5 Aerial Battles That Put 'Top Gun' To Shame
It's never a good idea to glorify war, but holy shit do fighter planes make it hard not to. It's not just the badassery of the machines themselves, but the fact that being a fighter pilot takes a special kind of balls that borders on crazy.
As a result, the aerial "dogfights" that have raged for the last century have provided the world with some truly insane battles. Like ...
#5. One Battle, Almost 200 Fighter Jets
As usual, in 1982, Israel found itself at war with its neighbors. This time the opponent was Syria. This was the fourth time since 1948 that Syria found themselves at war with Israel, and battles rarely went their way.
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Syria's military is the Detroit Lions of the Middle East.
But on June 9, 1982, this war spawned the largest air battle in history. Nearly 200 planes swarmed the skies in a display that military historians agree looked exactly like that huge air battle at the end of Independence Day.
Above: Powerful symbolism.
The whole thing started with Israel's Operation Mole Cricket 19, which not only is the lamest name for a military operation we've ever heard, but apparently there had been 18 previous operations named that. Anyway, the goal was to knock out the Syrian anti-aircraft missile sites that were threatening the Israeli jets. The Israelis sent in 96 aircraft, including F-15 Eagles (which by the way, to this day have a perfect record in combat) ...
... along with several other types of fighters, including F-4 Phantoms and F-16 Falcons.
The Syrian Air Force responded by flooding the sky with 100 of their own jets, mostly Soviet-made MiG fighters, like the MiG-23:
The Israelis first swept in and destroyed the anti-aircraft sites on the ground. Then the two swarms of fighter jets went at it in a blizzard of missiles and gatling gun fire. The aerial hellstorm went on for nearly two hours.
Of the 100 Syrian jets, 80 of them went plummeting to the earth in flames.
Of the 96 Israeli fighters ... zero were lost.
MathKnight
Several Israeli pilots did injure their jaws while yawning.
The Israelis called off the attack, because they knew they'd have to come back and take out the anti-air batteries that would surely replace the ones they'd destroyed. But they also probably felt kind of sorry for the Syrians, considering they had just obliterated pretty much their entire air force in one shot.
If you're thinking that makes the Israeli Air Force look pretty goddamned serious, well ...
#4. Outnumbered 28 to 1
On October 6, 1973, Egypt and Israel were at war, and not for the first time. Yeah, they get a lot of practice over there.
"This is like a vacation for us!"
Egypt thought it was a good idea to attack the Ofir Air Force Base in the Sinai Peninsula, which was held by Israel at the time. They sent 28 Soviet-made MiGs, mostly MiG-17s (which are notable for looking exactly like the planes a child draws on the back of a notebook):
Meanwhile, down at the base the Egyptians were about to attack, pilot Amir Nahumi was sitting on the ground in his F-4 Phantom fighter jet, with his fellow pilot Daniel Shaki. They were probably discussing how it was a perfectly average, quiet day and how surely nothing out of the ordinary would happen.
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It was one of those afternoons where you just spend hours hanging out and taunting the UAVs.
All of a sudden, MiGs were swarming over the base. Shaki and Nahumi waited for orders to take off and repel the attack ... but none came. Thinking, "Fuck the orders," Nahumi and Shaki decided to take off and fight the MiGs by themselves.
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Come get some.
Right after takeoff, they saw the runway below them get blown to shit. Which meant no one else would be able to take off to help them. Not giving a rat's ass about this clearly minor setback, The two pilots proceeded to take on all 28 MiGs.
Shaki and Nahumi managed to shoot down one of the MiGs. Then they managed to shoot down another one. And another. And another.
"Somebody find us more Egyptians."
In six minutes, this one lone plane blew seven enemy jets out of the sky. But of course you can't overcome those kind of odds forever, and the remaining 21 jets finally coordinated and ...
... got the hell out of there before they could be shot down, too. Did we mention that Nahumi was partially blinded by the sun during the battle (due to light reflecting off the skins of the MiGs)? And that he was flying on one engine after the other stalled, not due to enemy fire, but due to smoke from his own gun?
