts.
yeah 23mld was far superior compared to f4e phantom which was aging plane by the time mig23 got mld upgrage but not so sure about f16a dogfight
@@Xrdyls Mig-23 could win with Mig-29 as long as it didn't slow down.
My father was an Eagle Driver in the early 80's. I forget the exact numbers, but I remember he said the F15 and Mig23 could merge at like 300kts, the Eagle could go full burner and the Flogger could turn around and catch it within 10 miles (again, fuzzy on the numbers, but it was impressive). The Mig had like twice the turning radius of the Eagle, so in air-to-air it was no contest, but that plane was quick.
I actually flew the MiG-21 and 23 out of Indian Springs Nevada in the early 1980s (code name Constant Peg). The scenario your dad described was correct! The exact numbers were classified and I no longer remember them in detail but the point was made. The flogger was fast and that was about it. It was the Soviet answer to the F-105.
While flying the MiG-21, I could level turn with the best of them (for one turn, then out of energy,) but with the Flogger, I had only one tool in my bag of tricks: Speed and acceleration.
Notable: ground crews could do normal maintenance of the Flogger using F-4 Phantom parts (wheels, tires, some engine and fuel/hydraulic systems parts, etc.,) and one side of the aircraft was entirely compatible with NATO standard connectors and ports. The other was Warsaw Pact.
Yes, I heard that the Mig-23 was not very manueverable, which is odd. I would have thought the swing wings, fully extended would allow it to turn tightly at low speeds.
@@Thanatos833 It was very maneuverable, but also extremely easy to stall during it, so pilots didn't want to risk. This aircraft cried for fly-by-wire and computer control. 8.5 g limit and lower wing loading with optimal angle is no joke.
My father was the Shah of Iran 😂
The 23s that the 4477th were early Floggers (M`s and S`s)that had sat in the desert for years. They were first generation. Later generation such as the MF were far better with the penultimate being the ML serries that was 1 ton lighter and had the efficient and powerful R-35-300 engine.
I absolutely do not think it's realistic to call it the worst. I don't even think you can truly call it bad even.
Yes it was absolutely not great or even good, but it still managed to provide modern capabilities and a wide variety of mission roles.
Essentially, it was designed during one of those times when noone had a really firm idea of what was needed for the future, it also suffered badly from trying to be everything at once, except a dogfighter, but aside from that, it was a highspeed, long range, missile platform, fighter, interceptor, ground attack, heavy platform, medium/light-ish platform etc etc...
If it had been built 10 years earlier, it would have been designed completely differently. If it had been built 10 years LATER, its design might have ended up similar, but with a lot of adjustments and probably ended up a much better aircraft, because at that time, it was far more clear what was needed from this sort of concept.
Also, USSR should have split the design into two differently focused models, a larger model somewhat closer to the F-111 or F-14, where the swing-wing design penalties were less notable, while they built something smaller without the swing-wing design with dogfighting at least a major part of the design.
No, if you're talking worst ever SOVIET fighter, i suggest you look 1930s to 1940s, because there's some real whoppers during that time. And even if you just stick to fighters that went into serial production, the MiG-1, MiG-3 and the LaGG-1 and LaGG-3 are easy contenders, no matter how exceptional fighters may have resulted later on from those lines of development, like the La-7.
Totally agree, the MiG-23/27 wasn’t ideal, but it was an awesome aircraft and really, really fast, which made it perfect for the role the Warsaw Pact had in mind for both the fighter-bomber (MiG-23BN/MiG-27) and the interceptor (all other models)…
I feel like we're being way lenient on various Sukhoi designs of mid-60's vintage if we're just gonna say the Flogger is THE worst fighter the Soviets produced during the Cold War
What about the MiG-9? When shooting its guns the gases from the guns would enter the air-intake and shut down its engines...lol I would say the MiG-23 and 27 were far from the worst...
not to mention that all major problems were solved in 2nd generation of MiG-23 (except view of the pilot).
It got much of its bad reputation due to 1st gen of MiG-23 that had similar avionic suits to then MiG-21,yet cost more and couldn't be worked on in the field like MiG-21. And not to mention with angle of attack and yawn issues,which again,were solved with 2nd generation of MiG-23.
First generation was bad,not doubt,but 2nd was pretty damn good.Israeli pilots tested it against F-16A and their results said quite a lot.
Another few factors that ruined the reputation of MiG-23 were badly trained pilots and poor strategy or tactics(for instence,most of the Middle East trained mostly for simple interception tactics until mid 70s,thou this was done in 60s by Soviets as well). When one disects air battles and other equipment used there and how it was used,Israeli did not win just on equipment bases.Israel had superb tactics,some of the best pilot training,extremely well thought of strategy with accurate information about their opponent.
Aside from that,MiG-23 was complimented by Lazarus link,that wasn't just simple radar tracking from the ground.
And finally,people forget that later those MiG-23s(more 1st gen than 2nd) faced 4th gen fighters and in case of Iraqi war,far more in numbers even and with EW and good ECM capabilites(both lacking on Iraqi side).
As for retirnment of MiG-23 after fall apart of USSR,it was no wonder,as they did not have the funds to keep such large airforces anymore.That is why at first they were in storage and they stayed as possible reserve. They even reduced orders for MiG-29s and Su-27,including did not finish the full plan of expanding production capacities for MiG-29 due to those same reasons.
@@nikolaivasilev7371 The Libyan Air Force lost approximately 100 pilots during training on this aircraft.
Libya has bought more than 150
Always worth remembering that many Soviet aircraft operated in harsh conditions at home and were operated by poorer countries abroad. Its easy to complain about an asset when your military doesn't have the money for maintenance, good airstrips, regular combat training and so on. Its not always just about the aircraft.
@@phil4986 This is simply not true. You can try taking off a grass airfield in MiG-29, would end up in a burning wreck most likely.
@@liquidgoose1518 OK, if I am mistaken, I will delete the comment. I thought the Russians still held the grass field landing and takeoff standard as their modern standard.
@@phil4986 There is still Su-25 which is the only remaining modern Russian combat jet capable to take off from grass runways
Edit: Did some research myself and MiG-29 is indeed capable of operating on dirt runways, so I was wrong. However, nobody usually does that because landing 29 on a proper runway is hard enough
Russia copied so much shit from the F-4 its so embarrassing. Those who say I'm wrong....obviously haven't done just 5 min of research lol and will show how biased and ignorant you are lol and the reading it sucked so bad was because Russia had no idea what they were copying for what it exactly was for. Lol
@@nexpro6118 the Soviet copy of the B29 was panel for panel.
