The ambush by several MiG-29 'Fulcrum' fighters against two F-15 Eagles over Iraq

The McDonnell Douglas F-15 Eagle is an excellent fighter aircraft that made its first flight on July 27, 1972 in the United States.

The spectacular 'zoom climb' of a USAF F-15EX Eagle II fighter at Eglin AFB
The features of the new F-15IA Eagle II fighters that the US has approved for sale to Israel

Introduced into service with the United States Air Force (USAF) in January 1976, the F-15 is also operated by Israel, Japan, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, South Korea, and Qatar. This fighter has the record of never having been defeated in aerial combat in nearly half a century.

Of course, the F-15 faced extremely difficult missions where that record could have been lost. Some of those missions took place between 1990 and 1991, when the first war involving this aircraft on a large scale took place. In the Gulf War, the USAF shot down 39 Iraqi aircraft in dogfights: 36 of those victories were achieved by F-15 fighters.

In those engagements, USAF F-15s defeated various types of Iraqi fighters, including eight MiG-23s, six Mirage F1s, five MiG-29s, four Su-22s, two MiG-25s, two MiG-21s, two Su-25s, and one Su-7. The F-15, its pilots, and its integrated defense systems (which included E-3 Sentry AWACS aircraft) demonstrated their overwhelming superiority over their rivals. It was an opportunity to fight with what was then the most modern Soviet-made fighter, the MiG-29, nicknamed "Fulcrum" by NATO, designed to counter the F-15 and F-16, the most modern American fighters at that time.

One such F-15 engagement against Iraqi fighters took place on January 19, 1991, when two F-15Cs from the 58th Fighter Squadron, a famous unit based at Eglin AFB, Florida, were protecting a strike force of F-16 fighters. The two F-15Cs were piloted by Captain Craig "Mole" Underhill and Captain Cesar "Rico" Rodriguez, and were ambushed by Iraqi MiG-29 fighters that lured them into an area planted with surface-to-air missiles (SAMs). Last Saturday, the excellent channel Yarnhub published a video recreating the story of that engagement on computer:

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Main photo: Eglin Air Force Base.