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The Israelis celebrate the battle's anniversary every year with the traditional paper jet dance.
#3. Unarmed Plane vs. Iraqi Fighter Jet
It was January 17, 1991, and Desert Storm had just kicked off. At the head of the opening salvo of explosions were Captains James Denton and Brent Brandon. They were piloting an EF-111 Raven, which is basically a fighter/bomber that has been modified to be a radar jammer. So all of its weapons had been taken out, and replaced with the equipment to send out the powerful signals that would confuse the radar on whatever Iraqi weapons would try to shoot at the ridiculously large strike force of bombers coming in behind them.
Above: The EF-111 "Declawed Kitten" variant.
So, even though they weren't carrying bombs or missiles of their own, their job was crucial. If they failed, the Iraqis could lock on and create mass havoc for the dozens of bombers in the strike force.
To up the danger level, the night time bombing mission was flying between two major Iraqi Air Bases. When the Iraqis realized their radars were being jammed, they sent up some of their best fighter jets. One Iraqi jet, a highly maneuverable and heavily armed Dassualt Mirage F1 ...
Above: Dassault Mirage "Bristling with Goddamn Missiles" variant.
... spotted the unarmed EF-111 and went in for the kill.
Very quickly, Denton turned in an attempt to avoid the attacking Mirage. However, within seconds, the more maneuverable Mirage had locked onto Denton and fired a missile at him and Brandon who spotted it and called to his captain. The missile was a heat-seeker, homing in on the heat pouring out of their own engines.
Note: A missile is much faster than an F-111.
Denton did the only thing he could do -- he yanked on the stick and banked the plane into a 5-G turn, which was as about as much force as that aircraft could take without something important breaking off of it from the stress.
He was actually banking closer to the missile. Next, he unleashed a cloud of "chaff", which is handfuls of aluminum foil (no, really) meant to confuse the missile's tracking system.
It worked, and the missile sailed away into the night. But the Iraqi fighter was still there, and had lots of extra missiles. It continued to chase them through their turn, and no amount of aluminum foil was going to stop it. At this point, the two aircraft are skimming along at just 400 feet off the ground. In the dark. Jets do not have headlights.
The Iraqi plane locked on again, ready to fire.
The American pilots formed their fingers into pistols and made "pew" sounds as a defensive precaution.
At that moment, the pilot of a nearby American fighter jet (an F-15 Eagle, like those mentioned in the first entry) finally spotted his unarmed comrade about to get blown apart in the distance. He would lock on to try a long-range shot to save his fellow pilots' lives ...
... but he'd never get a chance to pull the trigger. Denton, in his F-111, barely cleared a ridge. But the Iraqi pilot didn't -- he crashed and exploded into a fireball. This is known in military circles as the "Han Solo losing TIE fighters in an asteroid field" maneuver, or at least it should be.
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The Air Force Academy still refuses to acknowledge General Solo's accomplishments in the field of pilotry.
Denton and Brandon were awarded with Distinguished Flying Crosses for performing the only known kill of a jet by an unarmed aircraft.
The top speed of the AK-47 also depends on the throwing strength of the user.
ReplyRemind me never to mess with Thai mercenaries.
ReplyMisinformed article: "So shooting a moving object in the air, while you are also in the air, where both of you can move in three dimensions, with a pistol, is the sort of thing that has probably only happened a few times in human history."
ReplyReally? That was standard practice for the first year or so in WWI!
Yeah, it was standard practice for pilots to shoot at each other with pistols. But the thing was, almost nobody ever hit anything. Even the guys doing it knew that at best they'd manage to distract the other guy. That's why they added gunners with machine guns.
Minor nitpick for the F-111 battle:
ReplyHow, exactly, could chaffs interfere with IR missiles? They are designed to interfere with BVR missiles, which require radar guidance. I am pretty sure that the author meant "flares" when he wrote chaffs.
Another thing regarding Mirage F-1s. They are certainly considered manoeuvrable when compared with other third gen fighters (category including Mig-23, Mig-25, and F-4) they are no match for fourth gen fighters of the "teen" series.
It probably was a mistake, countermeasures apparently use both chaff and flares at the same time.
