Foreign diplomatic sources quoted by Maariv Wednesday said Syria will soon receive Soviet MIG-29 aircraft. According to the paper, this will change the balance of air power between Israel and Syria.
Experts here said the arrival of MIG-29s in the region would return the situation to what it was in 1967 when Israel’s French-built Mirage jets were opposed by Egyptian MIG-21s from the Soviet Union. Both aircraft had equal capabilities and Israel’s superiority in the air was determined by the higher quality of its pilots, they said.
The MIG-29 is considered the equal of the American F-15s, the Mirage 2000s in the Israel Air Force, and in certain aspects, their superior. None of the Warsaw Pact countries have received MIG-29s. They have been supplied to India and may go to other Middle East countries in the future, including Iraq.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
