[CyberAnt]

I have a second and third question ...??

What is your assessment of this little "incident" being a dry run to take down the aircraft - the same as the one in China - except they knew this aircraft was not the exact same kind ...??

But ... did they have to get a visual to be able to tell the difference ...??

[Spook86]

To answer your question, yes, it could have been a dry run, especially since NK hasn't conducted one of these in quite a while. BTW, it's no accident that the intercept was conducted by MiG-23s and MiG-29s; not only are these the best fighters in the DPRK inventory, they're also flown by the most experienced pilots. And, not surprisingly, it's very rare for the MiG-23s and MiG-29s to operate together--another indication that this was not your typical intercept....