At 1:20 you say "MiG were looking for a replacement for the old MiG-23 model". Judging by the footage you show, I think you meant a replacement for the MiG-21.
I caught that was well.
Not a dark doc without some silly script error
Haha just commented on that.
Plus the Mig-21 was an interceptor as we eventually found out. It just looked like it could be a fighter with it's impressive wing area.
Yes, people do make small errors...small enough that the rest of us didnt even catch it.
Fun fact is that MiG released very interesting experimental YE-8 design in early 1960s. It was MiG-21 derivative, but it featured new nose cone for a powerful radar, belly ram air intake, canards and extremely powerful engine (which gave this aircraft more than 1:1 TWR). But it was abandoned after prototype crash, and swing-wing MiG-23 was chosen as it seemed like superior design this time.
In retrospect, the Russians should have stayed with the Ye-8, which was probably going to be easier to fly in the long run. The Ye-8's powerful radar and high thrust-to-weight ratio would have made it a formidable fighter until the arrival of the F-15 in 1974 and F-16 in 1979.
@@Sacto1654 it’s easy to say now. But it couldn’t be so obvious back then.
i googled the pictures and that looked like the F16 and Eurofighter's grand dad.. amazing! thanks for the info!
I had no idea that jet existed. Definitely looks much cleaner and an early version of the F-16.
Didn’t it also use canard’a ? I think E-8/2’
My grandfather was a test pilot in the USSR air force and was certified on the migs 17-29
And of all the models he hated the 23.
They had a huge flaw (among others) that's the vertical fin was made of laminate plywood. After a few too many flight hours the wood could swell and peel the skin off.
At max take off speed the tail disintegrated.
**Edit: the trailing edge of the control surfaces were made of a honeycomb type structure under metal skin. That swelled up because of bad weather and a drippy hangar.
His right elevator disintegrated not his fin.
His second time was the automatic control system failed and caused a yaw oscillation when sweeping the wings**
Laminated plywood at mach 2+?...Yeah.. right....
What in the actual fuck.
My grandfather worked for a plywood company that through several shell companies sold inferior plywood to the Soviets.
Honestly? Sources?
Never heard of plywood in after the Mosquito...
This statement is fake.
"The Mig 23 the first fighter with swing-wings". The Sukhoi Su-17, fighter bomer, first flight was almost one year before the MiG-23, 2 August 1966.
Fighter and fighter bomber are two different categories
No ding dong the American f-111 is the first swing wing aircraft 1964 ........the stoldviets copied the f-111 and created there crappy f-23 ding dong .
Su-17 was a multirole whereas the MiG-23 was the more purebred air superiority fighter
@@seanconservativeburke he didn't say first aircraft he said first fighter. There is a difference
The Su-17 and F-111 were both ground attack jets, with their air-to-air capability being purely self-defense.
Referencing a recent “Paper Skies” docco, if I’m not mistaken the cadre at the Soviet “top gun” program at Marii used Mig-23’s and consistently owned their students, even those equipped with the Mig-29’s and SU-27’s. That suggests to me that this aircraft in the right hands was more than effective and that it’s poor reputation is perhaps not a good measure.
Part of that reputation came because of a bad combat record (kills/shot downs). But most of this record came from middle east where pilots have historically bad record with any fighters, including some conflicts where they used US-made planes.
Russia copied so much shit from the F-4 its so embarrassing. Those who say I'm wrong....obviously haven't done just 5 min of research lol and will show how biased and ignorant you are lol
Its only significant advantage over its predecessor was its supposed bvr capability, which didnt arrive when it first flew, only with its 74 upgrade package, by which point it was facing F14s. In indian service the MiG21 outlasted it by thirty years.
This was not a good aircraft.
@@egoalter1276 - Well put.
Well there’s 2 different MiG-23s - the poverty pack export models & the later MLs,, especially the MLD. 2 F16 experts, an Israeli & a Dutchman, both with thousands of hours, flew the MLD extensively & agree it was better than contemporous F16 in every parameter but one. They esp liked the radar HUD
The MiG23 was not a bad plane. It's made to outperform the F4, and it is. It is discredited because of the "Arab" versions without serious radar and medium-range missiles. In the war against Israel, the Syrians did not use the newer versions in the most correct way. And the Israelis themselves had superior organization and intelligence, information processing and military thinking, and they would still win even with older aircraft. Then in Israel there were already the new generation - F15 and F16, which are logically superior to the older design. An analogue of the MiG23 with the same level of technology and time is the MirageF1, which is weaker than the MiG23. Also the latest versions of F4 (again weaker).
Dude de Mirage F1 could take on a Mig 23 anytime of the day.
bro really said its better than a mirage
It makes me wonder how well the MiG-23 would have performed in a real first-class air force like that of the Indians. I know it wasn't particularly well-liked, and its derivative, the MiG-27 was much more popular with the IAF, but they're so much more capable than the Arab operators that they probably could have gotten a lot more out of the airframe.
@@ligma5058 In Angola in the 80s?
@@IvanIvanov-yl4mz better pilots
This plane could not have been exported to the Czech Republic during its production, because, at the time, that country was part of Czechoslovakia. The Czech Republic did not appear until many years later. It's a similar story Zimbabwe, I think.
In the video almost right after Czech Republic and Czechoslovakia are mentioned as operating countries almost side to side, which is impossible
Lol yeah.... Errrr
Well Zimbabwe is just Rhodesia renamed. Czechoslovakia was just a made up country made in the aftermath of WW1
Uhh, Rhodesia or maybe Yugoslavia?
The F 111 and Mig 23 were completely different aircraft, different sizes, different roles; there is no point comparing them.
Was about to post that we'll said. Even the 27 is more comparable to a Jaguar.
@@MrOhdead … E Type?? 🤔😉
He didn't compare them at all kid. Only mentioned the F111 because of the swing wing design...
@@michaelfried3123 If not to compare them, why bring in the F111?
@@davidrees7978 because of the swing wing design...very few planes had it, he also could have compared the Mig to the F14 also. for the same reason..
Well tbh here the MiG 23 had a bad reputation during its service cause it took part in conflicts against way more advanced western aircraft such as F16,F15,F14 etc which are 1 generation ahead of the MiG 23 variants they fought against (MF.M,BN etc). Also the pilots which operated these MiG 23s during these conflicts were much much less experienced and flying with much more outdated tech compared to the Western pilots which also explains why they had so many MiG 23 losses. If they fought soviet pilots with thousands of flight hours and more advanced and improved MiG 23 versions such as the MLA and MLD Ι doubt if the feedback would ve been the same.
