MiG-21, the most produced supersonic fighter, has been a cornerstone of the Indian Air Force for over six decades, demonstrating incredible versatility from the 1971 Dacca bombing to downing an F-16 in 2019. Despite early operational challenges and a controversial "flying coffin" nickname, its adaptability and long service have cemented its legacy as a pivotal aircraft in Indian military aviation In the history of military aviation, no fighter has been made in such large numbers—more than 11,500 worldwide, with 850 of them flown by the Indian Air Force. None has been so versatile, so long-serving, so glorified—and so unkindly reviled—as the MiG-21.
The ‘angels’ were on their way. US President Richard Nixon,
who had armed Pakistan and warned India against war, had dispatched the 7th
Fleet, led by nuclear powered carrier USS Enterprise. The fleet had entered the
Bay of Bengal and was steaming towards Chittagong.
Signals picked up by air intelligence revealed that East
Pakistan’s military governor A.M. Malik had called a meeting at the Dacca
Circuit House, inviting UN representative John Kelly. If Malik appealed for UN
or US help, India’s hands would be tied and victory would slip away. The
meeting had to be prevented—without spilling civilian or foreign blood. All
eyes turned to Group Captain Malcolm Wollen, who was in control of two MiG-21
squadrons in the east. Barely an hour remained for the Dacca meeting when
orders reached the squadrons in Guwahati and Hasimara; strike near the building
where the meeting was going to take place, but avoid killing. Dacca was a 20 minute
flight away.
A new problem arose: there was no military map of Dacca.
Someone got a few tourist maps. Wollen chose four of his best MiG-21 pilots and two
Hunters. Wing Commander B.K. Bishnoi, the team leader, had already shown what
the MiG-21 could do when handled with skill. A few days earlier, he had led a
team of three on a mission to bomb the enemy’s communication hubs. Operating
without intelligence, they had entered the enemy’s firing range and were forced
to retreat. The following day, they took their planes dangerously low over the
runway of the enemy’s Tezgaon airbase and bombed it out. After dropping two
bombs, Bishnoi went for a second strike, even taking photos of the target,
proving that the high-flying interceptor could be sent on recce missions.
Now, on 14 December, as the MiGs were
revving up, Bishnoi was told the meeting would be at the governor’s house, and
not the circuit house. In military parlance, ‘the target had moved’. There was no time to lose by giving
new coordinates to the pilots. They took off, and from the sky Bishnoi radioed
his buddies about the new target. They located the governor’s house from the
limousines parked outside. Spotting a dome atop the building they concluded
that the conference room would be right below. Bishnoi and his three MiG
buddies flew over the dome, firing rockets straight through the roof, followed
by the two Hunters which had only guns.
That was the knockout punch of the historic war—a precision strike, never performed to such perfection ever before in the history of military flying, and never to be repeated by any airplane anywhere in the world till the arrival of laser guided missiles a quarter century later. The sheer audacity and precision unnerved the enemy. Governor Malik scribbled his resignation on a piece of paper and fled to the UN refugee office at Hotel Intercontinental. Within hours, Lt Gen A.A.K. Niazi, Pakistan’s eastern commander, surrendered with 90,000 troops to India’s eastern Army commander Lt Gen J.S. Aurora. Wollen got a Vir Chakra on 26 January 1972. The MiG? She earned her stay in India for the next half a century and more—longer than any airplane in any air force anywhere in the world. The MiG had come to India soon after the 1962 war with China, and had seen action in 1965. But the Dacca bombing of 1971 was her first moment of glory. Originally built as an high altitude interceptor with no ability for ground attack role, she would serve India for more than 60 years in myriad roles, most of which her creators thought she was incapable of, and against newer generation multi-role fighters like Mirages and F-16s. She would have her final kill when Group Captain Abhinandan Varthaman would shoot down an F-16 from the skies of Kashmir, a few hours after the Balakot bombing of 2019.
