Stolen MiG-25 

"equipment missing" i guess the stereo in the mig was pretty good.

Engines that quote “Suck in air to help burn fuel” must be a soviet secret, I’ve never heard of such technology

Wife: i need you to sign the divorce paper's Me a MIG-25 pilot: right after work

Happy to report as of 2020, Viktor Belenko is still alive in the U.S living a happy life with 2 new children as well as reuniting with his first after the collapse of the USSR.

“Let’s give two cruise missile engines a pilot and some wings.” “Ight lets do it”

And now the obligatory "In Soviet Russia" joke: In Soviet Russia, fuel burns engine.

Wooooooooooow..."Hey UPS, how much to ship my MiG-25 back to Russia?" UPS: $40,000 next day air sir.

One of the reasons that military intelligence was so spooked by the Mig 25 was that everybody thought it was constructed out of Titanium because the Russians were sitting on the world supply of the metal and that would explain how it flew so fast. Nobody considered that the Soviets would make it out of steel because that would be too damn heavy and it would fly like a pig. That was the big revelation of the Belenko incident. You might want to do a video about how Lockheed set up shell corporations to purchased the Titanium for the SR71 from the Soviet Union. I seem to remember it was something to do with baseball bats.

A plane so good, it uses pieces of its own engine for fuel.

"to this day, neither bill has been paid." Perfect note to end on.

Way back in the day I read the book "Mig Pilot" by Belenko. What an amazing story. The part about how an officer in the most top secret plane of the time was delegated (with the rest of the base personnel) to pick potatoes so they wouldn't rot in the field, gives you a stark reality of how these guys were treated. The barracks had a huge cable wrapped around the building so it wouldn't fall apart! That was because some of the concrete intended for use on the building was sold on the black market. So they just added more sand! He had to duck under this "I" beam to cross the room. And the stories of how he thought the American CIA guys were lying when they took him to a supermarket and said that they are all like this. "You mean American's don't have to wait 6 hours in line for meat that is spoiled?" What a great book. Note: It has been years since I read this, and my memory may be a tad off on some of the finer points, but the gist is correct.

This takes the old method of "I'm just running out for a pack of smokes" to a whole new level!!

Never heard the part about the bill for the shipping & runway damage & the Russians replying with a bill of $10M.. That's a great story!!

The 2 planes shown when describing F-4 phantoms were F-111s. Dont get me wrong, I enjoyed the video. I wasn't trying to be critical; just made an observation.

5:18 imagine getting dispatched to find an unidentified fighter plane just to see it disappear and not know where it is or how close it is to you

I was an Air Force brat living in Japan when the stolen Mig 25 landed. It was the talk of the town more for the embarrassment to the USSR than for what technology it might have. It was pretty much accepted that the Soviets used less finesse and more brute force when it came to their military hardware. Turned out the Foxbat was a big heavy plane with big engines and a lot of practical choices in its building but not much to learn from in terms of cutting edge technology.

That thing has "High Altitude Interceptor" written all over it.

The Lockheed A-12 flew in 1962, so I take slight issue with the video saying that Mach 3 was a barrier the US was struggling with but the Soviet’s were suited to. I realize that’s just meaningless editorializing, but that seems pretty inaccurate.

“In Soviet Russia, we bill you for giving us our stuff back!”

I can remember when this happened. It was all over the news and in the newspapers. This plane was a huge mysterious thing. I wanted to see what it looked like but in 1976, all you got was a grainy Black and White picture in the paper and fleeting glimpse on TV. It was a really big thing for a Soviet pilot to defect and bring a top secret aircraft. I remember thinking, why the hell did he go to Japan. I didn't have a clue about the logistics of a wagon back then. It was the cold war and the Russians were feared and Nobody ever defected from the Soviet Union. It was huge news.

Him: “The leap from Mach 2 to Mach 3 had proven too enormous for the Americans” Me: *A-12 noises*

The MiG 25 was a huge leap in capability, even if it didn't live up to western expectations.

The funny thing is the MIG-25 was built for a threat that never materialized, the B-70 Valkyrie and F-108 Rapier. The F-15 on the other hand, it's development can be traced from lessons learned from the Vietnam air war, countering the MIG-25 came later.

When I was in high school (a long time back...I'm GenX) I read the book, "Mig Pilot". It was about the Mig 25 that landed in Japan. Loved it. To read Viktor's story about life in the Soviet Union, his experience as a pilot and his subsequent defection was truly enlightening and exciting for a young person. It started my fascination with Soviet aircraft. At the time, most models were still very alien to the west. What stuck in my mind about the Mig 25 was: *it couldn't turn inside an F-4 *it still used vacuum tubes instead of transistors *it's extremely limited range

We returned the plane without a full tank of fuel. That's what pissed them off.

I love darkdocs this is a great channel way underrated and under subbed

Sounds like he got busted cheating on his wife. Pilot: Aight I'm outta here.

I have flown a fox bat. In 1993, I went to Moscow and went to 74k feet and M2.5. The company that arranged it was called MIgs etc. We burned 9000 pounds of fuel in 7 minutes climbing to 74 k. The windscreen was so hot you couldn't hold your hand on it from the friction of the air. I flew a mig 21, L39 four times, and a Su27. The whole trip was about 23 grand. It didn't suck.

When you said Belenko was intercepted by F-4's, but you showed footage of F-111's. Just figured that was worth mentioning in case you thought those were F-4's.

Belenko also mentioned that the soviets were working on an improved version too, this plane would later become the MiG 25PD.

Japan: we want $40 grand Russia: we want $10 million US: we got what we need

8:46 "Furthermore, as the airplane went above Mach 2.8, the immense force exerted by the compressors could potentially turn the engines inside-out". I haven't laughed that hard all week.

"In 1975 the technological leap to take an aircraft from Mach 2 to Mach 3 had proved to difficult for the west to achieve" In 1963 the A-12 (AKA Black Bird) flew at Mach 3.35. 12 years before the Mig 25 did. This was its official top speed. Actual top speed is still classified and rumored to be closer to Mach 4.1.

I hoped the mig would be at a museum in America or japan. I kinda wanted to see it

This was an amazing story in the mid 1970's. The plane turned out to be a dud with exposed rivets, iron panels and bad construction. Poor maintenance was a factor as well according to Viktor Belenchko, the pilot. He was impressed with the US grocery stores that had so much food 24/7 unlike Russia. At first he thought the stores were a fake generated for him. Hope your Witness Protection PLan is treating you well, Viktor Belenchko!

This all started when the Soviets made a missile that shot down the U2, so the USA made a plane that could just outrun the missiles: the SR-71. Then the Soviets tried to make a plane to shoot down the SR-71: the Mig 25. The USA thinks the Foxbat is a super plane, so they develop their own super plane: the F-15. USA then realizes the Mig wasn't that great, and ends up with an airplane that ruled the skies for decades.

And then there was the SAAB J-37 Viggen... A safe, highly technological and very fast Allround fighter. The Mig 25 was fast but that's it. It was big and needed a huge airfield.

The Japanese should have waited sending the plane back until the 40.000$ was payed. :-))

My grandfather worked for the CN Railway as an Expressman in the 40s, 50s and early 60s. I don't recall when he said and frankly he probably forgot himself what year it would have been, but he told me a story few times about how once a Mig crashed in the far north and it ended up getting put into a few CN boxcars and got shipped down to the states. He said he remembered the security around that train being insane because of it being such high importance to American and Canadian national security.

Also Belenko remained in the USA, though his family back in USSR were persecuted and ostracized. His wife was unable to get a job and his son ran away from school. Not sure how they ultimately fared. There is a great book on this story, 'MiG Pilot', by John Barron . Trying to locate a copy for myself .

9 мировых рекордов, принадлежащих МиГ-25, до сих пор (2019) никто не улучшил!

To Dark Docs. I love this spooky espionage cold war stuff! Everything you have done on this subject has been informative and accurate. I have shook Victor Balenko's and had a short conversation with him so l have a personal involvement to this story. Thank you for showing it.

Dark Docs 2:16 "The entire famous mig fleet is named after him" Artem Mikoyan: *Angry russian noises*

Anyone remember the movie Firefox with Clint Eastwood? Great movie👍🏻

The Japanese sent a bill that was the funniest part of the whole story 🤣

MiG-25: I can fly almost at Mach 3! SR-71: That's cute.

This might be the best video I've seen on Dark Docs yet.

I remember at the time being told that large parts of the plane were dismantled, analyzed, and then put back together. Almost. Which is why parts were in crates and some were missing. They weren't actually missing. US intelligence knew exactly where they were!

The Japanese:“Were gonna bill you for damages to our airfield and the shipping cost of the aircraft” Russians:”were gonna bill you for our aircraft” Maybes the funniest and biggest game of no u ever.

Clint Eastwood's Movie from 1982 Fire Fox was based on this plane. In the movie Clint breaks into a secret hangar and flies away in the super secret plane. I really enjoyed the movie and it gets my recommendation!

1:26 You're kidding, right? The MiG-25 first flew in 1964. The Lockheed A-12 first flew in 1962.. Entered service in 1965. It had a maximum altitude of 90,000 feet on low fuel, a top speed of mach 3.3, and was capable of sustaining mach 3.2 at 85,000 feet. The SR-71 first flew in the same year as the MiG-25, in 1964, but entered service 4 years earlier, in 1966. It was capable of everything the A-12 was, but was faster with 3,000 pounds of additional thrust from the P&W JT11D-20K engine variant, at full afterburner (34,000 lb), even though it was bigger and 6,000 pounds heavier than the A-12. It was capable of mach 3.35, so long as the compressor inlet did not exceed 800°F. I don't get how you could not think of the SR-71 lol..

Fast you say? SR-71: hold my beer.

I have the sad news of reporting that Viktor Belenko died on September 24, 2023 in southern Illinois, USA. The news was kept secret for 2 months.....

The U.S. was flying jets at mach 3 before the end of the 1950's in the form of the predecessors of the SR-71 and F-12 if I remember correctly. The Mig 25 was in response to the fast U.S. jets.

Wow, in my head I just never would have pictured this being just a few feet smaller than a WW2 bomber.

I remember the fictional novel and movie about a Soviet Jet called the Firefox that Clint Eastwood starred in. The plane was most assuredly modeled on the Mig-25. Some of the supposed abilities of the Firefox was stealth capability and thought controlled weapons.

Viktor Belenko. A excellent book. Remember when it happened. I was 10. Dad jumped up and down and made mass racket in the house. Pops was a private pilot since the army days. A 1976 model,,FRESH off the line with the latest updates. The cherry on top,,turned out to be a milk dud only. The 3.2 pass landed in Egypt??,,or just outside of Egypt??,, with white torched engines. 3.2 at 80,000 I think,,which shook the world,,if only for a few moments. Betcha the Sled drivers pulled back a couple missions because of that.

The Soviets accused the Japanese of “unfriendly handling”

Dark Docs is one of the coolest youtubes... I love the narration and the terse way it's written. Neat.

There is more about Victor Balenko, once he came to the United States. Apparently he got a ton of speeding tickets. Got in a few fights. He blended in very well. A regular American. He offered to go back into the Soviet Union and steal another plane. To give Soviet Union the big finger. He is quite a character. He was discouraged from going to the Soviet Union because if he was caught they would make him hate life. In fact the United States told him to be careful because the Soviet Union could send someone into the United States and put a bullet in him. In time he settled down. I would love to know what he is doing now.

Man you had the perfect chance to end this with, "As to whether or not Russia or the United States will ever pay these bills, I guess for now, we'll remain... in the dark."

Dark Docs:- "The Eagle would be the world's most formidable air superiority fighter" Supermarine Spitfire: Hold my engine oil

The way you just nonchalantly said "Any any speed over 2 THOUSAND miles per hour"

This is my favorite Dark Docs.

"Two F-4s were scrambled" -- while showing two F-111s.

and then came the MIG - 29 . You Should do the Story how the Soviets commandeered and reengineered , the Two Top Secret B-29's in WW 2

"But Amazon said return shipping was free!"