Forgot to mention a good amount of 23s lost didn't even have rwr or counter measures because that was removed in export models.
yea the mig23 had some complications but the later variants especially the mld were able to keep up with gen 4s, to some extent
Don't spread lies mixed with excuses. Typical russian who never accept real truth eh? Between mig23 and F15 introduction is only 6 years. Thats pretty short time. And about soviet pilots. I don't thing they been good. Just a reckless barbarians mentality, which not changed for ages. War in Ukraine shown that.
I think also western ignorance tends to ignore facts and choose the myth of "American superiority" - There' countless evidence from both Syrian, Israeli and Soviet reports to suggest that exported Migs were responsible for downing Israeli F-15's and f-16's in the 1982 Lebanese conflict
This is clickbait. I guess it was so bad they cut short the production run after 18 years and over 5000 planes?
did you even watch the video lol?
You have to remember it was made in the USSR. So it immediately has the disadvantages of being made in a poor country with forced labor, that often produced inferior copies of superior European and U.S. designs.
@SA-ks3ex Yes. Forced labor. In the USSR. In the 70s.
I'm sure you might remember the Berlin Wall existed and that people were shot escaping to West Germany because the living conditions in East Germany were horrible.
@@SA-ks3ex Okay, what about the Gulags?
@@SA-ks3ex I don't make things up. The Gulags may have "officially" disbanded, but they've still been operating since the 1960s. Where do you think the NKVD and KGB put political dissidents they still needed to question?
It's sad you seem believe everything your government told you. I don't trust my government. And neither should you.
It's nice to see the video contain footage of an actual Mig-23 rather than of aircraft completely unrelated to the subject of the video as has been the case in your past videos. Keep this up!!
the problem with the mig-23 was precisely its novelty for the Soviet Air Force. It was a completely different fighter in terms of technology. This made itself felt, as well as the quality of production of these aircraft at some factories.
The MiG-23 took root with difficulty, but in the end the pilots fell in love with it. You have touched very superficially on the variations of the aircraft. The MiG-23M and ML versions are completely different in their characteristics, the M was exactly the aircraft whose shortcomings you described to this family. ML is a pretty good fighter, which has improved maneuverability, reduced weight, as well as a built-in system that helps pilots not to go to critical angles of attack. A new radar and new missiles will be installed.
The MLD version, in fact, is the absolute maximum of this design, an aircraft that competed with 4th generation fighters. Experienced MiG-23 MLD pilots defeated young MiG-29 pilots in aerial combat. And I personally talked to the person who piloted both planes, and he liked 23 more, in the usual daily routine.
The poor view from the cockpit is due to the fact that the aircraft began to be developed in accordance with the old doctrines, where the pilot was only the one who would deliver the aircraft to the position where it would fire missiles and return to the airfield, exactly the same doctrine was used by American pilots. But Vietnam (for the Americans) and the Middle East (for the Soviets) have made their own changes in tactics
But reputation is very important. And in ordinary circles, even in Russia, there is a stereotype about this plane. And the beginning of the plane's life eventually passed with him his whole life. Bad planes are not built in a series of more than 5,000 copies.
Russia copied so much shit from the F-4 its so embarrassing. Those who say I'm wrong....obviously haven't done just 5 min of research lol and will show how biased and ignorant you are lol and the reading it sucked so bad was because Russia had no idea what they were copying for what it exactly was for. Lol
During dissimilar combat training over Area-51, captured Floggers were used. They learned it had massive acceleration in level flight.
Russia copied so much shit from the F-4 its so embarrassing. Those who say I'm wrong....obviously haven't done just 5 min of research lol and will show how biased and ignorant you are lol and the reading it sucked so bad was because Russia had no idea what they were copying for what it exactly was for. Lol
Why USA need to learn from soviet?
@@moneyisking777 because learning about your potential enemies capabilities is obvious and smart. Not knowing that obvious fact is the opposite of smart.
I got to see one up close and personal in 1981 (at an undisclosed location) in the US. I remember thinking they were more like farm equipment compared to our fighter's of the time. They copied the air intakes from the F4, except they weren't adjustable. Pretty awesome thing to see at 23.
“Have” Program?
Declassified now, they were Egyptian
The MiG-23 had adjustable intakes, but the MiG-27 (the ground attack variant) didn't
It ain't that big of a deal anymore, an old Army buddy of mine from back in the 80's bought one a couple years ago.
The ironic thing is were were both air defense gunners (Vulcan) back then, after he bought it I figured it was a good enough time to visit him so I jumped on a motorcycle and rode from PA to Amarillo TX to see him and check it out, when we walked into the hangar where it's kept I looked at him and said "Gimmie your gun, I feel like I should be shooting it full of holes!!!".
After walking over to it I told him "Never in my wildest dreams back then did I ever imagine that one day I'd be this close to one of these things unless it was dropping bombs on me".
What amazed me about it was how massive it was for being a single engine aircraft, I mean it was BIG, looking into the engine's exhaust was like looking into a cave, then I climbed into it's cockpit and was amazed at how cramped it was for being such a massive aircraft, I only had on jeans a t-shirt and a ball cap and it was tight, I just couldn't imagine being in one of things for hours with a flight suit and helmet on, that had to be uncomfortable.
@@GasPipeJimmy I got out in 1990, so I didn't know if it was already. Nellis was the greatest first duty station ever!
Eh, the copycat F-4 intake is a myth. They are called splitter plates in aeronautical engineering.
Friend of mine from high school went in the air force in the 80's and they tracked a mig23 as it flew from Poland over east Germany then entered west Germany. When fighters were scrambled they observed it had no pilot ( he had ejected but the plane kept flying). It ended up running out of fuel and crashing into a house on the border of France and Belgium.
It was a Soviet MiG-23M that took off from a Soviet airbase in western Poland. Soon after take-off the pilot experienced sudden power loss and ejected. The plane then sabilised the flight and kept flying on autopilot untill it ran out of fuel and crashed, as you mentioned, killing an 18-year-old house occupant in Belgium. I remember that accident from the news back then.
