Maximilien Moulliez
Been there, done that...Updated 3y
What was the reason for the easy defeat of Serbian MiG-29s? The MiG-29
is supposed to be an advanced fighter on par with the F-15. What
actually happened?
Originally Answered: What was the reason for the easy defeat of Serbian
MiG-29? MiG-29 is supposed to be an advanced fighter on par with the
F-15. What actually happened?
Meet Adolf Georgievich Tolkachev

The Man Who Ruined the Soviet Warplane Industry

In september 2016, Tom Cooper wrote an article that puts new light on US
winning streak in 80’s and 90’s against Libya, Iraq, Yugoslavia and others…

***

In March 1986, U.S. Navy aviators out-flew, out-maneuvered and jammed
the Libyan Arab Air Force so badly that the Libyans stopped flying their
interceptors over the Gulf of Sidra.

As a result, Tripoli had to give up its claim on this part of the
Mediterranean. Equally damaging, the lack of air cover allowed the
Americans to attack with relative impunity.

You could chalk up the Americans’ success to superior training and
tactics. But don’t dismiss another potentially important
factor — espionage. By the mid-1980s, the U.S. military had obtained
reams of vital intelligence on Soviet-made weaponry, particularly
aircraft and related systems, from Adolf Georgievich Tolkachev, a
disgruntled Soviet engineer.

Tolkachev was, arguably, the man who wrecked the Soviet warplane
industry. Much of what follows can be found in David Hoffman’s book, The
Billion Dollar Spy.

Consider the Americans’ sound defeat of Libyan forces. On March 24,
1986 — having already cleared the air space over the Gulf of
Sidra — U.S. Navy planes easily knocked out a Libyan SA-5 Gammon
surface-to-air missile site at Sidra and then sank several fast missile
craft of the Libyan navy.

Only a month later, U.S. Air Force F-111Fs bombed three
carefully-selected targets in Tripoli, while Navy A-6E Intruders struck
two targets in Benghazi. Despite fierce resistance from Libyan air
defenses, the Americans lost only one of their fighter-bombers.

Adding insult to injury, in January 1989 a pair of U.S. Navy F-14A
Tomcats shot down two Libyan air force MiG-23MF interceptors.

The U.S. winning streak continued through the 1990s. In 1991, U.S. air
power overwhelmed the Iraqi air force in a matter of three days. After
flying just a few defensive missions, the Iraqi air force— a
well-equipped air arm shaped and seasoned by eight years of bitter war
with Iran — was all but grounded and subsequently evacuated its most
precious aircraft to Iran.

Some of first victims of Tolkachev’s treachery were numerous Soviet
export customers, including Libyan air force pilots — including the
pilot of this MiG-23MF, about to get shot down by a U.S. Navy F-14A on
Jan. 4, 1989. U.S. Navy release

Except in a handful of cases, Iraq’s elaborate ground-based air
defenses — patiently developed at great cost over nearly 20
years — proved no major hindrance to U.S. forces.

These are only four out of about a dozen examples in which U.S. air
power overwhelmed its opponents in the last 30 years. Now, one could
argue that the opponents in question were no match for the
Americans — that they were poorly trained, poorly commanded,
inexperienced and equipped with downgraded export models of Soviet-made
aircraft and armament.

That they were, in other words, a far cry from the kind of threat the
Soviets, and later Russians, themselves represented. Well-informed Iraqi
and Libyan sources counter this impression, insisting that their air
forces possessed modern equipment operated by well-trained and skilled
officers and pilots.

Some might go as far as to say that the Serbian air force and
ground-based air defenses fared much better when confronting U.S.-led
NATO air power in 1995 and 1999. Others would stress that, by the late
1990s, Iraqi air defenses were so worn out, and so constrained by
nonsensical orders from top political leaders, that they posed greater
danger to themselves than to their opponents.

