It was Valentine's Day 1955 in the erstwhile Soviet Union. On that winter morning - the high was just under -5 degrees Celsius - there was something in the air at Zhukovsky Airfield, an airbase some ...

For a quarter of a century, much of the news about the Indian Air Force (IAF) has been about the abysmal flight safety record of its premier fighter – the redoubtable MiG-21. On September 26, after ...

Key Points - The Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-21 "Fishbed," one of the Cold War's most iconic and widely produced supersonic fighter jets (appx 11,000 units), entered service in 1959. -Designed as a ...

Today the IAF phased out the MiG-21 Bison after a 62-year-long career, spanning two thirds of the air force’s total lifespan. The MiG-21 is often thought of as synonymous with the Indian Air Force, ...

Compared to contemporaries like the American F-4 Phantom II, the MiG-21 was less complex and far cheaper to produce—but could hold its own against the more sophisticated American jet. The best Soviet ...