“Seconds later, we saw them, two MiGs. Crossover and the two of us engaged them. One MiG disappeared; the other MiG remained for 1-vs-2 air combat,” Gur, former Israeli Air Force F-4 crew member.
During the Yom Kippur War, the Israeli Air Force (IAF) faced an Arab coalition instead of just the Egyptian Air Force in the south and the Syrian Air Force in the north. Before October 1973, fighter squadrons from countries such as Algeria, Iraq, Libya, and North Korea were deployed in Egypt. A North Korean MiG-21 squadron was stationed at Bir Arida to protect Egypt’s southern region. The North Korean MiG-21 pilots did not engage with Israeli aircraft until December 6, 1973.
On that day, two pairs of Kurnass aircraft from squadrons 69 and 119 were dispatched to the Gulf of Suez area. The pairs operated in tandem, with the 69 pair (Shadmi-Gur, Shpitzer-Ofer) taking the lead over the 119 pair. Meir Gur recalls in the book by Shlomo Aloni and Zvi Avidror, Hammers: Israel’s Long-Range Heavy Bomber Arm: The Story of 69 Squadron:
“We were fished out of a lecture and were briefly briefed: something was cooking down south; go there. No unusual preparations, no more details. We were part of a large-scale operation, and our mission was to patrol. We flew to the area at high altitudes and flew a high-altitude patrol. The sky was not clear; visibility was not good, cloudy and misty. We patrolled for a long time, and we were already low on fuel when we were vectored in and out, flying west into Egypt, turning northwest, and exiting. We did not penetrate too deeply into Egypt, but we did it a couple of times. Then we were told to look for targets; our radars did not function that well in a high-to-low search. We flew at 20,000 to 25,000 feet, but I managed to see a couple of blips down below, very difficult to lock. GCI vectored us to engage. We jettisoned external fuel tanks and flew a large racetrack pattern. Still see the blips, but the range did not decrease—they probably flew a similar pattern at low altitude. It was very difficult to track that blip against ground clutter, but we managed to do so and finally came within range for an AIM-7 launch; shoot-down mode was not very good. Even more problematic was the mist that prevented us from seeing our wingman, so we had doubts. We decided not to launch.
“Seconds later, we saw them, two MiGs. Crossover, and the two of us engaged them. One MiG disappeared; the other MiG remained for 1-vs-2 air combat. The MiG pilot was extraordinarily good, flying wild and reacting in time. He was alone against the two of us, and he attempted to draw us into a slow-speed fight, but we insisted on maintaining high speed. All that time the 119 pair was flying overhead, asking politely but firmly, ‘Would you step aside, please?’
“We did not step aside. We kept exhausting this Korean pilot; obviously, at the time, we did not know he was Korean. Anyway, we got into the AAM launch position and launched an AIM-9D. A split second later, another AIM-9D flashed by me, not more than 200 meters away. Shpitzer was in a similar AAM position but slightly behind us. Considering the poor weather, this was an unpleasant situation, as he launched slightly behind a Kurnass flying with two afterburners. When I saw their AIM-9D flash by, I panicked; we could have shot down each other since we were so eager.
“Our AIM-9D homed perfectly. The AAM exploded, we pulled up, and the MiG emerged from the explosion flying seemingly intact. A second explosion followed Shpitzer’s AAM, and again the MiG emerged from the fireball and continued flying. We were already desperately low on fuel, so we disengaged. As we turned east, I looked back over my shoulder. The MiG turned west, descended to low altitude, and flew while trailing white smoke. I did not see him crash, but as we crossed the coastline, something else grabbed my attention as I scanned the sky behind us. Suddenly, I saw the characteristic trail of a SAM and then a huge explosion at roughly 20,000 feet. I monitored radio transmissions, and I knew that our aircraft already disengaged, so I said to my pilot, `they shot down one of their aircraft!’ From my Yom Kippur War experience, I figured that what I saw was a SAM exploding a fighter. I did not see the fighter because the visibility was poor, but I clearly saw the missile’s trail and the explosion.
“By the time we landed, we were notified that ‘our’ MiG crashed. We were awarded a shared kill, as the MiG was split between us and our wingman. I again reported what I saw on our way back, and shortly afterward, IAF Intelligence confirmed my story: the Egyptian Air Defense Force shot down a MiG-21.”
Hammers: Israel’s Long-Range Heavy Bomber Arm: The Story of 69 Squadron is published by Osprey Publishing and is available to order here.
Photo by Bukvoed via Wikipedia and Israeli Air Force
