Day: June 20, 2013

The following book review is written by a guest reviewer.

Reviewed by Sean YJ Chua

This is book is an excellent account combining the histories of the Arab air forces and the geo-political developments of the region in the period of 1950s-1960s.

This volume is a sequel to Volume 1 but with lots of additional insights with numerous old photos- some rather grainy but nevertheless very rare and unpublished.

The book begins with an addenda/errata to the Volume 1 with updates and corrections to every chapter and again with many rare photos complementing the text.

Chapter 1 detailed the development of the Iraqi AF with help from the RAF and of course complement by excellent photos of numerous British aircraft such as Hunter, Vampire followed by the arrival of Soviet supplied MIG15/17/19/21.

Chapter 2 focused on Egyptian air force and the development of its aeronautical industry. Egypt complex political relations with the Germans, Soviets is well described in this book. The indigenous Egyptian jet fighter the HA300 (A Mirage III lookalike) with the help of the Germans was used as a political bargaining chip against the Soviets to supply them their most advanced MIGs at that time the MIG-21. The rest of the chapter is focused on the early operational history of the MIG21F-13s which provides very good read.

Chapter 3 entailed the combat operational of Iraqi AF against the Kurds and the other aircraft operated by Iraqi and Egyptian AFs such as the MIG19, Hunter, IL-28, SU-7 and Tu16.

Chapter 4 describes the other Arab air forces of Syria, Jordan, Algeria and their operational aircraft plus some combat accounts. The only exception is Jordan which operates no MIGs but mainly British supplied aircraft mainly the Hunter. Lastly Lebanese’s Hunters was mentioned which saw no combat and subsequently put in storage in the 1970s.

Finally the last Chapter 5 is about the Arab- Israeli June 1967. Included are Egyptian order of battle in chronological order of the war verses the geo-political developments, and the subsequent defeat combined with intelligence failure, corruption and nepotism. The chapter analyzed the details of this defeat with references to the Soviets both personnel and their hardware.

Finally the book ends with a table of each individual MIGs delivered to the UARAF and coloured artworks of all the major combat aircraft aircraft.
A highly recommended book for the history buff who is into Arab air forces and their aircraft. This will definitely add some dimension to your collection of MIG histories!