(Text: author, photos: Dirk Peisker, Joachim Horschig, IG Luftfahrt Dresden, Fred Künzel, Norbert Kalz, Bernhard Pethe, author)
"Whoever goes on a journey has something to tell", as the German saying goes. And if someone travels to places others rarely go to, there is also a number of people interested in the stories. How I came to report on my MiG-21 travels at various places is described below.
Fliegerstammtisch Dresden, September 2023
Among the many reactions to my report on FLUG REVUE Online about my arrest in Romania was a phone call from Wolfgang Wehner. I had met the retired NVA lieutenant colonel in 2009 at the opening of the special exhibition "50 years of MiG-21 series production" at the Luftwaffenmuseum Gatow. He asked me whether I would like to give a lecture on the MiG-21 at the Fliegerstammtisch Dresden. I gladly agreed, and did not think long about the specific subject either, as I had had it in mind for some time: a report on my MiG-21 travels.
Beforehand I spent quite some time selecting a manageable number from more than 50,000 pictures. In the end 500 remained. Looking through them, there were interesting discoveries, such as that at the Dubai 2000 Airshow I had come within a few metres not only of the then Defence Minister and today's Prime Minister of the UAE, Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, but also of the long-time Syrian ruler Bashar al-Assad.
I also realised that it would definitely be impossible to present even approximately all the interesting experiences from more than 200 trips in one lecture. To gain at least a rough overview, it would certainly help to write down what has happened over what is now more than 30 years. The result was a text of over 60 pages.
I had combined the lecture on September 28, 2023 with a business appointment in Chemnitz, so the remaining 70 kilometres to Dresden should have been "a stone's throw". Far from it: thanks to a huge traffic jam and a diversion, I arrived hurried and harried on a hot late-summer day at the venue, a traditional restaurant in the heart of Dresden. The place exuded plenty of local colour but was hardly suitable as a lecture venue – cramped, with a poor view for many listeners and above all with technology that only after a long struggle was willing to show my pictures.
Nevertheless, a good 25 visitors – including Dirk Peisker, who accompanied me on some trips and had also contributed to this website – followed my lecture, and most were still listening attentively when after an hour and a half we were driven out of our room and "moved" to another, actually more suitable one. However, my lecture was far from over. Only after another hour was I to reach the end – the report on the MiG-21 farewell in Romania, followed by the (then) very latest pictures from Zagreb. Those who had stayed the course were enthusiastic, but I, who had not eaten anything for hours and had drunk little, was rather exhausted.
Fliegerstammtisch Cämmerswalde, January 2024
Among the audience in Dresden was Joachim Horschig of the Fliegerstammtisch Cämmerswalde. I had also met him in 2009, on the occasion of the lecture at the theme day of the Freundeskreis Luftwaffe at the Military History Museum Dresden. I gladly accepted his invitation to the municipality of Neuhausen in the Ore Mountains, where I had never been before.
The venue, the Gaststätte am Flugzeug, turned out to be appropriate to the subject, after all its own mini aircraft museum includes a MiG-21. 35 participants followed my lecture on a sunny winter's day. When the lecture ended with pictures from Zagreb from January 2024, however, the sun had already set. Although I had reduced the number of my pictures to about 300, my presentation still lasted two and a half hours. Thanks to the experience from Dresden and at the invitation of the hosts, I had eaten beforehand and was therefore still fit when I received the club mascot "Emil" from Joachim.
I was particularly pleased to meet Jürgen Vogt again, probably Germany's longest-serving MiG-21 technician, whom I had also met at Gatow in 2009 and who had supported me with many tips when writing my book
IG Luftfahrt Dresden, June 2024
The Cämmerswalde group in turn maintains contacts with IG Luftfahrt Dresden, and so it was no great surprise that a further invitation to Dresden followed, where on June 20, 2024 more than 20 interested people had gathered, including, to my astonishment, several who had already heard the lecture in Cämmerswalde. I also spotted other familiar faces in the audience, including Lutz Freundt, who published many interesting publications with his Aerolit publishing house and whom I had also last met at Gatow in 2009. Thanks to the experience of the previous events I managed to limit my lecture to a digestible 90 minutes, which – after finishing with pictures from the AirVG airshow in May – left more time for many interesting conversations into the night.
Freundeskreis der Luftwaffe Dresden, September 2024
Even before the lecture at IG 152, another request from Dresden reached me from the local section of the Freundeskreis der Luftwaffe e.V. Section leader Fred Künzel had himself been a mechanic / technician on the MiG-21bis at Marxwalde during his military service and was therefore particularly interested in the subject. On September 12, 2024, one day after the collapse of the Carola Bridge, I was in Dresden again to report on my travels to a very small audience at the Bundeswehr service centre, formerly the Luftgau command and later the NVA's "Friedrich Engels" Military Academy.
Luftfahrttechnisches Museum Rothenburg, October 2024
The fitting conclusion of my lecture tour through Saxony (all venues so far had been in this federal state) was the appearance at the airport restaurant of Rothenburg / Görlitz airfield on October 11, 2024. Almost exactly 30 years earlier I had last been at the former base of flying training wing FAG-15.
Thanks to extensive advertising by the host, the Luftfahrttechnisches Museum Rothenburg, for example on the events portal of the town of Rothenburg and in the Sächsische Zeitung, about 40 listeners had come, including the chairman of the operating association Hans Sagawe and association member Jürgen "Paule" Vogt, who had already attended the lecture at IG Luftfahrt Dresden and had extended the invitation for the trip to Germany's eastern border. Also present was Andreas Grüner, who had played a leading role in restoring the MiG-21SMT at Altenburg and whom I had last seen at the public presentation of this aircraft a good 20 years earlier.
Before the event there was an opportunity to visit the museum, which presents an extraordinarily lovingly designed collection including MiG-21 exhibits. Besides seven aircraft of different versions, there are missiles, guns, engines, ejection seats and various MiG-21 equipment to see. Informative display boards provide visitors with a wide range of information on the subject.
Given the many attentive listeners, my lecture turned out somewhat longer again at a good two hours, and the positive response I received in several conversations afterwards accompanied me on my way home.
Modellbau- und Technikmuseum Großbreitenbach, November 2025
More than a year after the Rothenburg date there was another opportunity to report on my travels. And this time it was practically a home game, as the venue was the Modellbau- und Technikmuseum Großbreitenbach, only about 50 kilometres from where I live. After five lectures in Saxony, at last one followed in Thuringia. And although the way was short, it led into "another world": from the autumnal green and brown Saale valley into the snow-covered Thuringian Forest.
About 15 listeners – most of them enthusiastic and successful model builders – had gathered at the alternative venue chosen because of the cold, the Bildungswerk Großbreitenbach. Not only because a lot had happened since the last date – above all, of course, the end of MiG-21 flight operations in Croatia (and thus in all of Europe) and the MiG-21 farewell in India – but also because the audience showed no signs of flagging, the lecture lasted almost three hours.
While at the lecture in Cämmerswalde a single MiG-21 formed the backdrop, in Rothenburg there were six. In Großbreitenbach it was to be a whole fleet from all over the world – not in the original, however, but in the form of superbly built models.