Alternate title: 5 reasons the 3rd world should quit trying to fight big boy wars
Reply Hide All See All 8 RepliesI should point out that America lost in Vietnam, and Iraq aint looking too hot
Pykezer, you gonad. The U.S. lost the politcal will and gave up and left. They were not beaten militarily. The U.S. won every single major engagement in Vietnam.
Paulie_Walnuts, you suck.
He sucks because he's right? That's cool, keep listening to the fucktards still whining about Vietnam without ever using your critical thinking skills.
American lose Vietnam War because useful idiots like Nospacesmyass. As Colonel Bui Tin acknowledge, after the Tet Offensive, NVA was already exhausted, their only hope lied to their Soviet comrades feeding the Nospacesmyasses with anti war propaganda. And idiots are suckers to propaganda, there lie their usefulness.
Gee, I can see there are lots of people with military experience, especially in the field of combat in Vietnam. Oh, wait, you're just a bunch of lazy armchair generals shouting "USA! USA!"? I see. Well, how about you visit some ex-conscripts who panic every time there's a loud noise and who have all sorts of major illnesses, then tell me that the U.S. won anything. Tell me that invading other people's countries with terrified young men who have no idea about the culture or nation that they are supposed to fight is somehow a great or moral thing to do. "Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori" my arse. I believe that Wilfred Owen said something similar once
Enlil, my APUSH teacher even agrees the US could've won Vietnam, he used to be in special operations for the Navy, he knew one of the guys that got Bin Laden
Dammit. Out of respect for the safety of the crew that got bin Laden, would everyone who even has the slightest connection to a member of the team just shut up about it. You know there's going to be retaliations that we don't hear about and by bragging about it, we're just compromising the safety of our boys .
LOL! Love the israeli vs 9000 bad guys. And, like, you belive that? Directly or indirectly, this story comes though the IDF PR department. Maybe something happened, but seriously. Get a little cynical about these kinds of stories.
ReplyThe basic claim isn't as incredulous as it sounds. Allegedly, it was 2 Israeli F4-Es. Amir Nahumi with navigator Yosef Yavin, and Danni Shaki with David Regev. They didn't just say "where we're going we don't need orders" and fly off into the sky, they were on standing red alert because of expected retaliation for the downing of Libyan Arab Airlines Flight 114.
Remember how the Mig-15 tore up our P-51s over Korea? The Mig-17 is a minor upgrade to that first Soviet jet fighter. It usually doesn't carry missiles, it is slow, but in the right hands, and against pilots who are unprepared for its incredible low-speed turns, its cannons can be very effective.
The Mig-21 is a supersonic interceptor from the same general era, it was built to catch and shoot down American bomber streams. It can't turn well, it can climb ok (worse after they fixed the fuel tank imbalance), but mostly it relies on ground controllers telling it exactly where to go, and then using its speed to pick and choose targets.
In Vietnam, when it went up against the American planes it was built to fight, like the Starfighter and the Crusader and the Thunderchief, and in the role it was built to fight in, as a high speed interceptor disrupting large attacking formations, it did well. In fact, the VPAF did so well in those Soviet planes that the Navy created Top Gun and the USAF created Red Flag, just to teach American pilots about maneuvering again.
And they also bought Phantoms, which Dave Lewis basically drew up because his team was bored. The F-4 was a whole new generation, built specifically to fight these kinds of planes, and they spent a lot of time over Vietnam. Lessons were learned, and changes were implemented, including first a gun pod then later an internal cannon, modifications to the wing, more reliable missiles, and improved avionics, radar, and warning systems.
The kill counts are up for debate. But the Egyptians thought so poorly of their pilot's performance that they asked for Soviet pilots to assist them. And they liked the F-4 so much that they bought them as soon as we'd let them. (Right after we sold Israel some F-16s and F-15s.)
Oh boy, cheer-leading for the evil empire
ReplyIsrael gets all their training and weapons from America (duh), and everybody knows their pilots are nutzoid.
