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That MiG-25 defection


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Hi, JMChladek

I must admit that of those books you listed I only read Peebles' Shadow flights. Other tidbits of information about Kapustin Yar came from various other publications and web pages, so I am hardly an expert on this topic. Still, apart from lack of any official British documents, which would confirm Kapustin Yar flight the most doubtful part to me looks aircraft's route. Why would Canberra's crew risk a lengthy daylight overflight of several Warsaw pact countries and practically whole length of European part of the Soviet Union, when taking off from and later landing back in Turkey or Iran would cut flying time and thus risk of interception or mechanical failure in half? Admittedly, this could be attributed to British overconfidence and their refusal to launch another deep penetration daylight reconnaissance mission after the supposed Kapustin Yar flight seems to support that. Just my thoughts. Cheers

Jure

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Was not the Kapustin Yar overflight the one where Kruschev harangued MacMillan in the UN, where he took off his shoe and banged the desk with it, ranting away in Russian? He threatened to shoot our Canberras down. Mac's reply was 'can I have than translated?'

 

  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tm7PY8GmeFE

 

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Hi, bentwaters81tfw

Those threats were actually made in June 1956 on Soviet Aviation Day celebration, according to Peebles. Kruschev warned General Twining not to send their intruders into Soviet airspace, as they would be shot down. He threatened to shot down all Canberras and he referred to them as flying coffins. I believe Twining was commanding USAF at the time, so Hruschev probably ment Martin RB-57 Canberras.

Shoe banging session actually happened in October 1960, more than five months after Powers had been shot down. According to Wikipedia, Hruschev actually lost his nerves over Philippine delegate's allegations about human and political rights violations in Soviet Union. Cheers

Jure

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On 9/28/2016 at 0:40 AM, Antoine said:

 

Really?

Then flight over France were a different story, as at some time in the sixties, U-2 (flying from the UK, I presume?) used to fly along the Rhône valley where the first nuclear plants were build.

That is, before those flights were intercepted by Mirage III (One interception is well documented, and I believe there were a few more), as they stopped thereafter... For a few years only, as the next visitor was the SR-71, against which we had no defenses.

I didn't mention France. I only mentioned China and the USSR. Okay, yes France left NATO in 1963, but it still kept independent mutual defense commitments with Germany and other European countries, so your country was still a western ally, even if the decision was made to leave NATO in order for France to maintain absolute control over its nuclear arsenal. As to why such overflights were carried out... I'm guessing there were multiple reasons from testing of new recon "equipment" to getting an idea of what France's nuclear production might be projected to be and the like.

One thing is for sure though, interception by a Mirage of a U-2 in French airspace is one thing, but it is highly doubtful there would have been an attempt to shoot it down so that is likely why the decision was made to do such an overflight. If such a flight had been attempted by a USAF jet over a Soviet Allied country, the results would have been a lot different.

Just to be clear as well, SR-71s have done overflights over some "threat countries" at times, such as during the Yom Kippur war and over Libya for El Dorado Canyon Bomb Damage assessment. But even then the flight paths were carefully planned to keep it out of the range of known SAM batteries. The USAF knew they had a good unique capability, but they weren't willing to make too many assumptions as that is what got Powers shot down a couple decades earlier. Steadily evolving recon satellites pretty much made the need for deep penetration of a Soviet or Chinese airspace with a USAF recon aircraft no longer necessary.

Edited by JMChladek
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