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IrAF Mig-29 Camo discreptancy?


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Hey all,

I brought up a question with regards to IrAF Mig-29 Camo's on the ACIG and wanted to get some views on some differing info. According to some of the ACIG site, IrAF Mig-29's ONLY had the two tone Grey camo applied. Reading the Osprey "F-15C Eagle units in Combat" a recount by Cesar Rodriguez on an encounter with a Mig-29 on January 19, 1991 states on page 26 "..I planed to merge with the bogey at 50 ft off of his left wing. As I crossed his wing line, I saw that it was a brown- and green- camouflaged Iraqi Mig-29?"

Up on bring up this discrepancy, I was told it was probably pilot error. My question, as there are many ex-pilots on the forum is, is it possible to mistake a two tone grey aircraft for Green and Brown? Especially at 50 feet?

Edited by Davfoe
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Short answer: Yes. You can see anything you want to see, and swear to it under oath later. The eyewitness has been exhaustively, scientifically proven to be the single least reliable source of information about anything. Human memory is incredibly fallible, malleable, and prone to being influenced by pre-conceived ideas and suggestion. People have spent their careers investigating and proving that.

J

Edited by Jennings
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Hey all,

I brought up a question with regards to IrAF Mig-29 Camo's on the ACIG and wanted to get some views on some differing info. According to some of the ACIG site, IrAF Mig-29's ONLY had the two tone Grey camo applied. Reading the Osprey "F-15C Eagle units in Combat" a recount by Cesar Rodriguez on an encounter with a Mig-29 on January 19, 1991 states on page 26 "..I planed to merrge with the bogey at 50 ft off of his left wing. As I crossed his wing line, I saw that it was a brown- and green- camouflauged Iraqi Mig-29?"

Up on bring up this discreptiancy, I was told it was probably pilot error. My question, as there are many ex-pilots on the forum is, is it possible to mistake a two tone grey aircraft for Breen amd Brown? Especialy at 50 feet?

On the Iraq Mig-29s, I always thought they were Grey and Green. If the Green is a tone of grey, I guess someone could see it as being green, sort of like the F-15 MOD Eagle, someone could say the top color is blue.

Unless Rodriguez said it verbally or in writing like a debriefing. There is no way of saying if he actually said it, could just be who ever wrote it in the book, wrote it that way.

Here is some video of Underhill and Rodriguez, talking about the fight. Starts around 2:09 on first link. Just putting this up as a verbal encounter of them.

" Jets depicted and maneuvers in the enactment are just that an enactment, and in no way taking to be correctly depicted. "

Fight starts at around 2:09

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WgQHS2hsx84...feature=related

Merge

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=44oaapoAqPU...feature=related

Edited by Wayne S
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On the Iraq Mig-29s, I always thought they were Grey and Green. If the Green is a tone of grey, I guess someone could see it as being green, sort of like the F-15 MOD Eagle, someone could say the top color is blue.

Unless Rodriguez said it verbally or in writing like a debriefing. There is no way of saying if he actually said it, could just be who ever wrote it in the book, wrote it that way.

Here is some video of Underhill and Rodriguez, talking about the fight. Starts around 2:09 on first link. Just putting this up as a verbal encounter of them.

" Jets depicted and maneuvers in the enactment are just that an enactment, and in no way taking to be correctly depicted. "

Fight starts at around 2:09

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WgQHS2hsx84...feature=related

Merge

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=44oaapoAqPU...feature=related

Yep, but Dogfights in not a very reputable source either.

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Yep, but Dogfights in not a very reputable source either.

I agree, at least one can hear from the pilots their selfs, at least in this one anyway.

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I agree, at least one can hear from the pilots their selfs, at least in this one anyway.

I would think that the main priority in a dogfight is "How do I kill this SOB, and how do I kill him *fast*?" rather than "Oooo, I do wonder if that loveley topside green is 34227 or 34159... now, where is my FS deck..."

At least, from pilots who manage to be still alive for a debriefing, that is. ;-)

Cheers,

Andre

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It seems strange to me how a bunch of Armchair pilots can tell a fighter pilot, who was in the air saw the damned plane...can say he's mistaken it couldn't have been that color.......He was there and they were somewhere picking their collective noses.........If he says he saw in the green and brown MiG I'll take his word for it, after all like I said he was there and who know maybe the Iraqis tried it to see how effectivie it was.....after all they did bury some to see if they could hide them till it was over.....and they did have their tanks dug in so there was only one escape route and it got blocked. Anyway I believe he saw a green and brown camou'd MiG....