Flight Lieutenant Brajesh Dhar Jayal was in Kalaikunda in 1962 when he got orders to report, along with seven others, to the headquarters in Delhi. “There were Squadron Leaders Dilbagh Singh, S.K. Mehra, Wollen, Flight Lieutenants A.K. Mukherjee, Denzil Keeler, H.S. Gill and Ladoo Sen, besides me who was the junior-most,” recalls Jayal, now 89. Dilbagh and Mehra would retire as chiefs; Jayal, Keeler and Wollen as air marshals; Sen as vice-marshal; and Mukherjee as wing commander (because of health reasons). Gill would be killed in the 1971 war. In Delhi, they were told they would train in the Soviet Union on MiG-21, which India was buying. Once there, they realised that flying the plane was no child’s play. For one, they were new to supersonics.
Two, everything in the cockpit was in Russian. Three, all dials were in metres and kilometres, whereas they were used to measuring speed, height and distance in feet and miles. Four, and the biggest challenge: the plane had no trainer version. They had to train on the rickety subsonic MiG-15 trainers, then on MiG-17, and jump into the supersonic’s cockpit and fly alone! Five, the Russians were not so friendly those days as they would be later. It looked as if they grudged giving their precious planes to the Indians who were still looking to the British and the west for both technology and ideology.
Jayal says it is a myth that India bought MiGs in response
to the Chinese aggression. “We were already training in the Soviet Union. One
day we were travelling by train when we were whispered to by our interpreter
that our country was at war with China,” he says. Soon the training was stopped
since the Soviet Union was as friendly with China those days as it was with
India. Recalled Air Chief Marshal Dilbagh Singh in his memoir ‘On the Wings of Destiny’: “Most
Russians were under the impression that India was the aggressor. They kept
asking us, ‘Why are you fighting the Chinese?’ When we told them that it was
China that had attacked India, their answer was: ‘How could they? They are
communists.’”
Training resumed only after a political decision. The first six planes, all Type-74, were shipped to Bombay,
and assembled by Russian engineers at Chandigarh for No 28 squadron, formed in
March 1963. The squadron would soon name itself the First Supersonics. “The
first one had the tail number BC 816,” recalls Air Chief Marshal (retd) A.Y.
Tipnis, who had by then trained on World War II-vintage Hunters before
converting to MiG-21. “It was bewildering—the Russian cockpit, metric dials,
supersonic speed, no trainer, not even a simulator.”
The climb and approach to land was three times steeper than
what they had been used to. The helmet visor, built for Russian cold weather,
had a heating system which made pilots sweat on the head in the Indian summer;
the field vision was much narrower than of western aircraft; western planes had
hydraulic brakes, the MiG had pneumatic brakes. “Everything was unsettling.
Honestly, the cockpit didn’t give us confidence,” says Tipnis.
No wonder, two of the first six planes, flown by Wollen and
Mukherjee, collided in 1963, leaving just four planes. “I think accidents
happened in the early days because of these problems,” says Tipnis.
Six more planes soon arrived. They were an advanced
version—Type 76 FL, with a different radar, an afterburner and two air-to-air
missiles, both of which were a novelty to Indian pilots who had only shot
cannons. While the afterburners gave a lot of thrust to the aircraft, they
burnt up a lot of fuel, limiting the plane’s operational radius.
Soon there was to be action. Pakistani ruler Ayub Khan
invaded Kashmir in 1965 and India hit back with a tank attack on Pakistan
Punjab. Meant to be a high altitude interceptor, the MiG was assigned mostly
combat air patrol near the border. “We would do some offensive sweeps over
enemy territory, and lure their fighters into our airspace for our Gnats and
Mysteres to engage,” recalls Tipnis. “But once a Pak Canberra came on a shallow
drive over our base and destroyed a MiG on the ground.” When the second
Canberra came, Tipnis and buddies hid in a drain and saved themselves.
In 1965, MiGs were not allowed any
night operation. The only thrilling action the squadron got was when the
commanding officer chased a Sabrejet and shot it—the MiG’s only kill in 1965.
