Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-17

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MiG-17
A restored MiG-17
General information
Type	Fighter aircraft
National origin	Soviet Union
Manufacturer	Mikoyan-Gurevich
Status	In limited service
Primary users	Soviet Air Forces (historical) People's Liberation Army Air Force (historical) Polish Air Force (historical) Vietnam People's Air Force (historical)
Number built	10,649 including Polish, Czech and Chinese variants
History
Introduction date	October 1952
First flight	14 January 1950
Developed from	Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-15
Variants	PZL-Mielec Lim-6 Shenyang J-5
Developed into	Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-19

The Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-17 (Russian: Микоян и Гуревич МиГ-17; NATO reporting name: Fresco)^[1] is a high-subsonic fighter aircraft produced in the Soviet Union from 1952 and was operated by air forces internationally. The MiG-17 was license-built in China as the Shenyang J-5 and Poland as the PZL-Mielec Lim-6. The MiG-17 is still being used by the North Korean air force in the present day and has seen combat in the Middle East and Asia.

The MiG-17 was an advanced modification of the MiG-15 aircraft produced by the Soviet Union during the Korean War. Production of the MiG-17 was too late for use in that conflict and was first used in the Second Taiwan Strait Crisis in 1958. While the MiG-17 was designed to shoot down slower American bombers, it showed surprising success when used by North Vietnamese pilots to combat American fighters and fighter-bombers during the Vietnam War, nearly a decade after its initial design. This was due to the MiG-17 being more agile and maneuverable than the American F-4 Phantom and F-105 Thunderchief, which were focused on speed and long range combat, as well as the fact that MiG-17 was armed with guns, which initial models of the F-4 Phantom lacked.