Word: mig
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...Saigon for signs of three North Vietnamese divisions known to be poised just inside Cambodia. Meanwhile, the air war continues. B-52 bombers have been striking Communist concentrations in the Highlands. Over North Viet Nam, a U.S. F-4 Phantom jet accounted for the first "kill" of an enemy MIG-21 in 22 months, but Communist gunners also downed two American F-4s-bringing to 13 the total of planes lost since mid-December...
...Cambodia. In one 27-hour period last week, four Phantoms ran into fatal trouble over Laos. One was downed by ground fire; two ran out of fuel while trying to evade missiles and flak along the North Vietnamese border; the fourth was destroyed by a missile-armed MIG-21-the first kill by a North Vietnamese jet since January 1970, when a MIG shot a U.S. helicopter down over Laos. Striking back, U.S. planes attacked five North Vietnamese missile and radar sites, one of them only 73 miles from Hanoi...
...course do the MIGs, which are beginning to venture within sight of U.S. aircraft again; for the past 3½ years, the North Vietnamese pilots have generally avoided combat. The Communist air force, which boasts 165 combat aircraft (including 40 advanced MIG-215 has not been improved since 1968, when it dropped out of the war after suffering sharp losses against the better-trained U.S. pilots. One theory has it that with the reduction of U.S. air strength, Hanoi's air chiefs have come under pressure to be less timid with their precious planes. Says a military analyst...
Within minutes, a 740 m.p.h. Czechoslovak air force MIG 17 was on his tail. When the pilot fired a poorly aimed cannon burst, Bezak turned and put the Zlin into a steep 4,000-ft. dive. As G forces slapped his sons against the cockpit canopy, his wife Marie, 27, shouted, "It's all up! We'd better go back." Instead, Bezak watched as the MIG frantically circled to make another firing run, and banked the plane as if he were obeying the air force pilot's unmistakable signal to return. Suddenly, Bezak turned again and slipped...
...sight of the MIG, Bezak hedgehopped across the countryside at an altitude of 400 ft. About 20 minutes later, he crossed the border safely near Nuremberg. On the ground, Bezak told reporters that he hoped to find work as a commercial pilot. Meantime, a West German magazine bought the first-person story of his escape for $2,100, giving his family a modest stake with which to begin their new life in the West...