Edited by Angels49
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Very easy for a pilot to incorrectly ID a color of an aircraft, especially if they were merging at what, something over mach 1 combined airspeed?. As I recall reading in "and Kill Migs", one of the pilots ID'd a Mig-19 or 21 as being "light blue" in color. Most likely a natural metal machine reflecting the sky. My question is, since the country has been occupied for years so it shouldn't be a great mystery, has there ever been a picture of an Iraqi Mig-29 painted in brown and green? Its not likely that only one was painted in that color and he was the only person to ever see it, so if there hasn't been photgraphic proof, I would go with the standard grey and green.

Edited by JasonB
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Would it be considered irony if he shot the MiG down fresh out of the paint shed and we never got a picture of it? :tumble:

So they considered it a bad luck color and only painted one bird that way? Besides, I'm not sure the Iraqi airforce HAD paint sheds!

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So they considered it a bad luck color and only painted one bird that way? Besides, I'm not sure the Iraqi airforce HAD paint sheds!

LOL good point! Just saying the IrAF got a little...busy after that. I really meant from a modeling perspective, it would stink to lose out on an alternate pattern like that. Crazier things have happened though!

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Very easy for a pilot to incorrectly ID a color of an aircraft, especially if they were merging at what, something over mach 1 combined airspeed?.

And even more especially with redouts and grayouts - try analyzing a color correctly through that!

Cheers,

Andre

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I don't understand how it's come to the point we are at with history

Lately,,,on the Internet, we constantly see that any observer is set on "auto wrong"

in the real physical world, there is a vast difference in intelligence and training (and resulting knowledge and skills) between those servicemen that are always wrong,,,,,and the modeling/history experts

one set of people has to pass intelligence tests, attend college courses, and train for years

the other set has to buy a model, maybe a book, and gain access to a web connection (or just 2 out of those 3)

once the connection is established,,,,,any pilot, ordie or truck driver in any service is fair game,,,,,entire missions can be changed just by the typing of a line

or,,,what that stupid, dull witted, slow reacting pilot saw can be automatically discounted, because, if anything one of them says is true,,,,,there'd be a webpage showing 103 photos of it

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Yes, but most of what you point out has nothing to do with basic human abilities and what the priorities of the pilot were at the time. Looking back at an event again is not always "revisionist history" or questioning the participants recollection, but trying to come up with what may be the truth.Pilots and military personell are human just like the rest of us, so they CAN be wrong just like everyone else.

In an expirement I watched, they took an auditorium full of college students (probably a 100 or more), then staged a mock mugging of the professor standing at the front of the class, then asked all of the students to describe the person that did the mugging. In this case, the mugger was probably visible to all of them for 10-15 seconds. Most of them totally missed all of the important details like clothing, skin color and height. Now I am sure at least one of those college students was intelligent enough, but in stressful situations, that has no bearing. When the pilot is merging with an enemy aircraft at something over mach one, I doubt his top priority was to take note of the color of the aircraft. Proof is proof, and since there has been no evidence to suport that the IRaqis ever flew Mig-29's with green and brown camo, why would the one statement of one pilot in a highly stressfull situation be considered more reliable?

Edited by JasonB
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all I am trying to point out is that some of those people in "highly stressed situations",,,,actually could observe what was happening in the course of doing their jobs

if the US didn't have pics of a Brown and Tan Corsair II in 1991,,,,it would be very easy to say that the Iraqi that survived a bombing was wrong when he described one to his local authorities

there are also pics of an F-4C stabilator on a Marine F-4B in Vietnam,,,,camo and all,,,,,but, without those pics, few would believe they could even fit, let alone actually have been fitted

and, just as an aside,,,what the "average" person can or can not do, see or remember just does not always jive with what can be done by a few

I am not trying to bash a specific person here,,,,,I am just trying to point out that some people really can see at Mach I, or remember what they saw at age 5, and describe it at age 50,,,,and actually have it verified after the conversation by the finding of an old photograph (afterall, some of us here can know thousands of little details about things that others can't about things that the average person doesn't even know existed)

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Are people jumping to the conclusion, that because an author wrote something in a book that it is true? Did Rodriguez or even Underhill, say the Mig-29 was brown and green? I would be more into questioning the info in the book and it's credibility. What ever the Book has writing, to me is " hearsay ".

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Hello dear friends..!

