The piece of the cold war nobody told you about - Africa's forgotten war - the air battles .

One hardly sees Hollywood movies with cold war plots in locations as obscure as Angola and South West Africa/Namibia, but yet the cold war's tentacles reached as far as Southern Africa.

Its likely to have heard about the Cuban missile crisis, but who has heard of Cubans troops and Soviet Union advisers operating in the Angolan Bush.

It's a long and interesting story that has its roots to way back in colonial times, but one can still find remnants of it in various museums or in the bush where viscous battles were fought.

The South Africa Border War war was mostly fought on the ground but its interesting to start the story off in the air.

South Africa deployed a number of aircraft and the Angolans had the Angolan Air Force Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-21bis Lofting-1 supplied by the Soviet Union via Cuba, shown below in combat colours.

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This particular one is one that crash landed in Northern South West Africa on 14 December 1988, after the pilot got lost and ran out of fuel.
The undercarriage was restored and it is housed at Swartkop Air Force Base near Pretoria.

The FAPA/DAA fought several battles with South African Air Force aircraft in November 1981, October 1982, and twice in September 1987.

Both the MiG-21MF and the MiG-21bis were deployed almost exclusively in the fighter/bomber role.

As interceptors they were somewhat unsuccessful due to their inability to detect low-flying South African aircraft. On November 6, 1981, a Mirage F1CZ achieved South Africa's first confirmed air-to-air kill since the Korean War when it destroyed Cuban Lieutenant Danacio Valdez's MiG-21MF with 30mm cannon fire.

On 5 October 1982, Mirages escorting an English Electric Canberra on routine reconnaissance over Cahama were engaged by at least two MiG-21bis. A South African radar operator picked up the attacking MiGs and was able to alert the Mirage pilots in advance, instructing them to change course immediately. As they jettisoned their auxiliary tanks, however, they were pinpointed by the Cubans, who opened pursuit.

In a vicious dogfight, SAAF Major Johann Rankin closed range and maneuvered into the MiGs' rear cones. From there, one of his two R.550 Magic missiles impacted directly behind the lead MiG and forced it down. The second aircraft, piloted by a Lieutenant Raciel Marrero Rodriguez, could not detect the Mirage's proximity until it had entered his turn radius and was perforated by Rankin's autocannon. This damaged MiG-21 landed safely at Lubango.

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The Mirage F1CZ with the kill also at Swartkop Air Force Base.