Posted on 04/04/2014 8:06:36 PM PDT by sukhoi-30mki
KIEV, April 4 (RIA Novosti) – Several mothballed Mikoyan Mig-29 Fulcrum fourth-generation fighter jets were returned to combat service in western Ukraine, the country’s Defense Ministry said on Friday.
“Specialists of our team have already returned several planes to service,” the ministry quoted an unnamed commander of an Air Force unit near Ivano-Frankivsk as saying. “We are now conducting test flights. Soon, more mothballed fighter jets will take off again.”
The state of Ukraine’s armed forces came under close scrutiny when the new government took office in late February, after months of violent uprising.
Kiev launched extensive combat readiness checks of its armed forces in early March, following Crimea’s announcement that it was ready to secede from Ukraine and join Russia.
Defense Minister Ihor Tenyukh said in his report to the president that the checks revealed “unsatisfactory” condition of the armed forces.
He said that out of 507 combat planes and 121 attack helicopters, only 15 percent are serviceable. Air Force crews lack proper training and only 10 percent of them are capable of performing combat tasks.
/johnny
Ukraine is in no condition to fight a war with Russia. Two decades of neglect of its armed forces have taken their toll.
Ukraine’s reservists supposedly only have two weeks training. I’m sure that gives the citizens a lot of confidence. Unfortunately, Zero wants to rake our military down to the same level.
"You not say Ukraine weak."
LOL... glad my mouth was empty, damn
How many older mothballed fighters could the US return to service?
I bet we have a lot mothballed. I remember a year or two back, Eglin’s 33rd TFW flew their F-15s to the boneyard.
Bump
Where did they get the spare parts?
Hmmmm.
They are gonna need considerable practice and training exercises to get up to the game the Russians can mount tomorrow.
Polish RAF pilots had lower quality planes than their British counterparts during the Battle of Britain, but had a higher kill ratio. It’s the pilot, not the plane.
It’s the pilot, the training and the experience, not the plane.
Do your best Ukraine!
/we should be supporting these brave souls. They are fighting for their country and many here are making fun of them? For shame FR..for shame.
It isn’t just that. The design philosophy of the Russian equipment is very different than ours. We design ours to be serviceable, maintainable, and repairable for rather long lifetime in times of war AND peace,often at the cost of initial cost and performance. Russian equipment is designed to be running much closer to the edge, and generally needs more upkeep and parts. Running lightly-built, highly stressed planes and engines near the edge was one of the reasons that the Russian planes looked pretty darned good on paper vs ours for years (and still do).
Oddly enough, there is a perverse unintended consequence of this. If you buy aircraft from the Russians, you had better have a price-controlled contract and be on good political terms with them as long as you plan on using then, because otherwise your fancy plane will be doing gate duty at the local public park in no time. On the other hand, US equipment is much easier to get (or even make)parts for, and has great training and documentation. Ask the Iraqi’s about their MIG’s at the dawn of the gulf wars. Then, ask the Iranians how their Shah-era planes are holding up these days. Amazingly well, I have read.
Yes, I remember an account from “Thunderbolt” by US ace Robert S. Johnson: The Polish pilots were considered slightly crazy, but could make those P-47’s do things the designers said they could not do.
Ukraine has a pretty high tech arms and space industry. They ought to be able to make ‘em themselves.
Pretty picture!
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