The Brief But Controversial Battle Of The Aegean, 1974
2024-07-19に共有
Missiles were fired by both sides. At least one aircraft crashed. Even fifty years on, the exact outcome is the subject of endless debate and no little acrimony. This video gathers the evidence from both sides and attempts to conclude on what happened.
A polite reminder that this is an aviation history channel, not a political one. Please endeavour to keep your comments civil and on the topic.
As you would imagine, this is an extraordinarily polarising incident, with a great deal of vitriol on hearsay on both sides. With that in mind, some sources:
This forum post has the most complete version of the original Greek account of the incident: forum.milavia.net/military-aircraft/f-102-delta-da…
A very old, but nonetheless well researched view on all the events of 1974. Note that at this stage it wasn't clear to people that there was only one engagement between F-5s and F-102s because of the date error in the original Skamparthonis accounts: archive.ph/BPj3I
The book "F-102 Delta Dagger in Turkish Air Force" by Levent Başara was hard to get hold of but does recount elements of the Turkish version of events. No references are provided. It is, however, an overall interesting read if you're extremely committed to learning about the Turkish Air Force!
Reference to the Greek F-4 crew that overheard the dogfight: www.fotodigimarco.eu/Aerei/Andravida/Andravida2.ht…
コメント (21)
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Something tells me both sides quietly met after the incident and agreed to just sweep the whole thing under the rug and forget about it.
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This is ridiculous! So many flights and actions investigated, so many sides offended and still only 38,3k loyal wingmen.
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Haven't watched it yet, just got the notif a minute ago. But I just wanted to say thanks for the excellent work you do here, particularly in your wonderfully natural and conversational - yet highly technical - scripting and your very comfortable and relaxed narration. This is rare stuff mate, very well done. Cheers. ed: obviously also appreciate the immense work that goes into finding accurate historical photos/documents/references etc. This is a full-time job!
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Some corrections: Its true that one Turkish F102 made a crash landing on soke highway and yes it had a gyro malfunction. Though it was piloted by lieutenant Colonel Vasıf Sayın and no he wasn't killed. He survived the landing and returned to base with minor injuries. He passed away in 2020 due to organ failure. Also there's a video on YouTube where a third pilot from Turkish 182. Squadron who was in the same base on that day talking about how he met and talked with Captain Onur after he shot down the plane after he landed.
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Some 50 years after the fact, we will never know for sure...
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Early Cold War US jets vs. each other... an unusual battle.
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The varying accounts, where at least one side is lying and probably both, remind me India-Pakistan air battles.
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Fantastic video! I love learning about lesser-known conflicts.
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Planes flew, things happened, planes landed {RUD or otherwise}. Those seem to be the only confirmed facts of the entire incident.
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Much awaited, much appreciated looking forward to excellent insights as always from you
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Do you do the art for the thumbnails? And if so, can you do a storefront where they can be purchased please
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I swear I heard you mention radar present on these aircraft at the beginning and then about a radio failure, so …..? And did any of these millions of pounds of aircraft have a radio between them? 🤔
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Very nice video. There are just two things you said that I have a few doubts about. To my knowledge, the F-102A didn't have a T/W advantage over the F-5A as it was much heavier, especially with a full load of Falcons, and the extra thrust was not enough to compensate for the added weight. Also, correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't the F-5E (and not the F-5A) the one with the radar gunsight? Anyway, I like the topic. I've read that the turks also used the F-102 in the unusual role of ground attack aircraft.
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this seems so stupid I can't believe anything either side says
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The scenario you present in the video seems quite realistic to me. I don't believe that the F-102 could score a kill against an F-5 in a dogfight. The scenario where Dinopoulos saw the F-102 bailing out using its afterburner and thought that he had scored a kill is also quite possible. Kudos for correctly pronouncing Skambardonis's name, a name that we Greeks can easily mispronounce, although you had a hard time pronouncing Achialos! Looking forward to your next video in this series!
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This really gave me a pound for air to ground.
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I haven't watched it yet, but for many documentary programmers on YouTube I was always asking to analyze this incident since even I read a lot about it I still couldn't get satisfactory information in Türkiye as a Turk. I look forward to watching you analysis.. One interesting thing from that time that was that prior to the beginning of the war, when choppers and troops gathered in south Türkiye, many chopper pilots testified that they had seen two F-4s flying at low altidue, probably filming the preparations. Turks didn't have operational F-4s yet in TurAF and Greeks were incapable to reach those ranges. Were those American or British?? And it is quite surprising that they did not inform Greeks. If the testimonies were accurate, this was something that is in mystery
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Right before the Merge hearing where the deuces were I can imagine them goin "oh sh@@"
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Lovely episode mate. I do have to say though, it’d be great if you put in subtitles!
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In 1974 I was on the island of Crete. I was planning on living there. I suffered to much because of this I moved.