Russia copied so much shit from the F-4 its so embarrassing. Those who say I'm wrong....obviously haven't done just 5 min of research lol and will show how biased and ignorant you are lol and the reading it sucked so bad was because Russia had no idea what they were copying for what it exactly was for. Lol
I remember reading a story about intercepted radio conversation over Angola during the Bush War. An inexperienced Angolan pilot in a Mig23 being mobbed by SAAF F1s, and panic setting in; then a Cuban voice comes over the radio, and calmly tells the pilot to point his nose up and open the throttle. No way the Mirages could keep up with that... I have no idea if it's true or not, it's just a story I read.
The MiG-23 had better acceleration than the F-14A, as many Navy pilots found out during training flights with "acquired" MiGs.
I remember Ward Carrol talking about that
@@99bimmer Constant Peg, 4477th TES. And their pilots HATED the Flogger. Some actively avoided flying it. Red Eagles by Steve Davies is a good read on the US MiGs. 11,0000 built? What bullshit is that? The total of Mig-23s is a bit over 5,000. Now the MiG-21 production was a pube hair above 11,000.
Yes Russian engines also had less life from being pushed harder than American engines.
It could out-accelerate the F16
@@mandtgrant Shut up russia bot!!1111!1111!!!111!!!!1
!!1!11!!
The MiG-23 was more about altitude and speed. It had respectable (and robust) Beyond Visual Range Capabilities in its day, only beaten by the MiG-25, but it lacked the ability to turn and burn with an F-4D/E (which was not particularly agile either). USAF pilots seem to suggest that the turn performance of the MiG-23 was 'somewhere between' an F-104A and F-4C but I am assuming it could match either at climb or altitude. The MiG-23 was really a BVR-interceptor.
the -23MF and later ML/MLA/MLD would do circles around the F-4...lol.
F4 is very comparable to mig23 , The problem is that the mig 23 also came in attack version which are essentially useless in Air combat and when counting kills they are included in the total
It's booms and zooms like American doctrine when the hellcat came in late 43
I always thought that MiG-23 seems more Interceptor than Fighter
@@thefridgeman
Possible but doubtful. The MiG-23LMD really took it to the next level. One wonders if a full avonics upgrade could have made it a "poor man's Su-27" much as the Shenyang F-8IIM was supposed to be: but neither did and the MiG-23 is pretty much retired from service everywhere. You'd think Ukraine might have replenished some stocks but they did not.
On January 1, 1993, Czechoslovakia split into two independent states, the Czech Republic and Slovakia... hope that makes sense :D
@Emily It didn't make sense what was told in the video, because when this plane was made and sold, the Czech Republic didn't exist, only Czechoslovakia existed at that time.
Regards from Prague.
Bro this landing gear alone is a engineering success. Like how did they even manage.
This is a really good channel, people actually talk rather throw cheap digs at each other.
Very impressive from you and the people who make comments.
nah, it's not. Presents inaccurate facts and draws unqualified conclusions.
This plane stands nearby my house, in a military museum (wings fully swept). Seen it up-close many times. It might be a failure, but still looks pretty bad-ass :)
It wasn't a failure and it is badass.
The plane is only part of the equation. The pilot is the majority of the equation. This plane in the experienced pilot can take on the F-15 and F-16 which it did and damaged and an F-16 in combat over Syria before sadly being shoot down in return. Israel denies it but it happened so this is A BADASS plane.
The MiG-23 was one of the best aircraft of its time. It made its first appearence in 1967. One shouldn't compare it with the later adversaries like the F-15 and the F-16. It was made to win the F-4 Phantom and it achieved this goal splendidly. In the skillful hands of the Soviet pilots it was a formidable Phantom-killer.
Nice video !!
Any way : Mig 23 was not as bad as it is portrayed here.
The Soviet doctrine was radically different from US. / NATO doctrine
The Mig 23 was planned to function for 1 or the most 2 flight sorties at the maximum.
The Soviets knew real good that it couldn’t survive in a hostile environment agains US aircraft. Also , all the samples sold/ given to Warsaw Pact countries were diluted or downgraded versions of the real Soviet Mig 23 ( at the exception of East Germany).
In Syria they didn’t perform that bad and the tally is not exactly against them. Factor in there poor if not dubious maintenance also the poor if not scandalous pilot skills of the Arab countries ( Iraq and Syria) and I’d say it performed quite well.
It’s short comings were.
-1 single engine
- 2 very hard and complicated maintenance
-3 extremely poor radar for export variants.
In overall it was not a bad plane to fly especially if you had to go in huge numbers against NATO you’d still have a chance to come back in one piece.
Fax
Everyone wants to take a dump on it in the comments
@@johnbennett951 sure. Sure. But the Flogger was a good plane , and even today with updated avionics and a reliable engine would do well against more modern craft
I think the complicated maintenance (especially on the engine) was not improved on export models as if the USSR had to go head to head with a client country, they knew that within 2 to 4 weeks the opposing airforce would be down just due to maintenance issues. And a friendly client country would get immediate backup in spares from the Soviet Union, so it was also a political lever…
finally a comment that isn't shitting on "putler" and nitpicking on every little issue of the flogger and instead is actually giving constructive criticism.
and if it truly was awful, why did they make upgraded variants and even the Mig-27 which was actually a converted Mig-23 suited for ground pounding.
I remember reading a US training team had acquired a mig23 and it was insane in acceleration. Slower than an F-14 but killed it off the line with acceleration. The engine had to be limited or else it would go too fast in a straight line
Ward Carrol talked about that recently on his channel. The 23 engine had so much power they were afraid the plane would disintegrate so they never found a top speed.
@@LuvBorderCollies yes thats where I heard it!
@@LuvBorderCollies And please remember tat it was the early S model that earned the bad reputation for the 23. The next gen M models are 8g capable, and the MLD 8.5G, unlike the early S model, which was limited to 5G. The 23 easily outaccelerated about anything of its time. The fact that its turbojet engine can go from idle to full afterburner in less than 3 seconds is mindboggling in itself.
@@DrittAdrAtta yes and a lot of the god awful combat performance came from nations/ pilots that were so bad they would lose even having a better plane. MLD is a true beast, the best this airframe was capable of
Ah yes… The SU-57, AKA the flying refrigerator!
Mig-23 was a multi-role fighter, heavily tilted towards ground-strike. comparing it against pure Western air-superiority fighters is just stupid.