And then there was Keeler, whom the Russians had sent back judging him unfit
for supersonic flying citing an old kidney surgery. He shot down a Pakistani
Sabre jet from his Gnat to claim a Vir Chakra.
Back then, the MiGs were not yet
inspiring or impressing the boys. They did not know then—those were the Gnats’
last hurrahs, before giving way to the MiG-21s as India’s frontline fighter.
Even Sabre killer Keeler would soon leave the Gnat and join the MiG stream. All
the same, for Tipnis, it was love at first sight. “I saw the plane in Ambala,
where the squadron had moved from Chandigarh,” he says. “I saw her delta wing,
her unique nose cone and more, and decided she was mine.” A mean beauty—a vamp!
After the war, the Russians sent two trainers, a big relief for rookie pilots.
“In 1966,” says Tipnis, “we joined the flypast on R-Day, to show we were there.
And I remember firing my first air-to-ground missile at Tilpat.” That sent out
a message—the interceptor could be used for ground-attack, too. MiGs of various types arrived
soon—Type 77, Type 96 and, finally, Bis—raising squadron after squadron.
After
their finest hour in 1971,
the MiGs did not rest on their laurels. The war ensured that India would no
longer be challenged militarily for close to three decades. After three wars in
two and half decades, India found herself fairly secure, with a million strong
army guarding the borders, a naval fleet that had smashed out Karachi with
missile boats patrolling the waters, and hundreds of MiGs guarding the skies.
The east was safe after the creation of a friendly Bangladesh, the western
neighbour stayed demoralised, and the northern threat was taken care of through
smart diplomacy. Ties were initiated with China, and ambassadors exchanged.
India began to invest in science and
technology. Missions to explore the Antarctic, the deep sea, the world of
electronics, space and the atom were launched.
The MiG-21 deal, which had signalled
the beginning of a strategic friendship, was followed up with more. Soon came
the MiG-23s, the 27s and the 29s through the 1980s, in fewer numbers and
off-the-Soviet shelf. In between came the few mystery MiGs—the 25s—which the
Soviets gave only to their closest friends. They ensured that planes,
technologies, spares and experts for all the ware came when required.
Suddenly, in 1984, there was a threat in the Himalayas.
Spies reported that Pakistan was planning to occupy the Siachen glacier. Prime
Minister Indira Gandhi sent a brigade to Saltoro Ridge and secured the glacier,
thereby opening the world’s highest battlefield. But how to keep the boys
supplied with food, fuel and firearms? Was there no plane in the world that
could drop supplies at such heights, she asked her Soviet friends.
Overnight they modified their An-28 transporters into
virtually a new plane called An-32, and sent them exclusively to India. The
An-32s, often escorted by the MiGs, have since been the aerial lifeline of the
Indian armed forces deployed not only in Siachen, but all across the Himalayas,
the deserts of Rajasthan, the jungles of the northeast and even when they went
on a ‘peacekeeping’ war to Sri Lanka.
By now, the MiG-21s were selling like hot cakes across the
world. With Indian pilots proving that this inexpensive high altitude
interceptor could be modified and put to use as a ferocious dogfighter, a nasty
ground bomber, a smart interdictor, and even a limited capability recce plane,
air forces across Asia and Africa began asking for it, making her the world’s
most produced fighter plane ever. Their trust in the plane was not misplaced.
The plane stood its ground—rather held its skies—fairly well against the
expensive American Sabres and Phantoms in several wars across the world. Once
flying over Cuba, a USAF U-2 spy pilot, it is said, couldn’t believe his eyes
when he saw a MiG-21F-13 shooting over his aircraft before tumbling out of
control. That the MiG-21 could shoot the otherwise elusive U-2 made the USAF
equip their U-2s with Sugar Scoop exhaust cover so as to shield them from the
MiG-21’s infra-red guided air-to-air R-3S missiles.
