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So with a thread drift, what can claim really claim to be the "World's Leading distributor of MiG parts" ie: most MiG kills by a particular airframe. I see this monicker used by fans of the F-15 in the modern era with 100+ MiG kills in US and Isreali hands, F-4 Phantom must be around 250+?? (USAF, Navy, Isreali, Iranian), Mirage III ~150?, but my vote must be the F-86 with over 700 credited in Korea, and perhaps a few more dozen in Pakistani hands. Maybe bf-109 over prop migs on the Easern Front?? Anyone got good number on total MiG kills by airframe type?
But there is another way to look at this. Rather than comparing
# F-4 shoot-downs of MiGs vs. # MiG shoot-downs of F4s
we could compare
$ cost of F-4s shot down by MiGs vs. $ cost of MiGs shot down by F-4s.
My guess is that if you did the $ numbers you would determine that the MiGs won in Viet Nam. I think the F-86s won in Korea as the cost differential between our and their aircraft was likely closer.
These comparisons could be extended to more recent US and MiG types but would be more difficult to evaluate, as the US or allied losses for the recent types would be very low (zero F-15s, I think). The low numbers would perhaps skew that statistics.
For the next conflict, should they shoot down several F-22s or F-35s, the other side might be able to lose their entire airforce and come out ahead costwise. The loss of just a few of our aircraft would be a significant loss - several percent of our entire air force. Heck, if we were to lose a B-2 that cost might exceed our opponents entire military budget for a year.
Just some thought to put the numbers into different contexts...
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, "drone" = Predator (and most don't even realize there is a such thing as a Reaper..let alone the difference.)