Accord to some sources..* ( ex. squadron in action Mig-29 Fulcrum, page 21 ) the first batch of Mig-29's delivered to Iraqui Air Force during 1987 was carried desert cammo, replacing the dark gray shade to Tan color, and retaining the light gray base color..! its probably to F-15 pilot fight against one of these first batch fulcrums..

cheers ..!

atte. Marco :salute::rofl::sunrevolves:

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if the US didn't have pics of a Brown and Tan Corsair II in 1991,,,,it would be very easy to say that the Iraqi that survived a bombing was wrong when he described one to his local authorities

yep crazier things have happened, life is stranger than fiction sometimes. A lot of people would not have believed that A-7-- very good point. Jason also has a good point that we probably would have seen some more pictures if they did exist and I understand that, but at the same time as i flipped through Dale Browns Tomcat Alley there are several F-14s whose buNo is listed but no known picture exists of the aircraft because it crashed on a test filght or early in its life. The aircraft obviously did exist though even if there are no pictures of it... just saying.

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It seems strange to me how a bunch of Armchair pilots can tell a fighter pilot, who was in the air saw the damned plane...can say he's mistaken it couldn't have been that color.......He was there and they were somewhere picking their collective noses.........If he says he saw in the green and brown MiG I'll take his word for it, after all like I said he was there and who know maybe the Iraqis tried it to see how effectivie it was.....after all they did bury some to see if they could hide them till it was over.....and they did have their tanks dug in so there was only one escape route and it got blocked. Anyway I believe he saw a green and brown camou'd MiG....

Thanks you, My sentiment's exactly.

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Hello dear friends..!

Accord to some sources..* ( ex. squadron in action Mig-29 Fulcrum, page 21 ) the first batch of Mig-29's delivered to Iraqui Air Force during 1987 was carried desert cammo, replacing the dark gray shade to Tan color, and retaining the light gray base color..! its probably to F-15 pilot fight against one of these first batch fulcrums..

cheers ..!

atte. Marco :whistle: :o :)

Very Interesting! Again, I'll have to post this on ACIG and see what happens. Are you sure it's Iraqi or was it Iranian as Iranian Mig-29's are in Tan and Grey, according to Hi-Decal.

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I would think that the main priority in a dogfight is "How do I kill this SOB, and how do I kill him *fast*?" rather than "Oooo, I do wonder if that loveley topside green is 34227 or 34159... now, where is my FS deck..."

At least, from pilots who manage to be still alive for a debriefing, that is. ;-)

Cheers,

Andre

I don't think anyone quoted FS numbers, but if a guy is at 50 feet and want's to ID, I'm sure he's going to be looking at roundels to check if they are friend or foe. If your that close I'm sure you'll notice the color of an aircraft as well. Also, another way for a pilot to check if it's Friendly would be to check color or camo. At a distance the Mig-29 and F-18 look alike, Rodriguez states in his account he wanted to get a Visual ID. If it's green and brown, it's probably NOT an F-18 as no allied countries fielded Green and Brown F-18's in Desert Storm.

I do think that one need's to check if the recount in the Osprey is paraphrased or word for word, though one would think that if it wasn't something rather interesting it wouldn't have been added into the interview.

It's unfortunate that Osprey doesn't add Bibliography's or footnotes in there works.

Edited by Davfoe
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never seen a pre or post war pic of an iraqi mig-29 in anything other than standard fulcrum camo - iriaf mig-29s were sand and grey though!

as for the there are too many variables to consider - the most likely the person who wrote it may have got the wrong mig designation! ospreys arnt exactly the most infallible aviation source out there :D

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I am reminded of the World War Two B-17 (or perhaps it was B-24) gunner who went down in history at an IPMS event several years ago for saying that Focke Wulfs were painted "purple and dark blue". And then he pointed to a 190 model in RLM 74/75/76 on a table and said "This one is painted right - exactly like that! Purple and dark blue!" His memory was fine - 50 years later he was able to match a color to what he saw during the war, and "by the books" his memory was right. He just had an odd way of describing what he was seeing - or perhaps to him, it really did look "purple and dark blue".

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Hey all,

I brought up a question with regards to IrAF Mig-29 Camo's on the ACIG and wanted to get some views on some differing info. According to some of the ACIG site, IrAF Mig-29's ONLY had the two tone Grey camo applied. Reading the Osprey "F-15C Eagle units in Combat" a recount by Cesar Rodriguez on an encounter with a Mig-29 on January 19, 1991 states on page 26 "..I planed to merge with the bogey at 50 ft off of his left wing. As I crossed his wing line, I saw that it was a brown- and green- camouflaged Iraqi Mig-29?"

Up on bring up this discrepancy, I was told it was probably pilot error. My question, as there are many ex-pilots on the forum is, is it possible to mistake a two tone grey aircraft for Green and Brown? Especially at 50 feet?

page 26 of that book has the color profiles of F-15s, I see it on page 56

it is a quote by Cesar

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