However, leaving aside details about aircraft and equipment, training,
tactics, strategy, politics and other background noise, one thing
remains common in all these operations — U.S. forces’ amazing level of
knowledge about the Soviet and Russian weapons systems used by the
Libyans, Iraqis and Serbs.

For example, the pilots of the U.S. Navy A-7E Corsair IIs that attacked
the Libyan SA-5 Gammon SAM site near Sidra during the evening of March
24, 1986, knew the exact performance specs of the system they were facing.

Likewise, the crews of the two F-14A Tomcats that shot down a pair of
Libyan MiG-23MFs had intricate knowledge of the swing-wing MiG-23. U.S.
Air Force F-15 pilots hunting MiGs over Iraq in the period 1991 to 2002
knew precisely what their opponents’ aircraft, avionics and armament
were capable of doing.

The MiG-29 was severely hit by the Tolkachev affair, and Soviets reacted
by fielding the MiG-29SMT, depicted here. However, such efforts were far
from satisfactory, while a lack of funding caused delays lasting decades.

Evidence indicates that superior intelligence was the key to American
military successes. Consider that the tactical manuals that the U.S. Air
Force’s Fighter Weapons School issued in the late 1980s were already
well-informed about even the latest Soviet equipment, including the
MiG-29, Su-27, SA-10 Grumble, SA-11 Gadfly and many others.

Tolkachev provided much of the most useful intelligence. He was, in the
1970s and ’80s, an electronics engineer at the Soviet Union’s Scientific
Research Institute of Radar, better known as the Phazotron Design
Bureau — the USSR’s main developer of military radars and avionics.

Motivated by the persecution of his wife’s parents under Joseph Stalin
and disappointed in the communist government, Tolkachev established ties
to the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency in Moscow and, beginning in
1979, began transferring huge volumes of highly classified and extremely
sensitive data about the most important avionics, radars and weapons
installed in Soviet-made combat aircraft.

The amount of material that “Donald,” as Tolkachev was known to the CIA,
was such that U.S. translators couldn’t keep up with it. They remained
busy translating and studying the information Tolkachev had provided
well into the 1990s.

As early as December 1979, the U.S. Defense Department completely
reconfigured the electronics package for one of its latest fighter
aircraft, based on the information from Tolkachev.

An internal CIA evaluation from March 1980 praised Tolkachev’s
information on the latest generation of Soviet surface-to-air missile
systems. “We never before obtained such detail and understanding of such
systems until years after they were actually deployed,” the CIA stressed.

In April 1980, another internal CIA memorandum called Tolkachev’s
information on jam-proofing tests for Soviet fighter aircraft radar
systems “unique.” Obviously, Tolkachev provided data that no other CIA
asset had access to.

Only few months later, Tolkachev was credited with “providing unique
information on a new Soviet fighter aircraft, and documents on several
new models of airborne missile systems.”

Similarly, a memorandum from the Defense Department from September 1980
praised the impact of Tolkachev’s reporting as “limitless in terms of
enhancing U.S. military systems’ effectiveness.” Tolkachev’s leaks had
the “potential to save lives and equipment” and were “instrumental in
shaping the course of billions of dollars of U.S. research and
development activities.”

The extent of the damage Tolkachev caused the Soviets is hard to
summarize in a few sentences. What little the CIA did release about its
cooperation with Tolkachev indicates that he might have inflicted
irreparable harm to the Soviet military aviation and air-defense industries.

He certainly provided the Americans with full insight into modern
Soviet-made aircraft such as as the MiG-29, MiG-31 and Su-27 and their
air-to-air missiles — and enabled U.S. scientists and engineers to
quickly develop electronic countermeasures against these systems.

Perhaps more importantly, the Tolkachev affair hit the Soviet Union at a
time of instability for the USSR. A Soviet spy in the United States
revealed Tolkachev’s own spying in early 1985. The Soviet government
executed Tolkachev in 1986.

Photo credits: David Hoffman and Tom Cooper Collection

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