The MiG-21 saw frequent action in the Vietnam War and was one of the most advanced aircraft at the time. However, many North Vietnamese aces preferred flying the MiG-17, due to the high wing loading on the MiG-21's. With high wing loading, the MiG-21 was not as agile or manueverable as the MiG-17. Employing a delta wing configuration, it was the first successful Soviet aircraft combining fighter and interceptor in a single aircraft. It was a lightweight fighter, achieving Mach 2 speed using a relatively low-powered afterburning turbojet, and is thus comparable to the American F-104 Starfighter and French Dassault Mirage III.

It was also used extensively in the Middle East conflicts of the 1960s and 1970s, by the air forces of Egypt, Syria and Iraq against Israel. The plane was outclassed by the more modern F-15 Eagle (designed primarily to combat the Soviet MiG-25 "Foxbat"), which was acquired by Israel in the 1970s. The Indian Air Force has been one of the largest users of this plane after it was used in the 1971 war with good results. The war also witnessed the first supersonic air combat in the subcontinent when a MiG-21 shot down a F-104 Starfighter. It was also used as late as 1999 in the Kargil War with mixed results, and employed during the early stages of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, but was soon outclassed by the newer MiG-23 and MiG-27.

Due to the lack of available information, early details of the MiG-21 were often confused with those of the similar Sukhoi fighters also under development. Jane's All the World's Aircraft 1960-1961 describes the "Fishbed" as a Sukhoi design, and uses an illustration of the Su-9 "Fishpot."

This particular 1:72 scale Chinese Chengdu J-7III fighter was attached to the 29th Air Division, then deployed to Quzhou AB, China, during 1998. Sold Out!

Dimensions:
Wingspan: 8-inches
Length: 3-3/4-inches

Release Date: April 2020

Historical Account: "The Arms Market" - The Chengdu Jian-7 (export versions F-7) is a People's Republic of China-built fighter jet derived from the Russian Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-21. It is still produced today, and serves in the air forces of some nations. It is an upgraded version of the original MiG-21 with more modern avionics and weaponry. It serves mostly as an interceptor in the air forces that operate it.

In the early 1950s and 1960s, the Soviet Union shared most of its conventional weapons technology with the People's Republic of China. One of these was the famous MiG-21 short-range interceptor and fighter aircraft. Powered by a single engine and designed on a simple airframe, these fighters were inexpensive but fast, suiting the strategy of forming large groups of 'people's fighters' to overcome the technological advantages of Western aircraft.

With the delivery of a handful of MiG-21F fighters along with technical documents, China set about to reverse engineer the aircraft for local production. The effort was largely successful, as the Chinese design showed only minor differences from the original. Poor initial quality and slow progress resulted in full scale production only coming about in the 1980s, by which time the design was showing its age. However, the fighter is affordable and widely exported as the F-7, often with Western systems incorporated like the ones sold to Pakistan.