Actually met him ( Victor Belenko ) long ago at a conference while on Active Duty and got a chance to hear him speak. Intelligent, funny, but dead serious type of guy. God Bless him and for the incredible sacrifices he made to come over to the West. We were DAMN FORTUNATE to have such a man as he to request asylum and to provide us clues that the Soviets were NOT the 10 ft tall giants our intel people were drawing them up to be!

The mig 25 engines had to be replaced almost after every high Mach run....

good video, but he failed to mention that it was designed to counter the xb-70 valkyrie bomber the us was constructing and later was cancelled. the mig-25 was made to go that fast to shoot down the xb-70 as well as provide more protection over large swaths of russian territory

"Oh, by the way you'll want to cover that plane up. On a similar note, I'm defecting."

FWIW, MiG-25 is a Russian 1970's aircraft: top speed Mach 2.8 (3,000kmh), Ceiling: 24,000 m (78,000 ft), Range: 1,000 nmi; In 1964, the Lockheed A-12: Mach 3.35, Ceiling 26,000 m(85,000ft), Range: 2,500 nmi. Turns out, the feared Foxbat was a gas-guzzling barge that ate its' own engines

Nov. 18, 2019----A few notes about this. I remember when all of this happened and how the Japanese government tried preventing photos of this plane being taken by civilians even as it was being covered up. A couple of months later, Hasegawa released a 1/72nd scale kit of it based on photos taken. When they released a model of the F-15A, they had side by side and from top down view of the two aircraft....with the F-15 being just slightly different than the MiG-25. Also, from what I understand, the MiG-25 was designed to counter the XB-70 Valkyrie, a U.S. bomber the Air Force was building, but it never went into production. As for Bilenko decision to defect, I read that the CIA had been working on him to defect. And I wonder what happened to his wife and their son. Fast forward a few years and I'm doing 90 TDY at Shemya AFB, Alaska. My squadron there had all of 3 A.F. people: me, the commander (a major) and a TSgt., while all the others there were civilians as Russian linguists listening to whatever they could from Russian installations which weren't that far away. The Major was one of Bilenko's interpreters at the time. The CIA had put Bilenko in a safe house in Washington DC, then one day, Bilenko was missing! Everyone assumed the KGB had organized a snatch team with the intention of bringing him back to Russia. His being gone from the safe house was much more simpler. He wanted to get laid, so went looking for a hooker. When he came back, the CIA took care of his future needs. Yeah, true story. And the world found out about the SR-71 in 1964 when LBJ talked about it. As to the MIG-25, a lot of tech knowledge was learned. Like the hydraulic fluids used in the landing gear was alcohol based. With little personnel support such as grocery store, movie theater, etc., a lot of these troops would drink it, more than once resulting in blindness or death. And there were many MiG & SU aircraft that the Air Force got their hands on, like the Israeli's helping recover MiG-21's and India selling some of theirs. They'd be tested at Area 51, which is where that brigadier general was killed while flying a SU-27, which the AF did its best to cover up cause of his death other than an aircraft training accident. Thing is, the BG was NOT qualified to fly the plane, but because of his rank.... Also, a lot of these Russian aircraft were flown/tested out of Tonopah airport, Nevada. At one point, it had been a WW 2 training base for black B-25 crews who didn't get to see combat as the war ended. As to the AF ground crew, they were the best of the best.

Good channel, good content. Do us a favor, get closer to the microphone or turn your gain up. I'm tired of having to max out the volume to hear you whisper about all these great subjects

I remember when they first started talking in public about the mig-25 foxbat. This would be before the defection. The mig-25 was the be-all to end all of Fighters! Then they got the hands on it. The fit and finish of the plane was actually fairly crude. The Pilot's view from the cockpit was poor in particular happen behind the aircraft there was no ability to see that direction at all. Handling was like a cement truck. To its credit the mig-25 straight line was faster than hell. Subsequent make 31 Foxhound has improved in some of the deficiencies of the mig-25 including the materials used and the fit and finish. The Mig-25 used use stainless steel in it's construction to compensate for kinetic heating in high-speed flight. The Mig-31 uses lighter-weight alloys would the same thermal properties. It's definitely an upgrade to its predecessor. To sum up the flight envelope up to mig-25, straight fast and high! It did feature a decent look down shoot down radar to the heat-seeking missiles and to radar guided missiles but no gun.