Just one addition to make, the ML, P and MLD remain to this day one of the fastest accelerating combat aircraft in history, absolute king until the latest generation. Also the speed limitation, like for many contemporary top tier Russian interceptors is an airframe limitation, not a performance limitation. They will go much higher and much faster than listed maximums but neither aircraft nor pilot will survive. Even the MiG21 is like this and doesn't give inherent speed or altitude limitations in pilot manuals, it gives operator limitations for systems management, off the top of my head it's something like a stability related maximum Mach and that governs your alt but you can exceed. The MiG25 is infamously worse, with a 2.5M nominal engine limitation except with special permission and then a 2.8M airframe limitation before the canopy starts melting, but it can go much faster. The Flogger, perhaps not the downgraded versions since they had basic engines but the Russian service ones certainly experience this same story again. It will basically keep climbing or accelerating until they break, not such a good thing but it is an impressive thing, since the listed maximums are already extremely high performance. American aircraft tend to be the opposite way, actual flight performance is always quite a bit less than the listed maximums and in service they generally can't get anywhere near those figures by a long shot, no matter what you do with pilot management. There are various reasons for this and it's not really about propaganda or something, it's kind of a can of worms to explain but that's a loose summary. Russian cold war jets are really over the top in performance, you have to be impressed by them. American ones, exquisite quality and fantastic tech, I mean safety protocols doesn't even allow them to be quite the same bull in a china shop.
The F-4 had teething problems as well, and it took enduring a lot of losses over Vietnam to figure out where the flaws were, and what needed to be changed to make the F-4 a dominant aircraft.
The MiG-23 never really got a similar chance. By the time that Arab air forces flying downgraded export models got their butts whipped in the late 1970’s and early 1980’s against aircraft like the F-14 and F-15, the Soviets had already been developing the MiG-29 and Su-27 for several years. So the MUCH-improved MiG-23 MLA and especially the -MLD variants were never really tested against peer aircraft, as customers switched to the newer 4th Gen aircraft.
A parallel would be if the Vietnam War had ended in 1967, and later F-4 variants never got developed, leaving it with a poor win:loss ratio against the vastly cheaper and simpler MiG-21, for example.
There were NATO pilots who flew against the later variants of the MiG-23 flown by East German, Czech and Polish pilots who regarded it as a formidable aircraft.
When the MiG 23 appeared it had an engine of approximately the same power as the F 16 with 50% more mass than the F 16.
The instruments were not ergonomically arranged and required constant monitoring due to the manual change of the wing angles, so that the pilots had little time to take care of the situation around the aircraft.
In order for the pilots to see the situation, they would have to look between their legs. That is where the radar screen was located.
@Vat RW This is not a story about an engine, but about an airplane. If they had just put the wings from the Su-15D, the weight would have been over 4t less. The confirmation for that is IAR-95.
There was no radar screen between legs. It had HUD with radar/IRST information displayed on it.
The stats seem to had lifted from the MiG-23MS evaluated by the US. All other mass produced MiG-23's variants had more powerfull engine and no radar screen whatsoever. As for the cockpit instrumentation while it might be convoluted and somewhat unintuitive it had the advantage of following a very similar layout to other Soviet planes, making re-training very easy.
I've been watching this bloke for years, his narration has changed so much.
I think now is perfect, very polished and professional, the kind of voice you'd expect to hear in a quality TV documentary.
Excellent channel, cheers :)
The Mig-23 wasn't quite the "dud" claimed in this video. One has to remember that in the middle east conflicts, the Mig-23 was going against much more advanced aircraft like Israeli and American F-15s and F-16s. Those F-15s and F-16s weren't "monkey" versions of the aircraft like the monkey versions of the Mig-23 that were exported. Also, when the Mig-23 went up against more evenly matched aircraft like the Mirage III and Mirage F1, the Mig-23 dominated them as evidenced by the Angolan/Cuban war against Apartheid South African aggression in the late 1980s.
The video is ludicrously biased, which is typical.
Comparing stats like fuel capacity of 20-ton MiG-23 to those of 45-ton F-111 is just lowbrow - not to mention F-111 was a total failure.
MiG-23 has order of magnitude better safety record than F-16: every 7th F-16 already crashed. Now, that's what you call "questionable safety record".
India did not view it as a replacement for the MiG 21. It was always a deep strike aircraft with nuclear weapon capabilities.
Mig 21 is still in service in 2023
While 23 25 and 27 retired early
@@sonnyvictor3584because 23 and 27 were too expensive to maintain
And 25's role was replaced by satellites
@sooryan_1018 didn't the 23 have a lot of flaws in the airframe
Same for 27
@@sonnyvictor3584 it did, but a lot of it was related to maintenance issues
Back in H.S. in the early-mid 80's those Floggers were THE symbol of Soviet influence. They were all over the media. Never struck me as a bad airplane but more of an overly ambitious one. Cramming all that new sophisticated design / tech into one airframe was bound to have operational real world issues .. and it certainly did. If you lived through the height of the Cold War back then though it was and remains an icon.
Man the Flogger probably has the worst luck when it comes to all the main soviet fighters throughout the years. Such a cool aircraft and yet it's the forgotten middle child between the Fishbed and Fulcrum, and thats not mentioning the large amounts of misinformation surrounding it too.
Yes exactly and the biggest issue is that it’s relevance was directly proportional to the operational life of the F4 phantom and possibly Mirage F1
11:18 ... "thank-you-for-watching, dogs-guys..."
I was always fascinated by the complexity and size of the 23's landing gear.
I always found the MiG-23 to be an intersting aircraft. Also I really just love the way the thing looks. It looks like if you built a fighter jet muscle car. You look at it and the whole thing looks like just the most engine in the least airplane in order to be the fastest. I don't know if it was good to fly, considering I've never even flown it in a video game (and actually, come to think of that, where are my MiG-23s in games? The MiG-21 is always there, then they jump straight to the MiG-29 and SU-27). What I do know is that the thing looks fast as fuck and dangerous too.
in War Thunder you can fly the Mig-23 but the grind to get there is atrociously long.
@@axelmiranda2001 Yeah War Thunder is the only game I know of with the MiG-23 in it, but the issue with that is a 2 part problem, excluding the grind which would 100% be an issue for me.
#1 - War Thunder's high tier jet battles with missiles look stupid AF.
#2 - I would have to be playing War Thunder.
@@nomar5spaulding you buggin missle fights are fire right now wym
@@omnipotent-man8365 I mean the gameplay looks boring, stupid, and cheap.
Fighter jet muscle car! Could pass anything except a chance to fuel.
