Chapter 337 Visit to the MiG Design Bureau

"Welcome to Moscow." China is related to the Soviet Union's entire Far East strategy. In order to prevent China from leaning towards the United States, it is necessary to vigorously promote arms sales to China. By selling fighter jets to China, China can distance itself from the United States. Therefore, facing this visit from China, the Soviet side also attached great importance to it. Defense Minister Ustinov personally came to welcome the Chinese inspection team.

The Chinese team was led by the Minister of Defense, which means we did not neglect our Chinese friends in terms of standards.

General Xu stretched out his hand and shook the hand of the Soviet man opposite. After nearly twenty years, high-ranking officials at the defense minister level of the two countries shook hands again!

This is a moment worth celebrating!

Andre stood at the back and shook hands with the people in front of him. He had met most of them in China before, and he had a special feeling when they met again in Moscow.

This arms sale will definitely be successful! China needs advanced fighter jets, and we can meet China's needs. The reason is that simple!

"Let's go to the nearby air force base first. There is a MiG-23 fighter regiment there, which will be a good opportunity for us to show you the outstanding performance of our fighter jets." Marshal Ustinov said after the two sides exchanged greetings.

"We are very satisfied with your MiG-23 fighter. Now, we want to go to the Mikoyan Design Bureau to take a look at the MiG-23 production line." General Xu said, "We want to see how the MiG-23 comes off the production line and whether our existing domestic production lines can produce the MiG-23 without large-scale modifications."

The statement was very clear: he wanted to see the production line! Ustinov and Andrei were very curious about the guest's request, but they agreed anyway.

Is this a trick of playing hard to get? No, they said they were very satisfied and wanted to see the production line right away? Did they already know that the F-16 is not suitable for them? Even so, they should have paid attention to the art of negotiation. Or did they overestimate their ability to deceive people?

The convoy headed towards the Mikoyan Design Bureau on the outskirts of Moscow. Most of these people had actually been here less than 20 years ago. Things have changed, and now seeing everything around them again, many people are sighing.

Mikoyan-Gurevich Design Bureau is a famous Soviet aircraft design and manufacturer. It was established by Artyom Mikoyan and Mikhail Gurevich in 1939. The design bureau began its career with the design of the first MiG-1. In the era of jet aircraft, the MiG Design Bureau became even more famous and ushered in its own glorious legend, including MiG-21, MiG-23, MiG-25, MiG-27, MiG-29 and MiG-31. Each one is quite classic!

However, as time passed, both Mikoyan and Gurevich passed away, and now the one who controls the Mikoyan Design Bureau is Rostislav Apollosovich Belyakov, who joined the Mikoyan-Gurevich Design Bureau after graduation to work on aviation engineering design. After that, the young Belyakov was appreciated by Mikoyan, and in 1962, Belyakov was appointed as Mikoyan's first deputy. After Mikoyan's death in December 1970, Belyakov, then 51 years old, naturally became the chief designer of the MiG Design Bureau.

In this position, Belyakov worked diligently and contributed his strength to the Soviet defense cause. Today, he was very excited to receive the news of the visit of Chinese friends. Now, the J-5, J-6, and J-7 flying in the Chinese sky are all masterpieces of the Mikoyan Design Bureau, the corresponding models of the MiG-15, MiG-19 and MiG-21. With this exchange, the fighters of the Mikoyan Design Bureau will fly in the Chinese sky again!

Moreover, Belyakov had also had contacts with Mr. Tang of Shenfei and Mr. Song of Chengdu Aircraft Corporation. At that time, Belyakov organized people to help China become familiar with the production of MiG-21.

Time has passed, and this time, when the two sides met again, they had countless emotions in their hearts.

"Welcome our Chinese friends." Belyakov said to the visiting Chinese personnel: "We are very happy to teach our MiG-23 production technology to our Chinese friends."

"This time we are here mainly to look at the production line. Our country does not have much funding. If we can transform our original production line so that we can produce MiG-23, we will save a lot of precious funds," said General Xu.

"Okay, then I'll take you on a tour of the factory," said Belyakov.

Producing fighter jets sounds complicated. In fact, just like producing cars, they are assembled from individual parts. Aircraft factories generally produce the fuselage, while engines, avionics and various equipment are produced by supporting manufacturers.

"Our MiG-23 fuselage is similar to the MiG-21, both use aluminum alloy as the main frame structure, and titanium alloy is used as the load-bearing structure in key parts." Entering the production workshop and seeing the fuselage frame being cut by aluminum ingots, Belyakov introduced as he walked: "So, you can use the existing equipment to produce MiG-23."

The factory building is very tall and you can see workers busy at work. In fact, although aircraft production is also called assembly line production, most of them are actually assembled manually by workers. Especially after the fuselage is formed, the installation of various equipment is entirely the task of skilled workers.

After all, fighter planes are not cars. Even if they are produced in large quantities, they can only be produced in the hundreds a year. Only under the war system can the annual production exceed 500.

"This is our final assembly workshop." Belyakov continued to walk forward and led everyone to the factory building at the back.

When Andre saw the plane in the final assembly workshop, his heart skipped a beat. No wonder they came straight here as soon as they got off the plane!

The main task of the Mikoyan Design Bureau is now to develop the MiG-29, and the MiG-23 can only be regarded as a transitional product. Therefore, it is now only carrying out the mid-term improvement plan of the original MiG-23 according to the standards of the new MiG-23MLA. There is only one type of newly produced MiG-23, which is the MiG-23K!

Now, the MiG-23K is being assembled in the factory! This twin-engine carrier-based fighter! This aircraft was not sold to China. Obviously, China's intelligence department knew that they also had a twin-engine variant of the MiG-23! Therefore, they came to the Mikoyan Design Bureau and used the name of inspection to make the Soviets no longer hide it!