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NEW SOVIET BOMBER
IN EASTERN GERMANY
LONDON,.Wed.-Russia has put a new and heavily
armed jet bomber into service in eastern Germany
and the Soviet Air Force now has five new types of
swept-wing jet fighters as well as another twin-jet
fighter-bomber.
These details of Stalin's war
plane progress were published
today in the latest volume of
Jane's "All the World's Air
craft"-the authoritative annual
encyclopedia of international
aircraft developments.
Jane's gives the estimated
maximum speed of Russian
MIGIS5 jet fighters now being
used in Korea as 640 m.p.h.
The world speed record is 670
m.p.h. held by an American
Sabre jet but Britain has a new
jet fighter, the Hawker 1067,
which is faster than either
MIGs or Sabres, Jane's says.
Expansion
Jane's editor in a preface says
that the nations of the world
are engaged in the greatest air
power expansion ever known in
peacetime.
Much of the new development
was shrouded in secrecy but the
editor mentioned the formation
by the American Air Force of
the first guided-missile squad
ron equipped with jet-powered,
pilotless and expendable bomb
carriers and also the first ex
perimental contracts for "Con
vertaplanes," combining the
lift and hover of a helicopter
with the high-speed level flight
of normal aircraft.
Large Glider
The book said that the Rus
sians also had sent a number
of light bombers to Czechoslo
vakia and Poland.
Aircraft usable for training,
ambulances, towing gliders and
crop-dusting also had been sent
to Bulgaria and Poland.
Jane's said that there was a
rumour that P. V. Tsibin, one
of the Soviet's leading aircraft
designers, had turned out a very
large glider.
The book published a photo
graph and sketches of the MIG
fighter.
Authoritative information
about the high-speed fighter
was lacking, Jane's said, but
American technical experts
were studying the remains of
one that had crashed in Korea.
The volume said that much
speculation had been aroused
by the appearance of what pro
bably was the Soviet's first suc
cessful jet bomber.
Believed to be known as the
T'U10, the plane was seen in
large numbers at the 1950
Soviet aviation display and now
was in service in eastern Ger
many.
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