Everyone be shitting on the MIg 23, kind of sad I do like the design of the jet and plus I flew it when I was serving in the east German Air Force.
and I really liked it… Sad to see that the title of worst fighter jet belongs to it. 😢
Don’t believe everyone most of them are just going by very superficial and biased information
MiG-23, the Soviet Union's answer to the F-4 Phantom. Fun fact with the MiG-23 is that it copied the F-4 Phantom's engine intakes. So much so they even kept the blades between the intakes/fuselage meant to prevent landing nets from an aircraft carrier causing unnecessary damage to the aircraft. People often claim the intakes were not copied but it's odd the MiG-23 would have features that the F-4 had specifically for carrier landings when the MiG-23 wasn't a carrier aircraft. This heavily implies the engineers working on the MiG-23 copied features from the F-4 without knowing exactly what those features were for. To me it makes it quite obvious that they took the F-111 and married it with the F-4 Phantom and ended up with an aircraft that was barely better than the F-4 Phantom.
Problem with this aircraft though is, is that it was quickly made obsolete within only a few years of service. It was barely an upgrade over the MiG-21 when it entered service, and once more modernized versions of the MiG-23 came about it was already too late, as far more advanced western designs had already entered service.
I'd argue comparing the MiG-23 to aircraft like the F-16, F-14, and F-15 shouldn't really be done. To be honest, it's more comparable to the F-4 particularly the E variant than other American aircraft. For how much older the F-4 is. That doesn't bald well for the MiG-23 in my opinion. What I'm saying is, the MiG-23 is basically as I said before a Soviet F-4 Phantom literally. They have nearly identical performance wise with the F-4E actually having a maneuverability advantage. So it mostly comes down to weapons, electronic suites, and pilot training.
To be blunt. By the time the MiG-23 came out the concept of Super Sonic Fighters being relevant was already going the way of the dodo. They're still relevant only in the context that they're fast. It's the only advantage a F-4E or MiG-23 would have over say something like an F-16 or MiG-29 and that is if they're modernized versions. Put it this way, within a year or two the F-16 and F-15 would exist. Meanwhile the MiG-23 was considered barely an upgrade by most pilots from the MiG-21.
As I said. MiG-23 should be compared to the F-4E Phantom. It's the closest aircraft performance wise that the US Air Force had to the MiG-23 even if the MiG-23 was slightly better in some areas.
1. It was developed in order to cover the USSR borders vs. incoming F-111s and F-4 Phantoms.
* The far north and the freezing-far-east were covered by Mig-25 and some Su-15.
2. Compare it to F-14 . . . also a radar-centric weapons-systems defensive-interception platform.
3. The Mig-21bis from 1972 onwards was revised in the 1990s
thanks the to drastic miniaturization of electronics from the 1960s to the 1990s.
4. The shift to the ML version of 1978 included:
4.1 ~10% lighter air-frame.
4.2 ~10% more powerful motor.
4.3 Helmet-mounted sight for close-in IR missile dogfights.
5. The abysmal failure of the original Mig-23 might have been the cardinal issue,
which broke the back of the Egyptian pro-Soviet camel,
which was desperately looking for an answer to the F-4 Phantom II
on the Israeli service (and its indigenous missiles).
6. It might have still scored an Israeli F-16 in a hit and run attack early on June 1982.
1. Wrong, it wasn't. It was not an exclusive VPVO plane, like the Flagon. For example, it was deployed in East Germany, far away from USSR borders. And it was not developed as an interceptor, more like a multirole.
2. Wrong again. The radar in the MiG-23 (except the later MLA and MLD) was pretty much useless and actually, the planes was designed to be used under guidance from the local air defense radar operator (GCI) and there was no RIO. The F-14 huge radar and long range Phonenix for fleet defense, vs point defense in an interceptor under strick CGI control.
3. The MiG-21bis was only "revised" by other states, outside of the old USSR. Because they couldn't afford new planes.
4. Wikipedia, lol.
5. Wrong, again. The Egyptians broke away from the Soviets because of other reasons (more to do with geopolitics and their desire to get Sinai back), it was the Syrians that got their ass whipped over the Beqqa Valley and still stayed with the Russians/Soviets.
Maybe open a book instead of learning "history" from War Thunder or internet.
@@thefridgeman Mig-23 is interception only in nature - absent of FoV and large AGMs, with a few lame bombs underneath optionally to dupe African customers in the 1970s. Mig-27 was the ground-attack variant. Although USSR succeeded only with large airborne radars like the Mig-25/31. Syria got the Mi-21bis complete - nobody upgraded Mig-21outside of USSR, only outside Russian Federation in the late 1990s - by Western contractors. Syria also got Mig-23 ML + Mig-25 and later also Mig-29. Egypt simply needed the US money while not finding utility in the 1st gen of Mig-23 thus feeling crappy. Syria had no stress since it was busy occupying and plundering the Lebanon (dope, many workers, it did the 'civil' war ). By now it does it in partnership with Hezbollah. Mig-21bis was developed for a gap-stopper because between 1967-1972 all were rightfully skeptical about the Mig-23 first gen.
If you read the book, "Red Hats", about the secret squadron in Nevada, they had their own unique experiences with the MiG-23... None of them good, oddly the 23 was too aerodynamic and passed a certain speed which compressed the control surfaces it didn't want to slow down , which meant the pilot was just along for the ride for a while and was hopefully in level flight when it occurred. The F-111 and F-14 had a system that automatically set the wing angle.... The MiG-23, the pilot had set it manually, other assessments stated task load on the pilot was heavy, not good for a dogfighter. It had fuel stashed everywhere, including 50 Imperial Gallons in the Vertical Stabilizer... It looked like hitting it anywhere was going to turn it into a match, being compact and important components packed everywhere didn't help either.
That said, during the Angola vs South Africa conflict the South African Pilots in the early variants of the Mirage F-1, were reportedly not to anxious to get into a fight with MiG-23s.
Mig-21 is still in service and upgraded while mig-23 is not. that says a lot....lol...
Yeah tbh mig-21 was a way better plane then mig-23
Inthe 1970s I was involved in sourcing the components and building the "Flogger".
We had problems getting the wings to swing back and stay on when required. Ok it came in a cardboard box at 1/72 scale without glue, but it was a challenge!
How the Russians built 11,000 MiG-23/27's still bewilders me considering how woefully flawed that airplane was. No wonder the Russians started to pour money by the late 1970's into what became the MiG-29 and Su-27, both vastly superior planes.
The issue with the MiG-23 isn't that it was a bad aircraft. It did what it set out to and was a distinct improvement over the aircraft that preceded it.
