The Unrealized Potential of the MiG-29

In the late 1970s, the Soviet Union would develop  a new fighter aircraft which, for a time, rivalled the F-16 as the best dogfighter in the sky. The  MiG-29 Fulcrum - as it became known - was a great design. As time has gone on, the aircraft  has remained a part of Russia’s inventory, although outclassed by the newer Flanker variants,  and new models of the original western rivals, like the Viper and Eagle.

In this video we  will look at the classic Cold War fighter, the Fulcrum, which despite its public  reputation, was sadly overlooked for sustained development. For over two decades it  has arguably never reached its full potential. In the late 1960s, the MiG-25 Foxbat gained  international prominence.

Very modern looking for its time, the aircraft was largely a mystery  in the west. Washington believed it may be an air superiority fighter, fast and highly agile.  It was very fast, but not agile.

The MiG-25 was primarily an interceptor, made to hunt intruders  like the SR-71. Whilst it was good propaganda for the Soviets that the west believed the  Foxbat was an air superiority fighter, designers in the USSR knew that the  Americans would respond with an aircraft to match what they thought the  Soviets had. They were correct; designers were hard at work on two new  designs; the F-15 for air superiority, to supersede the F-4 Phantom, and the F-16 in a  close defence role, basically replacing the F-5.

In the early 70s Sukhoi had been tasked  with developing a new aircraft as part of the Soviet Advanced Frontline Fighter  program. And then a second - the Advanced Tactical Lightweight Fighter program, with  Mikoyan tasked with developing a rival for whatever emerged from the United States  own Lightweight fighter program. A concept, codenamed Project 9, came out of these efforts  and by 1974 development had begun.

In 1977, the new fighter aircraft would take its maiden  flight - the Mikoyan MiG-29 Fulcrum. It was small and agile, Mach 2 capable, easy  to operate, and technically advanced. With everything looking good, in 1983, the Fulcrum would officially enter  service with the Soviet Air Force.

From the beginning, the true rival to the Fulcrum  was the F-16. Both were medium to short range, lightly armed, fast, agile fighters.  Likewise, the initial versions of both aircraft had a strong emphasis on  dominating within visual range combat.

It is claimed that in the years just  after the fall of the Soviet Union, German pilots who had the opportunity to  try both aircraft in training missions reported a number of things; firstly, that  the MiG-29 was a more “touchy” aircraft, maybe because of the ability to toggle flight  control systems. Secondly, it had strong haptic feedback through the stick and throttle,  resulting in a more “raw” flying experience. The flight control systems made this MiG  a dangerous and unstable aircraft in the wrong hands, which for new pilots  would be a distinct disadvantage, creating a steeper learning curve.

On the other  hand, with an experienced pilot in the cockpit, this high level of sensitivity would be  beneficial. As with other Soviet jets from the 70s and 80s, it came with options to  expand the pilot’s control over his jet; notably, the ability to switch off the automatic flight  control systems, which would bypass any limits and essentially route all movement to the joystick  alone, much like a World War 2 fighter. Again, very dangerous in the wrong hands, but with  experience a tactic which could provide an edge.

This attribute is noteworthy for the time. During  the 60s and 70s, as fly-by-wire systems and flight computers improved, it divided pilots.  Older pilots would sometimes claim that they preferred older flight controls, which allowed  them to feel the subtleties of the aircraft better.

This complaint was echoed by some Israeli  pilots who moved from older Phantoms or Mirage 3s to the F-16, which had a far smoother digital  control system. It all came down to preference. The Fulcrum has long been claimed  to have an instantaneous turn rate at optimal speed of between  24 to 26 degrees per second, with some claims going as high as 28 degrees. 

With a light load-out and correct fuel quantity, this could hypothetically be true and  a significant claim. Modern F-16s can optimally pull an instantaneous turn rate of 22 to  24 degrees per second, whilst the old F-16A could reportedly go up to 26 degrees, with its legacy  loadout of wingtip sidewinders and no drop tanks. In terms of sustained turn rate, it  was also close.

At around 10,000 feet, and with roughly half a tank of fuel, the  F-16A could hold a sustained turn rate of 19 degrees per second in a level turn, reaching  peak performance at around Mach 0. 73. The Fulcrum on the other hand - according to declassified  Air Command and Staff College documentation, as well as the Luftwaffe manual - is capable of  a sustained turn rate of 16.

6 degrees per second, albeit at a different stated  altitude of 5,000 feet, at around Mach 0. 55 with full air-to-air loadout. So, we could say that despite the differences in measurement and altitude, speed, and load-out, if  both sides were sending their best, it would have been a near even fight during the early years  of the Fulcrum, coming down to pilot skill and perhaps only outdone by slight advantages the  Viper may have held after a sustained fight.

