K-13 (missile) - Background - The Sidewinder Missile

The Sidewinder Missile

During the Second Taiwan Strait Crisis in 1958, the Republic of China's (Taiwan) F-86 Sabres faced the much higher performance, mainland Chinese PLAAF MiG-17s. The MiGs had speed, maneuverability and altitude advantages over the Sabres, allowing them to engage only when they desired, normally at advantageous times. In response, the US Navy rushed to modify 100 of the ROC's Sabres to fit the newly introduced AIM-9 Sidewinder missile, the latest model being the "B" version. These were introduced into combat for the first time on 24 September 1958, when a group of MiG-17s cruised past a flight of Sabres, only to find themselves under attack by missile fire. This was the first instance of guided missiles being used in air-to-air combat.

On the 28th, a similar engagement resulted in one of the missiles becoming lodged in a MiG without exploding, allowing it to be removed. The Soviets later became aware that the Chinese had at least one Sidewinder, and after some wrangling, were able to convince the Chinese to send them one of the captured missiles. Gennadiy Sokolovskiy, later chief engineer at the Vympel team, said that "the Sidewinder missile was to us a university offering a course in missile construction technology which has upgraded our engineering education and updated our approach to production of future missiles."

A subsequent claim was made by Ron Westrum in his book "Sidewinder" that the Soviets obtained the plans for Sidewinder from Swedish Colonel and convicted spy Stig Wennerström, and rushed their version into service by 1961 copying it so closely that even the part numbers were duplicated. Although Wennerström did leak information of the Sidewinder after negotiating its purchase for Sweden, none of the known Soviet sources mention this, while all explicitly mention the Chinese example.