Western Artists' Concepts of Soviet aircraft during the Cold War

I believe the so-called "Tu-200" was a completely bogus Tupolev project resulting from misinterpretation of Soviet information by the West.
 
Thansk a lot. Who made up this sinful project? ;D


TuG-75 source : Flying Magazine December 1951
 

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Hi,

the MiG-25 & MiG-23 from 1967,an artist drawings.

Советские самолеты А.С.Яковлев 1979
 

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These are not 'artist drawings', but heavily retouched photos from Domodedovo air parade.
 
...
 

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I was fumbling around at lunch today and came across this post. Every time a see reference to tis supposed project, I think of the Chinese J-9.

PaulMM (Overscan) said:
Service testing of a new single seat single engine fighter with double delta (a la Viggen) wing, closely resembling the "Faithless", intended as the MiG-21 successor.

Air International October 1974
Click to expand...
 

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There is a pic of a model of this 3-view in another thread on the MiG-31, IIRC, here on SPF.
 

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From JAWA 1985.
 

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Better quality pictures to supplement Reply #151 of this topic:

Spread from 1955' issue of Air Trails magazine (source http://www.airplanesandrockets.com/magazines/air-trails/air-progress-soviet-air-force-mar-1955-air-trails.htm), drawings by Douglas Rolfe.

Looking on the represented types, I wonder, how it's possible to draw them so inaccurate: Jak-23 didn't have any visible airscoop in front, MiG-15bis have two engines etc?

This has been just popular magazine of youngsters, as far as I understand. But did another, more professional books or magazines of this period, similarly incorrect?

Anyway, Doug Rolfe drawings have been a good example of style - both aircraft and cars. Just check http://www.airplanesandrockets.com/index.htm - "Vintage magazines" section
 

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Found at whatifmodelers. I don't know if these were serious artist concepts of supersonic Soviet bombers or not. Originated from Avpro(?)
 

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I believe they were Myasishchev M-20 studies, part of the evolution that lead to the Tu-160.
Not really sure why Avpro drew these, or what their aim was in general!
 
Hood said:
I believe they were Myasishchev M-20 studies, part of the evolution that lead to the Tu-160.
Not really sure why Avpro drew these, or what their aim was in general!
Click to expand...
Yes, this is one of M-20 variants.
 

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flateric said:
Yes, this is one M-20 variants.
Click to expand...

Curiously, Google search-by-image immediately suggest, that this is M-20.
There have been plenty of projects' versions: https://testpilot.ru/russia/myasishchev/m/20/m20_1.htm
 
an interesting design, not one I recall seeing previously, do you know if it had any basis in reality or merely a speculative exercise assuming a Soviet X.15 equivalent ?

cheers, Joe
 
A twin fuselage missile launcher aircraft.

Source: Oltre il Cielo 1959 01
 

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Source: Oltre il Cielo 1959 05
 

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From Cielo 1953 12
 

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From Ali Nouva 2/1952.
 

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From Aero Journal 6-7/1999,
 

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John Forbat's, TSR2 precision attack to Tornado, has an interesting Vickers design for a possible Soviet M3 bomber with stand off missiles ! hmm are there any other examples of such 'official' future planning adversary designs ? the GD. Mig2000 comes to mind ?
 
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I love this thread! Congratulations to everyone who has contributed to it for so long. But, how about the other way around? Is there such a thing as eastern artists' concepts of American (or NATO) aircraft during the Cold War? I suppose so, but how much of it ended up being available to the general public after the end of the Cold War, is what I wonder.
 
Easterners knew the Western aircraft thanks to the same source Westerners knew the Eastern aircraft (and often Easterners knew Eastern aircraft). Jane's. Seriously, magazines like Letectví + Kosmonautika often sourced articles about new Soviet projects directly from Jane's and similar publications. While L+K published a lot of concepts of Western aircraft, it was almost always copied from some Western source. I saw several articles where L+K used only NATO code for some Soviet aircraft, because they didn't have better sources than Western publications. West was simply much more open.
 

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