By the 1980s, the MiGs began to be joined by newer planes, too. First came a few
British Jaguars, a deep strike plane, and then multi-role Mirages, but none of
them could replace the MiG-21. The Jaguars were dedicated deep strikes, with
hardly any capability to do air combat. The Mirages, though multi-role, were
found to be frightfully expensive and India could afford just two squadrons of
them, bought off the shelf. Like a beat constable on his prowl, the MiG-21s
continued to do the routine patrolling duty in the skies—day or night, rain or
shine, summer or winter, desert or mountains.
The hard grind, coupled with the disintegration of the
Soviet Union, began to take its toll on India’s MiG fleet. Short of varieties
of planes, Indian pilots made the MiG-21 a workhorse, employing her in every
role, most of them unimagined by her Soviet makers. Spare support from Russia
became scarce for several reasons. First, falling into a western sales trap,
several Soviet military companies began turning swords into ploughshares
creating a severe shortage of military equipment and spares. Second, the
Soviets had scattered their military industries across several republics, and
those ended up in different republics. Third, street smart western arms agents
swooped on these factories, and bought up the spares in tonnes only to sell them
at monopoly prices to third world countries like India. On a visit to Russia in
1997, this correspondent heard stories about western agents swooping down on
old military factories and buying nuts, bolts, caskets and valves in kilos to
sell them at 50 to 100 times the price to countries like India.
Yet she flew around, bravely fighting the odds, at times
falling off the skies every month—one in a month occasionally—earning her an
unkind nickname ‘flying coffin’, especially after the mother of an accident killed
pilot launched a media campaign against the plane. As Air Chief Marshal S.
Krishnaswamy, who would put up a brave back-to-the-wall fight defending the
MiGs, told The Week in 2003, the numbers did not portray the reality. It was
just that more MiGs were falling off because more MiGs were flying. There were
four times more fighter planes in the Indian skies at any given time than civil
planes, and about three quarters of them were MiG-21s. “Three out of every five
fighter planes getting into bad weather is a MiG-21,” he said.
The real statistics were bewildering—MiG-21s alone flew
54,100 sorties a year; every pilot flew at least 20 times a month. Thus more
MiG-21s got into bad weather, hit by birds, and fell due to pilot error, engine
failure and tech snag because more of them were flying. Over 400 MiG-21s had
been involved in accidents claiming 200 lives during the last six decades. But,
as Air Marshal P.S. ‘Pudding’ Ahluwalia, who looked after air safety, explained
on another occasion, “It’s like saying Marutis are accident prone. More Marutis
get into accidents because there are more Marutis on the road.”
There also was the issue of the lack
of an advanced jet trainer. Without one, pilots who were trained on basic
Kirans which took off at 200km per hour were next put into the MiG-21 cockpit,
which had a take-off speed of 340kmph. The gravity pull would shoot up to 9G,
whereas the human body can tolerate only 4G to 5G. The anti-gravity suit took
care of 1G; the rest had to be overcome through rigorous training.
There were conspiracy theories, too.
Many believed that the vicious ‘flying coffin’ campaign against the MiGs began
in the late 1990s after the Air Force decided to upgrade 125 of the Bis
variety, and fly them till the LCA Tejas came in bulk a decade or two later.
The decision poured cold water on the plans of many western plane-makers who
were eyeing India’s huge multi-role plane market.
Yet, the MiG and her pilots bravely
survived the smear campaign and soldiered on—chasing the Purulia arms droppers
across the subcontinent in 1995 and forcing them to land in Bombay, bombing the
enemy on the Kargil heights in 1999, shooting down the snooping Pakistani
Atlantique over the Rann of Kutch a few months later, and finally shooting and
shooing away Pakistani jets when they came chasing the Indian Mirages that had
bombed Balakot. That one, performed in the Kashmir
skies, was her last stand. There, she killed an F-16.
By R. Prasannan
Courtesy: The Week and www.theweek.in
All
photos from the Vayu Aerospace Review archives