A serious aviation authority once categorized US and Soviet warplanes. He said the Soviet ships were like trucks on their way to war - they could land in pastures and burn perfume.

The US planes he categorized as elegant horses on their way to an airshow - needing just the right fuel, long, flat runways, and so on.

In the Korean War the Mig-15 was conceded to be a slightly better fighter than the F-86, but the Russians used that conflict as a training ground. They lost a lot of planes, regarded it as worthwhile as they also wound up with a whole lot of combat-trained pilots.

A fascinating aside. About 75% of all Communist fighter missions were flown by Russians, a few by Chinese and fewer still by North Koreans. US pilots time and again reported seeing Caucasian faces in Mig-15s with Chinese markings. Because the USSR was a part of the UN Security Council NO ONE wanted to acknowledge the UN was fighting the USSR there. Several hundred American pilots and crew members came down ALIVE in either China or the Soviet Union. NONE of them were repatriated, as that would have "blown" the alleged neutrality of the Soviet Union. As far as the US government is concerned they are still alive.

Hard to believe.

Arf