O
CTOBER 20 WAS an
important day in the
Serbian calendar.
Not only was it the
73rd anniversary
of the liberation of
Belgrade from its Nazi occupiers, but the
Serbian Air Force also o cially inducted
new ghter equipment. This was almost
30 years after the delivery of the last
ghters to the then Yugoslavian Air
Force. The Serbian Ministry of Defense
marked the event with a military
exercise and accompanying ceremony
named ‘Freedom-2017’ at Batajnica air
base, Belgrade.
Instead of procuring the six MiG-29M/
M2s with which Serbia planned toFor a third consecutive year the ‘BARS-
2017’ (Brotherhood of the Aviators of
Russia and Serbia-2017) joint exercise
was held in conjunction with the VKS’s
968th Sevastopol Composite Training and
Research Aviation Regiment at Lipetsk-
air base between October 2 and 8. The
968th Regiment has three MiG-29SMTs,
ve MiG-29UBs (‘33 Red’ to ‘37 Red’) and a
single modernized MiG-29UB (9.53A, ‘
Red’). These allowed the Serbian MiG-
pilots and their Russian counterparts to
practise bombing with P-50T training
bombs equipped with pyrotechnic
charges indicating the point of impact.
Pilots also practised gunnery with their
GSh-301 30mm cannon and rocketry with
S-8 unguided rockets red from B-8M
rocket launchers carried by the two-seat
MiG-29s. The unit’s jets were joined by a
sixth MiG-29UB, ‘17 Blue’ (RF-92193), whicharrived from the 116th Training
Center in Astrakhan. In total, 14 Mi-8,
Mi-17 and MiG-29 pilots of the Serbian
Air Force’s 204th Airborne Brigade took
part and logged 91 hours and 10 minutes
of ying time in 75 sorties. In the process
they used 123,400kg of kerosene and red
1,096 rounds of ammunition, rockets and
bombs.
Most Serbian Air Force MiG-29 pilots have
logged the majority of their ying hours on
the MiG-21, because its operational costs
are nearly one third of those of the MiG-29.
But after the retirement of the single-seat
MiG-21bis, new and experienced MiG-
pilots were only occasionally able to y
the three MiG-21UMs. Two of these were
always busy with QRA duties at Batajnica
due to the unavailability of the four original
MiG-29s (only two ‘Fulcrums’ were airworthy
before October 4, 2017).‘FULCRUM’ PILOTS ON EXERCISE
Five of the six former Russian Aerospace
Force MiG-29s ordered by Belgrade were
recently handed over to the Serbian
Air Force.report and photos: Babak Taghvaee
SERBIA
EXPANDS
MiG-
FLEET
replace its four aging MiG-29/UBs in
2013, the Serbian Ministry of Defense
requested second-hand MiG-29s from
Russia in 2015, as a low-cost, temporary
solution. The Russian Ministry of Defense
accepted the request during 2016 and
selected one surplus Russian Aerospace
Forces (VKS) MiG-29 ‘Fulcrum-A’ (9.12),
three MiG-29 ‘Fulcrum-Cs’ (9.13) and two
twin-seat MiG-29UB ‘Fulcrum-Bs’ (9.51) for
delivery to the Serbian Air Force under a
military aid program.
With the delivery of four MiG-29SMTs
to the 116th Training Center of the VKS inDecember 2015, followed by 10 more the
following year, several of the unit’s older
MiG-29s became available for Serbia. All
but one of the jets selected still had time
on its airframe and engines before its
next overhaul.
On December 22, 2016 the Serbian
Prime Minister Aleksandar Vučić and
Russian President Vladimir Putin met in
Moscow. O cials from both countries
signed a contract for the acquisition of
surplus Russian arms the next day. As
well as the aforementioned six MiG-29s,
Below: the materiel included 30 T-72 main battle
A MiG-29 from
the original
batch delivered
to Yugoslavia
heads up
the new-
look Serbian
‘Fulcrum’ force.
The nearest
jets are each
armed with a
pair of R-27R
(AA-10 ‘Alamo’)
and four R-73E
(AA-11 ‘Archer’)
AAMs.At the end of ‘Freedom-2017’, two MiG-29s
joined the sole MiG-29UB from the original
batch, serial 18301. They ew a ‘missing
man’ formation in memory of MiG-29 pilot
Maj Zoran Radoslavljević, shot down on
March 26, 1999 by an F-15C during NATO’s
Operation ‘Allied Force’.SPECIAL REPORT | SERBIAN MiGhttp://www.combataircraft.net January 201816
16-17 Serbia MiG-29 C.indd 16 23/11/2017 11: