The first truly successful Soviet jet fighter was the Mig-15. Helped along by incredible British stupidity in supplying the Russians with state of the art jet engines, the Mig-15 was in many ways a superior aircraft to the F-86 Sabre that it fought in Korea. It was superior in climb, armament and altitude performance. It wasn't as fast and had a tendency to 'snake' at high speeds, but when flown by skilled pilots, was able to get the best of the F-86.

It was also one of the most heavily exported aircraft of its time. Even today, several of the Mig-15 UTI trainers are still quasi-operational in some of the world's smaller air arms.

This sheet has five schemes for bare metal Mig-15s. There are no units given and what you basically have is a silver jet with national insignia as camouflaging aircraft during the plane's operational life was not the norm.

Starting from the top is probably the most colorful of the group, the Chinese version with its red and white striped tail. This is followed by the Egyptian version which has black stripes on the outer wing panels. The more mundane versions are those by Algeria and Hungary with the Rumanian aircraft at the top of the other page.

Typical of Superscale sheets of the time, minimal information is given though considering the lack of stencils, it is sufficient.

When this sheet was developed, the only 1/72 Mig-15 around was the Airfix version. That kit is probably one of the worst that Airfix ever did and is cartoonish at best. Though condemned by Mig-philes for inaccuracies, the best one around is the Dragon version if you can find one.

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