How the U.S. Got Its Hands on the Mighty Soviet MiG-25
The Mig-25 Foxbat was designed to directly counter American aerial might.
When it comes to Russia’s military capabilities, the Kremlin has a long history of pushing the truth. In fact, stemming back to the Soviet era, realistic stats concerning specs and capabilities of defense platforms were often exaggerated. When the USSR debuted the Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-25 “Foxbat” in the 1960s, U.S. officials were extremely wary of the fighter’s alleged prowess. The Foxbat, like all of the airframes produced during this tense time period, was born out of the arms race between Washington and the USSR. The Soviets wanted to field a modern high-speed, high-altitude, reconnaissance aircraft capable of evading even the most advanced technology of the West. When the MiG-25 entered service, it quickly became a kind of “boogeyman” aircraft widely assumed by the United States and its allies to represent the best of Soviet technology at the time. However, the ultimate defection of a Foxbat pilot in the late 1970s confirmed the Soviet fighter was simply a paper tiger.
An overview of the Foxbat
As mentioned earlier, the Foxbat was designed to directly counter American aerial might. The Soviet Air Defense Forces was tasked with the air defense of the USSR, which directed manufacturers Sukhoi and Mikoyan to create prototypes. By the late 1950s, Mikoyan’s MiG-25 officially entered its development phase where it would embark on its maiden flight within a decade. The front-running Soviet fighter featured a stainless-steel body, enabling the aircraft to withstand the heat generated by traveling at speeds in excess of Mach 2.8 (times the speed of sound). The downside of using stainless steel, however, made the fighter very heavy which ramped up the cost of operating the gas-guzzler.
The Foxbat was powered by a pair of Tumansky R-15B-300 afterburning turbojets, specifically designed for high-altitude performance. The jet was also well-armed with top-notch electronics like the Smerch-A2 radar sight and Identification Friend or Foe transponders. On paper, the Foxbat truly appeared to be a formidable threat to America’s own aerial arsenal.
The defection
In 1976, Soviet pilot Victor Belenko defected to America flying a MiG-25. The Soviet pilot, disillusioned with the USSR, waited for a scheduled sortie out East with a full tank of gas to make his move. Instead of returning back to Soviet airspace like he was meant to, Belenko headed for Japanese airspace while gradually descending in order to escape his pursuing squadron mates. Notably, the Soviet pilot carried the training manual for the Foxbat upon arrival, likely as a way to secure his stay in America. Once the Foxbat was further examined, it was discovered to not be quite as capable as the USSR purported. The fighter’s service ceiling and airspeed were much lower than expected and its engines were deemed to be unstable. Additionally, the jet lacked a look-down shoot-down radar capable of tracking targets flying low to the ground.
While the Foxbat never lived up to promises made by the USSR, the fighter would eventually be exported and deployed to combat zones across the globe over its service life.
About the Author: Maya Carlin
Maya Carlin, National Security Writer with The National Interest, is an analyst with the Center for Security Policy and a former Anna Sobol Levy Fellow at IDC Herzliya in Israel. She has by-lines in many publications, including The National Interest, Jerusalem Post, and Times of Israel. You can follow her on Twitter: @MayaCarlin. Carlin has over 1,000 articles published over the last several years on various defense issues.
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