picture 195070

In the aftermath of Kulyapin’s experience, but also that of several other intercepts of Western aircraft that ventured into the Soviet airspace of the late 1970s and early 1980s, in 1981 the V-PVO ordered its Su-15TMs to be upgraded through the addition of UPK-23-250 gun pods with twin-barrel 23mm cannons under the fuselage. Later on, also APU-60-I rails for R-60M short-range air-to-air missiles (ASCC/NATOcodename ‘AA-8 Aphid’) were added under the inboard section of the leading edge of each wing. Thus came into being, the ‘ultimate’ form of the Su-15TM, as best-known in the West ever since, and illustrated here, on another jet of the 166th Guards Fighter Aviation Regiment, V-PVO. (Artwork by Tom Cooper)