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Old 12th September 2011, 21:55
JoeB JoeB is offline
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Join Date: Jan 2005
Posts: 121
JoeB
Re: Korea-MiG-15 and the other side of the history

Another way to summarize is as follows:

1. 293 Soviet MiG's lost to Sabres: per Mr. Seidov's study of Soviet archives on a case by case basis

2. 224 PLAAF MiG's lost: officially stated, though not yet subject to review on a case by case basis by any independent researcher, a few not to F-86's.

3. At least some KPAAF MiG's were certainly downed by F-86's. The defector No specified some particular incidents (for example January 25, 1952 his unit was jumped by F-86's and lost 4 a/c, corresponding to a combat reported on US side with numerous claims). And KPAAF MiG losses are definitely not included in the PLAAF's total. No's 100 losses to all causes is still the best estimate AFAIK. Remember that No gave US interrogators all kinds of other info also about Soviet/Chinese operations at Antung, units, pilots etc that turned out true. He was very reliable.

4. I found around 90 F-86 air combat losses in case by case study of USAF records, considering all known MiG claims (all Soviet ones in time and place, not just date). And case by case means finding a US report of every *combat* the Soviets recorded with F-86's: one exists in almost every case. It's not just a matter of sifting through loss info, but highly complete and detailed (in most cases) operational info.

5. Mr. Zampini claims there were 270 F-86 air combat losses. Mr. Zampini's main source of 'US records' is AFAIK the former Defense POW/Missing Personnel Office online database KORWALD. AFAIK he's never researched hard copy US archives himself. But, 270 F-86 air combat losses is simply not what the records say, whether you've reviewed them or not. A number like that comes from (selectively) rejecting what the US records say (as to cause, date, damage v. total loss, or in some past cases Mr. Zampini seemed to feel certain Soviet claim accounts were convincing enough to conclude losses the US records don't mention at all). Mr. Zampini believes he has good reasons to use this method (as I've heard him describe before) but here I'm just focusing on the difference in method.

The research method to get figures 1 and 4 is basically the same: look up each case in declassifed records, report what the records say. The research method to get the total in 5 is basically different.

Joe
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