The spy satellite photos created panic in the Pentagon. They showed an enormous Soviet airplane, probably an interceptor, with engine intakes the size of small cars. The wings were huge, too, hinting at maneuverability far beyond anything America’s first-rank McDonnell F-4 Phantom II could achieve.
These were prototypes of what would become the Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-25 Foxbat. After the airplane appeared in public for the first time in July 1967 and went on a record-setting spree, it appeared the Soviets had a wonder weapon that could match the best in the West—the Mach 3.2 Lockheed SR-71 Blackbird spyplane. The lightened MiG-25 prototypes, designated YE-155R (reconnaissance) and YE-155P (interceptor), set 29 speed, altitude and time-to-climb records, some of which still stand. For pure speed, they notched 1,852 mph. They could climb to 98,425 feet in four minutes and 3.86 seconds and ultimately reached an absolute altitude record of 123,520 feet.
In truth, the MiG-25 turned out to be a Potemkin Village of an airplane. The same kind of surveillance failure behind the so-called “missile gap” that John F. Kennedy exploited during the 1960 presidential campaign was also responsible for “Foxbat hysteria.” The Foxbat interceptor did achieve its mission in one way, though. It kept the SR-71 out of Soviet airspace for several years while the West pondered the big MiG’s true capabilities. And big it was. The Foxbat was the size of a World War II heavy bomber—nine feet longer than an Avro Lancaster, two and a half feet taller than a Consolidated B-24 and with a gross weight almost 27,000 pounds heavier than a Boeing B-17. Photographs of MiG-25s looming over its swarms of technicians and ground crews suggested that the airplane was maintained by toddlers.
The Soviets were short on titanium technology, however, and titanium is a key ingredient of high-speed flight. The heat generated by skin friction at supersonic speeds softens and weakens aluminum, making titanium the best answer for flying extremely fast. But titanium is expensive and difficult to machine and shape.
