Mig-29 Fulcrum in service....

Yes that I know the U.S. did buy some MIG-29 for the aggessor squadrons in Nevada.Also for Top Gun in San Deigo,Ca and bought some SU's for fight and test evaluations.Digger

tnx. where did you get that source?

I've been researching this like crazy. An article I found from AvWeek dated 13Nov1997 says that the USAF bought 21 MiG 29s' ( 6XMiG 29A, 1XMiG 29B, 14XMiG 29C) from Moldova (wherever that is). They are reforming (reformed?) Red Eagle Squadron. I'm still looking for references/pictures of other Russian planes in the US (preferably in US markings)

That is a cool site. Wish they would ID their pics though. The three pics of the Mi 24 are all of US operated Hinds. They also list these as being used by the US: Mi 8/17; Mi 24; L-39; An 2 and the An-32. Now if I had pictures of these!!!

Theres a mig15 a su27 and a new one I havent found out what it is yet on display at the nellis red flag area just inside the nelli blvd gate. I dont know if they were bought or more likely captured Also at the nellis air show last year there was a fire engine red mig 15 flying around

The fire engine red MiG 15 would be the one from stolli aviation. They are a display team operating several Lims. I got to see one of their planes at an air show last year and one of the guys with them told me that they were bought in Poland.

Roadkill, I'm really glad you're getting some of the info that you needed. This is some really interesting stuff... I also wish that site would id their pictures.

I feel like I'm just dashing my head against an immovable object. This is so frustrating. Now that I have a suadron (4477 TES) I thought it would be easier. Guess again. Tha lack of material on this is equally frustrating. I've gone so far as checking out some of the UFO sites. And people call me a crackpot!! I found one where a woman swears she was kidnapped by a UFO and had Elvis sing to her while they did weird tests on her. My only respite to keep my sanity is to frequently duck in to the forum. Hey, another use for the forum, PSYCHIATRIST!

Here is a link to an article that was in Airman Magazine that's about how the USAF obtained it's Mig-29's

http://www.af.mil/news/airman/0598/mig.htm

Yes, the MiG-29s in American service came from the former Soviet republic of Moldova. From What I understand, Moldova is the poorest of the former republics and the MiG-29s proved economically unsupportable for them.

They sold part, if not all of their MiG-29 fleet to America who was quite willing to pay a considerable price for them. I believe the U.S Army's Mil 24 Hinds also came from Moldovan sources.

Its not completely unlike The Czech MiG-29 fleet after the break up of Czechoslovakia. The bulk of the Czcehoslovakian Air Force's Fulcrum fleet was based at Sliac in central Slovakia While the bulk of its MiG-21 fleet was at Bechene in central Czech Republic. The Czechs didn't have a viable number of MiG-29s and the Slovaks didn't have enough 21s to bother supporting. As a result, the Czech fleet of 29s was sold, part to Slovakia and part to Poland and part of the Slovak 21 fleet was sold to the Czechs and the other portion was sold to other buyers.

Wow, crazy. That is not much of a surprise though. Mig 29s were (are) operated by a very large group of countries, many of which were part of the USSR. Heck, East Germany had mig 29s, and when they unified again with West, the migs would have been readily available. I'm not even going to begin to list countries where it'd be possible to buy. If you have enough money, you yourself can buy one. Since the collapse of the Soviet Union revealed easter Europe to be in a trully desparate monetary situation, fat American dollars would have been all too welecome by many countries :)
On the other hand, I'm sure that there are numbers of American planes in places you probably wouldn't believe.
A similar discussion arose on the Armor forum. Soldiers from Iraq took pics of some of the armor found there, and you would not believe what kinds of stuff they found. Iraqis even had Shermans. Yep, SHERMANS!! :)

Yes, well alliances shift back and forth and who supports you one day doesn't the next. The Iraqi Shermans are more likely the British Firefly version of them as Iraq was part of the British Empire for several years.

Israel is an interesting study in this shifting supplier thing.

Currently, its military is either domestic developed stuff or American supplied.

In 1948 it was getting some British WWII surplus equipment and some German originated stuff (Czech built Bf-109s and ME-262s)

A few years later, Britain dropped support and France stepped in to fill the void, supplying a multitude of machinery over several years (mysteres, Vautours, Mirages, Noratlases...and thats just a few of the aircraft.

After France dropped support, the Israelis domestic aviation industry worked the Mirage into the Nesher and eventually the Kfir.

Then came America, supplying A-4s, F-4s, F-16s, F-15s, C-130s, E-2s..... American support continues to today.

I've heard very recently that America wanted Israel to halt development of the Merkava mk.IV tank and buy the Abrams instead. I'm not sure what the truth of that is, but they'd be crazy to stop the Merkava production, with as long as they've been making them already and the amount of money they've invested, plus the type's more than obvious battlefield proven abilities, they'd end up on the losing end of that deal for sure.

Back to MiGs; they've been a proven seller on secondary markets for years and likely will continue to be, primarily because most of them have a reputation for toughness and trouble free operation.

Germany recently announced it will be ceasing MiG-29 operations this year.

Other types that have done well on secondary markets:
F-5 Freedom Fighter (shortly after Canada retired its fleet of them, 12 of those retired aircraft were sold to Botswana's military)
Mirage III variants
F-16
F-86 Sabre
T-33