Excellent summary of a long and complex story. In the book, MiG Pilot by John Barron, this story was detailed, and the story of Belenko himself, who had serious doubts about the decisions he made, was told. The human side of the story, perhaps, could not be included in detail in a short video, and this is a good video. However, Belenko's story and personal struggles were as much part of this narrative as the bit about the Foxbat itself. Thanks for this video. Well done.

Good video.. "to this day, neither bill has been paid."

I remember when this went down It was big news for about two minutes

You know its bad when your own pilots defect to your enemy with a top secret high-speed aircraft that can go to mach 3

If you ever find a copy of MiG Pilot by Viktor Belenko, you should read it. During a class, his instructor told them that American F-14s could climb faster and turn tighter than the MiG 25 and he replied with "Then why don't they give us F-14s and get rid of this sh^%?" But the most surprising thing to me was when he came to America, he was asked what he really wanted to do. He said, "See an aircraft carrier and go to a grocery store." He did not think they'd let him do either. At the grocery store he was shocked when they let him pick up packages of meat and put them back and take another. He was sure it was all set up just for him and wasn't really the way Americans shopped. Its a great book.

I got to to speak with a member of the inspection team. The officer said it that it wasn't that hot. Lousy electronics Over powered engines.

I have a feeling it will be a similar story when we get a J-20 and an SU-57.

9:42 No wonder why the intakes of the F-15 looks so similar to the MIG-25, also felt bad for the soviets. That pilot's personal life costed too much. But then again if the soviets were treating the common people badly he DID THE RIGHT thing,!!

The SR-71 was flying in 1966 and the A-12 slightly sooner. The US wasn't "having problems getting aircraft to go from Mach 2 to Mach 3" 5:20 those aren't F-4s. They are F-111s

“the crew on the TArMAC”

I think this was the jet that Clint Eastwood’s film Firefox was all about....

This plane is the literal example of “rocket strapped to a pair of wings”

Imagine a MiG pilot seeing an F-35 today. I’m sure there are plenty pilots still around, and man their minds must be blown.

legend says that to this day, the unpaid bills are still having compounded interests

5'18": you're showing a pair of F-111s instead of F4s

Wow! This is a very cool bit of history. Thanks.

Japan: “...and for that, I’d like my hotel bond back” USSR: “yeah, nah you seemed to have taken all the linens, curtains and some of the toiletry set”

I thought we had the SR-71 Blackbird before they had the Mig 25.

At 2:19, when the narrator says "the entire famous Mig fleet is named after him"... that's funy, cause that plane is a *_Tupolev 128_* ... Edit: and at 3:13... Edit: Mig-27 at 4:58, the "F-4" at 5:20 are F-111... Sloppy work...

This is easily one of my favorite channels on RU-vid.

MIG-21 and 25 are some of the coolest planes I’ve ever seen

The west was definitely capable of flying planes at Mach 3 when the MiG 25 was developed. The Lockheed A-12, the early version of the SR-71, first few in 1962 and was regularly reaching in excess of Mach 3 by 1963. Let's also not forget about the Mac 3+ capable North American XB-70 that first flew in 1964 and was the plane the MiG-25 was literally designed to shoot down. As for the reason why the west never bothered with making bombers and fighters that flew as fast as the MiG 25, it's pretty simple. The west knew that the Soviets would have a hard time intercepting the jets for a few years, then improve their air defence missiles and they'd have to start all over again. In plain English it was just a pointless waste of money. This is the exact reason why the XB-70 never went into proper production and why they instead just started flying bombers at low altitude. The F-111, TSR-2, Tornado and B1/B1B were explicitly designed for flying fast at low level so that the curvature of the earth prevented long range radar detection.

3:18 - Wow, large wings, particularly useful on fighter planes to generate lift! Did he actually just say that?! hahahahahahah

I remember seeing a documentary which stated the MIG-25 benefited from espionage work done by Soviet spies within the AV Roe Canada plant when they were developing the Arrow. It is said this was one of the reason the project was canceled and all prototypes destroyed because of the breach in security, if true that could definitely be a cool Darkdocs.

So we built a fighter to compete with our imagination. and we WON! Woot woot Murica.