“Dutch pilot Leon van Maurer, who had more than 1,200 hours flying F-16s, flew against MiG-23MLs from air bases in Germany and the U.S. as part of NATO’s aerial mock combat training with Soviet equipment. He concluded the MiG-23ML was superior in the vertical to early F-16 variants, just slightly inferior to the F-16A in the horizontal, and had superior BVR capability”
According to airwar.ru
It’s true, the MiG-23 has BVR armament with proper look-down shoot-down capability. In the 80s it received improvements to maneuvering over the models he discussed and even equipped with the R-73. It would have been properly lethal if used adequately. The hit and hide tactics in particular would have been optimal against better US 4th gen fighters and that’s exactly how MiG-23s took out F-14s.
The ML wings rip almost exactly at 1.5x normal safe G limits as outlined in the MiG-23ML manual.
There is potentially the issue of Gaijin applying the same “overload limit increasing with decrease in fuel weight” thing they got going on for all planes.
The manual isn’t specific, so the developers chose the nominal rip G forces being for full fuel or gross weight or something.
İ see so its a problem that can be avoided if they choose to do it.
For the sake of game balance they should adjust this issue alongside with sparrows guiding problem and missing radar modes, i believe those fixes will be more then enough to put F-15 to 12.7.
There is one second hand citation on a Russian website that just gets repeated at face value without any context ad-infinitum across internet message boards.
The fact of the matter is the way that War Thunder models the MiG-23ML variants is extremely generous and of dubious authenticity. The fact that you can unfold the wings at high speed and then out turn any of the more modern Russian fighters creates a rather ridiculous situation.
If the MiG-23MLD was as good in real life as it was in the game…the USSR would have never bothered designing and building the Flanker or Fulcrum.
The US also needed a light fighter, which was the f-16. Then later on, the f-14s age was showing and because the navy and air force have beef , and cuz carrier aircraft should be purpose-made, the f-18 was built. The F-22 was in a way the American response the the su-27, which was the Soviet response to the F-15 (also why I agree with f15 staying at 12.3 because the gripen, m4k, and su-27 are all newer and more advanced than the A model F-15)the f-22 also was almost an experiment to see just how good the stealth tech could be when used on a fighter built to be stealthy on radar.
The MiG-23ML/A/D is able to sustain higher turn rates than both the Su-27 and the MiG-29 in game by 1-2 degrees per second while being a much older airframe with a worse thrust to weight ratio.
They made larger twin engine aircraft according to a new design philosophy put forth by TsAGI… The same argument could have been presented for MiG-19 vs MiG-21. There are a monumental number of reasons the MiG-29 and Su-27 are superior to the MiG-23. Additionally, the MiG-23 would never be used in a sustained turn fight at 7.5-8.5Gs in the same way as the MiG-29 in real life. This is an awful argument… and it’s not just a random Russian website. It was a direct quote from a pilot who flew both. It’s equally useful as “evidence” as the American test / aggressor pilots accounts.
The MiG-23ML variants out-rate both the MiG-29 and Su-27 by 1-2 degrees per second margins while having worse power to weight ratio. In-game the MiG-29 and Su-27 are a step backwards in comparison to the extremely favorable modeling of the MiG-23.
I would even go so far to say that the MiG-23ML variants can reliably win against both planes in a BFM fight.
Where is the direct quote?
As far as I can tell this anecdote purely comes from airwar.ru and even Wikipedia doubts it’s credibility.
The F-14 has similar performance increase over other fighter types due to the swing wings in spite of the T/W. You’re also probably comparing the static T/W of MiG-23 which doesn’t show the whole story.
Likewise with the F-14A, which has less than a 1.0 T/W static… Has a higher sustained turn rate than even the F-16 depending on fuel loads.
Anyhow to avoid derailing we should probably discuss the F-15 and I happen to agree with the consensus on the issues that has been discussed thus far… not trying to say it doesn’t deserve some fixes. (So does the F-14).
There is not a single point where the MiG-23ML variants have better thrust to weight ratio to the MiG-29 or Su-27 in-game.
The difference between turn rates between the F-16 variants and the F-14 ends up being a lot less pronounced in practice. Even if optimally flown in full real controls the F-16A will not struggle with the F-14A. On the other hand the MiG-29 and Su-27 practically fall out of the sky due to extremely high drag in turns other than at a targeted rate speed.
But regardless I don’t think there is anything out there that supports the idea of the F-14A being able to maintain a flat turn at 24 degrees per second.
Basically all those US evaluations refer to older MiG-23 variants that aren’t remotely as capable to the ML/MLA/MLD.
The G rating for the MiG23ML and derivatives is 8.5G, and in warthunder it doesn’t pull more than 12.5 (which is a bit less than 8.5 times 1.5) in standard conditions.
MiG-23MLDs flown by experienced pilots put up a good fight against MiG-29As flown by less experienced pilots.
The only reason the MiG-23 is remembered badly is the fact that it had a troubled start and has a poor K/D, which was mainly caused by hundreds MiG-23BNs shot down, and not the actually capable air to air variants.