Iraq tells Iran - “Hey, can we get our planes back now?”
I had to chuckle when I read this story, about how the current Iraqi Air Force would love to have some of the planes Saddam had flew into Iran back again.
As you may recall, Saddam ordered a large number of his aircraft flown into his former enemy, Iran, during the 1991 Gulf War. I presume he figured he might be able to save them there, rather than get them all blown up by the invading American and Coalition forces.
Of course, most of the circa 1980’s Soviet- and French-built aircraft are now obsolete, but when you’ve got nothing, you’ll take just about anything. Currently, the Iraqi Air Force consists solely of some vintage helicopters and transport aircraft. What many people don’t realize, is that a large number of Iraqi fighter-bombers were actually buried in order to hide them from invading forces.
The FOB I was at in Iraq, Q-West Base Complex, was an Iraqi Air Force base. The former Iraqi commander of that base still lived in the area and was a big player in contracting with his occupiers. The guy knew the base like the back of his hand, spoke nearly flawless English, and was a real smooth operator. One story he liked to tell was about how he was ordered to bury his fighter planes in the surrounding fields before the invasion, and he did so.
Funny thing is, the locals saw what was going on and remembered where the fighters were buried. Then, when the smoke from the invasion cleared, they dug them up and sold bits and pieces of those multi-million dollar aircraft as scrap metal. Nice.
BTW - the photo is of me standing next to an old Mig-21 at QWBC, Iraq.
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