The issue with the MiG-23 is that it came out shortly before the F-15, an aircraft with an undefeated record in air to air combat. Shortly followed by the F-16 and F-18, aircraft which are also exceptional compared to everything that came before.
The Mig-23's biggest flaw is that it was an incremental improvement that came at a time when the opposition was advancing its designs by leaps and bounds.
Very true Best way to judge this design is to compare it to F4 phantom Saab viggen and Mirage F1
As for the issue with the Holes in the splitter being the same as the F-4, they ARE NOT the same. Similar function but intake, BLC on the splitter and dimensions are different from the F-4.
The algorithm picked the perfect time to put this in my suggested
In 1989 one of those strayed across the iron curtain in an unmanned freak flight and crashed in Belgium...
In bellegem
The Mig 23 did well against our Mirage F1's in Angola. The radar and their air to air rocket was superior to what we had.
Ooh I was waiting for this one. Ironically one of my favourite planes of all time.
MiG-23 was significant memory of my childhood. Been watching them with my parents during landings. And they were very often flying over our heads. The weird silhouette and long afterburner flame with rings were realy interesting thing to rememeber.
Some Flogger tidbits. The intakes were copied from the F4 to the extent that they had inboard netcutters (which served no purpose for the a/c whatsoever). Its fire detection system (and this a/c had significant fire risks) was optical, rather than smoke-sensing; so the pilot only got an alarm if there was already a fire large enough to trigger an optical sensor. The ventral fin had to be included because of high speed instability (a common feature of Soviet fast jets). It retracted when the gear came down, meaning the pilot was looking for "four greens" rather than three. And even with it retracted, the clearance at the stern of the fuselage was tiny enough that landings had to be at a very precise AoA.
It had serious problems with stores. The Sovs couldn't figure out how to copy the F111 or Tornado's swivelling pylons, so the Flogger, at least early models, was limited to fuselage or wing glove hardpoints only.
"Worst" is a bit subjective, but for those who describe the MiG23/27 as "awesome", I suggest you look again.
About the netcutters, i saw comment under different video saying that it was used for cooling of avionics not just some copied purposeless feature.
The ventral fin was in fact to reduce stability; it was too stable in roll. Though I very much doubt you'd understand how that works.
"Powerful fighter jets like the SU 57" You meant to say powerful flying continents?
I love Dark Docs. Even with the script error in every single video 🤣
I like the four direct contradictions to 'the worst jet ever ' narration in this one.
Westerners in 1970s-early/mid1980s were familiar with MiG-23MS, downgraded export version if MiG-23MF.
The latter versions - MiG-23ML/MLD could fight well against the F-16s and Mirage2000.
If anyone wants more on this aircraft paper skies has a wonderful video on it. Use both these videos to enjoy the history side of TH-cam
Still a good looking Bird regardless of any design flaws.
Fascinating piece of aviation history, thank you !
Child: I want an F-14.
Mother Russia: We have an F-14 at home!
The F-14 they have at home.. ^.
I believe it's hard to compare Russian airplanes, when operated by russian pilots in Russia, and the same planes operated by foreign pilots in foreign countries.
(ex: the Mig 21 in Vietnam)
Russian pilots flew against the IDF in the 70's. The Egyptian pilots were getting shot down a lot and the Russian advisors were mocking them for being bad pilots. The Egyptians got mad and told the Russians to go out and prove they are better. The Russians met the same fate. The IDF shot down a number of Russian piloted planes in the Sinai. Some Russians didn't make it out but others who did were captured or bodies found later.
Same thing happened during the Korean War with Chinese and Russians.
@@LuvBorderCollies I believe not many Russian Pilots were shot down in Vietnam.Those Migs that were shut down weren't piloted by Russian pilots.Russian Pilots did shot a lot of American planes.
@@pedroleal7118 The US bent over backwards to not hit soviet and chicom missile troopers and advisors on the ground. There's no evidence that soviet pilots participated like in Korea though.
@@majungasaurusaaaa What I meant is that Russian Aviation record is different from the countries they sold the plane to.
I had a version of Mig23 body on my University campus which was gifted by the Indian airforce and was one of the coolest thing on the campus.
It was hollow from inside so one day me and the bois in dead night went through its engine outlet and stuck our heads out of its cockpit. Fun days.
Another great video
Read something about an American test pilot flying either the MiG 23 or the 27. He was surprised that they weren't very big.
My father was The commanding officer for Mig 23BN/Mig 27 squadrons
He always said that was the only aircraft which gave him a hard time when it came to instructing his juniors....
Fell sorry for your father being stuck in the Soviet “military”.
@@FactNinja prob was somewhere other than Russia but still an Allie to Russia
The Engine was reason many IAF Pilots lost their life same with R25 of MIG21BIS in IAF Service..
Ever heard of the Sukhoi 17?
It was another Soviet era swing wing design.
When I look a this fighter jet all I can think of is: “I’m an island boy, I'ma just island boy, I’m an island boy, I'ma just island boy…”
🤓
It was built for a war that was never fought ie: a conflict possibly nuclear in central Europe where airbases would have been probably wiped out early on - in this context we would have been left with the Harrier as the champion of the West… at more or less the same time Dassault was developing the F1 with a strong reinforced undercarriage…to operate from hastily prepared runways…
The first time I saw an F1 making a low pass in the cold, grey French air was in '84, when there was much anxiety about the Cold War heating up. I got a little panicky since the Dassault hotrod's empennage, when viewed from below, looks so much like the MiG-23's!
Cuban mig23 actually shot down a SAAF mirage f1
The requirement was not for a shorter take-off run - but rather the ability to meet the performance requirements with the larger (heavier) radar, weapons and fuel requirements, while still being able to operate from the airfields then operating MiG-21s it was designed to replace. Scaling up the MiG-21 would mean scaling up the take-off run. Hence, the swing wing. It was an interceptor first. Not a dogfighter. The comparison to the F-111 is ludicrous. It did what it was designed to do.
Almost all you wrote is wrong.
1) requirement was lower take off and landing speed
2) yes, larger radar was a requirement
3) scaling up would not scale up take off run, that is not how aircraft work
4) it was not an interceptor first, it was a front-line fighter by every bit, and outperformed the phantom (which it was designed to counter) in every category except the amount of ordnance carried
5) but yes, comparison to the F-111 is just stupid.
