It ' s a shame the Mig 29 has a bad reputation from high combat losses and smoky engines . Also the avionics being very difficult to operate and the Russian Air Force favoring the Su 27 platform also didn ' t help . All the mig 29 s lost in combat were operated by poorly funded 3 rd world countries . The soviets sold the mig 29 to anyone for a bargain which attracted many poor countries . These countries could barley operate these planes let alone afford flight time training for their pilots . And these mig 29 s were going against far more advanced military equipped with awacs and being outnumbered . I hate how much praise the F 15 gets because it has over 100 kills with zero loses from enemy aircraft . Yeah it sounds impressive at first until you realize all those kills were downgraded , poorly maintained , poorly trained , and outdated aircraft . The only worthy opponent the f 15 faced were Iraqi Mirage F 1 s but it was unfair .