However, the Fulcrum did hold one noteworthy  advantage in that pilots could use the Shchel-3UM helmet mounted display, giving them the ability to  acquire targets within a wider envelope. From 1984 onwards this system also allowed employment of  the R-73 short-range air-to-air missile. The F-16 would have been limited to boresight acquisition  at that time.

Thus, it is possible that at one point in the mid-1980s, the Fulcrum may have  been the deadliest dogfighter in the skies. In beyond visual range combat,  however, it was a different story. As time went on, the Sukhoi Su-27 ‘Flanker’  slowly adopted the technologies which gave the Fulcrum an edge in the dogfight. 

The Flanker was already a highly agile aircraft - despite its massive size. In a drawn  out dogfight the Fulcrum may have had an edge, with its slightly higher consistent turn  rate and lower drag. However, a good pilot in the Flanker could end a dogfight quickly using  high angle-of-attack manoeuvres.

The adoption of similar helmet mounted target acquisition systems  gave Flanker pilots the same ability that was once the exclusive advantage of the Fulcrum. The  Flanker already had better range, a better radar, considerably larger weapons stores capacity,  and superior beyond visual range capabilities. The Soviets began to realise that a Flanker would  be able to track, lock, and destroy a Fulcrum before the two ever even entered a merge.

Unless,  of course, the Fulcrum addressed its weaknesses. However, after the collapse of the Soviet Union,  the new Russian Federation was in economic disarray. This likely played into the decision  to dedicate resources for Flanker development over the Fulcrum.

Modern combat was favouring  the ability of the Flanker over the Fulcrum; dogfights were less likely, and more powerful  radars meant longer range missions were almost a given. If Russia was to have one aircraft to lead  the fleet, all signs pointed to the Sukhoi design. While Mikoyan’s Fulcrum would never be completely  abandoned, it would essentially lose priority as the years went by.

The advantages it  held earlier on slowly became outclassed by newer developments. The Flanker surged ahead  in development, and the performance gap between the MiG-29 and rivals like the Viper or Eagle  just kept getting wider in air-to-air combat. Mikoyan reorientated the Fulcrum towards  air-to-ground tasking, it also received R-77 compatibility (a beyond-visual-range  air-to-air missile), but it’s unclear if these upgrades elevated its capabilities  close to that of the Sukhoi’s Flanker.

While the Flanker may have been comparable to the  F-15, the Fulcrum - much like the F-16 - would have to be adapted to fit into a role it was  never clearly intended to fill. At the core of the Fulcrum design was agility, short range  combat, with a specific focus on dogfighting, just like the F-16A. We could speculate that  if a MiG-29 upgrade program had received higher priority, the Fulcrum may have followed  in the footsteps of later F-16 variants; adopting a far better radar, improved  beyond-visual-range capabilities, newer engines, advanced internal systems, and  so on.

Just maybe, like the Viper, its high speed and agility could have made it a deadly  opponent both within and beyond visual range. To the credit of the Fulcrum modification  programs that were done, the aircraft was improved. But these improvements were nowhere  near the upgrade programs of its rival, the F-16, which went on to produce cutting edge variants  with over 2,000 aircraft still in service today.

After two decades of retaining Soviet era  technology, the Fulcrum finally underwent a large-scale modernisation program in the mid  2000s. This program took the aircraft out of the Soviet era and introduced a variety  of newer systems, like glass cockpits, an improved HOTAS, improved helmet mounted system,  and so forth. This resulted in the MiG-29M and M2, and the carrier based MiG-29K.

This  program (despite being more limited in scope than those seen on the Sukhoi  fighters) proved the sound airframe design had unique strengths and could still  be a worthy platform for development. This was followed by a second major improvement  program, producing the MiG-35 Fulcrum-F by 2017, and limited production and trials by  2021. Touted as a 4++ generation fighter, this is what Mikoyan needed to  keep the Fulcrum concept alive.

With a handful of interested foreign  customers and two dozen on order for the Russian Aerospace Forces, we may see the  Fulcrum employed again as the MiG-35. In fact, according to Russian media, the MiG-35 may have  already been tested in the Ukrainian conflict. While anything could hypothetically happen to  the huge number of Fulcrums, from the early 2000s onwards, the focus has been to maximise  the capabilities of the Irkut-manufactured Su-30 variants, which have become Russia’s  most marketable export aircraft, and its most versatile domestic multirole aircraft.

The  role of frontline air superiority has largely been handed off to the KnAPPO-built Su-35S, and  likely to continue into the foreseeable future. The story of the MiG-29 is an interesting  one. In the short term it was a serious adversary to the Viper, but as time went on,  the Fulcrums slowly faded into the background as Sukhoi’s designs took centre stage.

This  was likely due to Russia’s economic problems in the 1990s - something the United  States didn’t have to deal with at that time – and severely limited  the Fulcrum’s sustained development. Hope now lies with new MiG-35 program for any  significant future for the Mikoyan design.