@@19Koty96 Scaling up weight wise definitely affects take off run - not necessarily 1 to 1, but I never claimed that. Lower take-off and landing speed shortens takeoff and landing run
@@someoldguyinhawaii4960 youre scaling up engine power and wing area too, which is mainly why i say it makes no sense. the bigger su15 generally had very similar takeoff and landing params to 21, despite being twice the size
Having been a weapon system mechanic/loader on the F111 in the 80's. With the terrain following radar, the F-111 was a high-speed low level all weather medium bomber. While in it's initial design including the Navy model, it was probably thought of being useful as a fighter which as you know the mission changed once the Navy got out of the program. Although it did have a 20 mm gun in the weapons Bay, I believe that was to meet the numbers game by allowing it to be a tactical aircraft instead of a strategic aircraft. I did learn that the F-111 was used in ground support much like the A10 because of its ability to fly slow with the wings forward. Imagine if that weapons Bay had been fitted with a 30 mm. Only half of the weapons Bay was used for the 20 mm gun and it's magazine drum.
But by the F-105 the AF was already saying "we're not risking an expensive jet to strafe a truck". The F-111 did "low and fast"+ "one pass, haul ass" + "speed is life" air support. Low and slow with wings forward? Nope.
Vietnam didn't own any Mig 23, some "Mig 23 in Vietnam" pictures were actually Soviet aircrafts that based in Vietnam during the Cold War
Dark skies at 4:00 can you please include footage of a mig-23 in an airshow? I want to hear the pure sound or the roar of the engine instead of having to search one.
Like the comment so he can see this message.
That might exist somewhere, but most likely on celluloid film or VHS video tape
F-15 was made with laminated plywood too, that is why it can fly without one wing
Despite being a problematic aircraft, the MiG-23 family is just cool looking! The Russians have a knack for creating pretty planes. (Su-15 and MiG-19 are a couple of my favorites too.)
Was it the one that couldn't take off? I'd be pissed too
I always enjoy your videos. But l did think this one a little harsh. The F111 Aardvark mentioned in comparison was in itself a poorly executed design and hanger Queen. But l enjoy the camaraderie and good manners in the posts.
I have also never heard of the Mig-23P...last versions were the 23MLA and MLD. These were VERY capable aircraft. The 23s were retired not only for budget cuts but to enable the Mig-29 to come online.
P is just another name for the ML series I think
yeah MLD is just a fuckin beast, but too late for MiG 23
@@bodenplatte1360 lol lmao
23P is air-defence specific variant of ML with different datalink.
@@19Koty96 oh, thanks for the info, my knowledge on modern fighters is kinda lacking compared to what I know about WWII birds
But it looked super cool, and that folding ventral stabilizer was kinda nifty.
If it was that bad then it should be called Flunker
Good to watch the action in this video, however, it has too many inaccuracies
The Russian mig 23 was a decent jet for its time. It is also one of the fastest accelerate aircraft and can also out run f16 it is also the powerfulest single engine fighter with 28,660lbf of thrust for its time
But it's engine was still unreliable and had a short lifespan. Outruning an F-16 was no good when the F-16s were still shooting them down...And shooting them down with ease....
Yes f16 can shoot them down what f16 came out 8 years after mig 23 and f16A or early f16 can't do bvr
Thanks
Western people think the MiG-23 is the worst Russian combat aircraft? Interesting, I thought otherwise. For instance, I’ve heard the Israelis felt the Flogger was a much better air combat performer than the later and far more advanced MiG-25.
Mig 25 was kinda just a flex ngl
Thank you so much for mentioning this. I just find it funny how people (internet geeks) always try to overhype the mig 25 while the plane was basically a shithole and even now I still think the Soviet lied about his top speed
I don't think anyone really thought the 25 was a great dogfighter after they got over the scariness of its top speed.
@@16rumpole initially there were fears the 25 was quite maneuverable. It looks like it should be on paper. Turns out it was incredibly heavy which affected it’s ability to maneuver.
@@kwharrison6668 if you had a look at its lift/drag and mass properties, its actually really not that bad; it just has severe limitations put on it due to thin wings, after all, dogfighting was not its purpose, the 25 _was_ (unlike the 23) a pure bred interceptor. And it was amazing at that role.
Did he just say the SU-57 is a powerful fighter?
Beg to differ- the Yak 38 was by far the worst Soviet fighter.
Mig-23 was 3d generation jet-fighter and it's supposed to counter 3d generation planes of nato countries. And nato had 2 of them - american F-4E Phantom II and French Mirage F1. And among them Mig-23 was the best and was superior that was proven in all conflicts.. But Mig-23 had bad luck, because of few circumstances and it was forced , mostly to counter American 4th generation jet fighters - F-16, F-15 and F-14 and it most cases Mig-23 was of export versions, driven by 3d world countries pilots and terribly outnumbered. Though, Mig-23 had worse characteristics it managed to be more or less even and managed to get a few victiories against 4th generation jet fighters. In some areas it outperformed F-16 and managed to give real fight to F-15.
The intakes were direct copy's of the F4 Phantom's. Russia obtained a few good condition crashed F-4's as well as 105's and reverse engineered them.
They have the exact number of holes as the intake of F-4 Phantom.
and other geometry and dimensions
anyway, it would be very abstract if they had the same essentially the same air intakes, they must be adapted to the engine, not the other way around, so copying the intake from f 4 would not have any sense
but whatever
@@tonieistotne9471well they did copy the intake design, its a 1:1 lol
@@Woodland_Warrior have you seen them side by side? because if so, the second question, sorry but are you blind? I've never understood where this theory comes from and how someone is able to believe it, even apart from the fact that the intakes on the mig-23 are almost half the size of those on the f-4, even looking at them for more than a second is hard not to say that these are two different constructions, one is rounded along the entire length and the other is straight-on with only rounded corners
@@tonieistotne9471 Sorry, it isn't correct to say 1:1, but it is pretty damn close. The designs are *nearly* identical. In fact, you highlighted one of two differences. First, you're correct, the F-4's intake is rounded all the way whereas on the Mig-23 it is only rounded on the edges, but this isn't a big difference... at all. The second difference is an add on the Soviets engineered which was a movable ramp to help regulate airflow into the engine. Beyond these two things, they are almost identical, and vary only slightly in size.
6:23 Vietnam never had the Mig-23. They moved from Mig-21 straight to Su-22 and Su-27/30 family. Last Mig-21s were retired in 2015.
Groundbreaking design= makes big impact craters.
he said that the 23 was the only Soviet wing fighter; that's just not true, the Fencer was a swing wing plane. This guy needs to do his research better. Granted the Fencer was more of a fighter bomber and strike aircraft.
It did well during the Iraq Iran war.