Reply>Israelis
Reply>Felt kind of sorry
HA
#4 makes me think Bullshit, because the F4 did not even have any guns, just missiles. it had gunpods, added later, but they were nowhere near the jet intake.
ReplyTrue. But the Israeli Air Force were given F-4E variants, which included the 20mm cannon.
wooh thailand
ReplyGo Israel! Jesus, It's like they don't even have to try!
Reply Hide All See All 3 Repliesyah those Palestinians just starve themselves!
"Go Israel! Jesus,"
lolwut
Gawd, until reading this comments section I didn't realize how much hate Israel had towards it. I might not agree with everything that Israel has done to Palestine, but really, it doesn't mean they're evil. Israel, has had to defend itself from attackers on all sides ever since it was formed. While it might not be excusable, their reaction to things like Hamas in the Gaza Strip and such is understandable.
And you have got to admire the sheer military might Israel has for a country its size. Of course to survive for as long as it has in such a hostile area, they had to be good. And damn, Israel really does know how to fight.
God damn mechanic stole my kill
ReplyI was thinking of number 2 as soon I as I read this. Kermit Weeks of Fantasy of Flight owns the L-4 and a F-156 (not the one that was shot down).
ReplyWhen speaking about ammunition, the word is "ordnance," not "ordinance," which is "a piece of legislation enacted by a municipal authority."
ReplyWe're gonna go in there and drop some m***********g legislation on their asses. Good luck fighting bureaucracy, assholes!
I actually saw this mistake made in a university textbook about WWII. I couldn't take it seriously from then on...
This article makes me want to enlist.
Reply Hide All See All 5 RepliesYou'll have close to zero chance of ending up like one of these guys and have to settle for ending up like one of the Guys Who Made Rambo Look Like A Pussy. Are you okay with that?
lol just keep in mind that you need to be an officer in order to fly a plane. Enlisting will just let you be a mechanic on one of the planes.
Well, you could get to be a helicopter mechanic, a crew chief, and get to man an M-60. But from up there you won't make Rambo look like a pussy, you'll be more like the guy who was able to shoot women and children because he didn't lead them too much.
Pete552, that is true; but did you read what the mechanic on the helicopter did?
The other thing is that after you enlist, you can become a warrant officer in the army and fly helicopters.
this article is USA and her allies self masturbating. Can we have less bias please? I'm sure there are awesome pilots from the rest of the world as well.
Reply Hide All See All 8 RepliesAnd you, Mr. Immelmann, are the bukkake boy in this lovefest. Maybe you should list some examples rather than just opening your mouth for everybody.
quite, commy
History is written by the victors. I'm sure Cracked would write about epic German pilots if they could find any articles about them.
Well, the Red Baron was as epic a pilot as there was, but the question is were any of his battles as spectacular as the ones in this article?
Yeah, #1 was pretty baller.
I doubt there are any in the Middle East though (Egypt, Syria, etc.) It sounds like they never had any good ones and are probably running out of normal ones!
There are. In WWII there were entire German squadrens were every pilot had 100+ kills. But hearing about how Nazis slaughtered obsolete Russian planes isn't as entertaining as the stuff here.
Ok, give us a documented kick-ass aerial battle where an American-alligned country was NOT the victor and we'll listen. You seem to be saying to the author "you did all the research and came up with a list of amazing events I don't like because it doesn't involve someone else winning. Go research for me an event that I like that is on par with the stories above. You can't find one? LOOK HARDER FOR ME! And I want something cool like the story where they brought down an aircraft using nothing but air with helicopter propellers, except where the other guys are doing it!"
Chuck Yeager vs. The Sound Barrier. We kicked physic's tail there.
ReplyNumber 4 should have been called "Will Smith losing aliens in the grand canyon" manoeuvre
Reply Hide All See All 3 RepliesNumber 3, even
Han Solo beats Will Smith in ID4. So, no, it shouldn't.
yea, han solo's craft survived the maneuver, will smith's did an imitation of a grasshopper hitting a car windshield.
The missile fired by the Mirage against the EF-111 was a radar guided missile. Hence the use of chaff, which only works against radar guided missiles.
Replygold bond will clear your chaff right up