The Brianovich story...............or,Don't tell Stalin and he might not know!

[thedarkmaster]

Life wasn't easy in the USSR during the Great Patriotic War .....and never more so for those designing the aircraft that the motherland was using to drive back the Fascist Beast.

One possible route that appealed was to produce a direct copy of one of the Western aircraft already in service with Soviet units, one that was a world beater, and one that had a large propaganda image all of it's own.

The Lavochkin design team was given the task of making a copy of the Spitfire that was then entering service in increasing numbers, but before the design could be put into service it had to pass the eyes of Uncle Joe Stalin........and that's where the problems all began .

On the morning of the meeting to show Stalin the plans, the Li2 carrying the visiting Lavochkin group crashed outside of Moscow, though the most senior of the teams members survived all their plans and drawings where destroyed in the ensuing fire . Now anywhere else and at any time else this would not be a problem but in the last few days Chief Marshal of Aviation Alexander Novikov had been on the end of Stalin's bad mood and he wasn't going to suffer it again.

Novikov ordered the design team to not mention the crash and to quickly find some drawings and images of spitfires to show Stalin......and the problem really started to get worse.

The one remaining draughtsman on the team, Pavel Brianovich had little to work on, his head hurt and besides he had only seen the drawings once before......he was only here because his wife was the daughter of a candidate member of the politburo......he had no real skill but he could talk his way out of a tight corner......which is why he was still married and able to visit his mistress in Moscow !

Brianovich collected his drawings and listened as an experienced air Force pilot filled in the blanks of his knowledge on the Spitfire....which to be fair was most of the things he needed to know.

He did a couple of doodles of the Spitfire from above, with it's telltale wing shape, now so famous all over the world, to make up for the missing drawings that Stalin wanted to look at.

All was going well in the meeting, Stalin had not noticed or at least not commented on the cuts and bruises........maybe he saw so many he just didn't see any anymore ?.......that is until the Marshall saw the view of the wings on the Spitfire copy...........he stopped he did a double take.." So Comrades ..this wing is incorrect, are you trying to deceive me ? are you working for the Fascists? "

The room went quiet and all eyes turned towards Brianovich as Semyon Alexseyevich Lavochkin gestured towards him ........." Well Comrde " Brianovich began " i have studied the Spitfire and i can say that with the skills of MY design team i have managed by flipping the wing to improve the design, it will comrade lead us to new heights in aircraft design" ..............and so the lie was told.........and as no-one was willing to tell Stalin the truth they where now all caught up in the lie together........and the problem became huge.

So was born the Brianovich series of aircraft.....a rather poor copy of the spitfire, well not rather bad, bloody useless in fact, but as comrade Stalin had said it was OK then nobody with in the communist world was going to tell him that.......a series of aircraft that soldiered on and on in a variety of roles none of which it was suited for.


Brianovich Br1




Brianovich Br2, winter 1944





Brianovich Br2 Luftwaffe evaluation 1944.........they think it's crap





Brianovich Br2  Korean Peoples Air Force 1950's





Brianovich Br2  People's liberation army air Force, China 1949





Brianovich BR2 Soviet Naval Aviation, Far East late 1950's





Brianovich Br2 Soviet occupation forces , Soviet Zone of Austria 1950






Brianovich Br2 , Kiev air defence zone 1950's





Brianovich BR2 Czech Air Force 1950's





Brianovich Br2 Cuban Revolutionary Air Force...Bay of pigs





Brianovich Br2   Hungarian Peoples Air Force late 1950's





Brianovich Br2 painted to represent a Spitfire Mk1 of the RAF during the filming of the movie " Battle of Britain " 1960





Brianovich Br2 in South Vietnamese service 1960,  inturned with a defecting pilot it was used as a hack for a short while until burnt out in an incident two months later





Brianovich Br9 Target drone, 1966





Brianovich Br5 , Night Fighter, Berlin 1945





Brianovich Br23 Jet fighter of the German Democratic Air Force 1960





Brianovich Br80  A counter insurgent variant briefly considered ( about 20 mins) in 1980







This story all started on a visit to the £1 shop in Skegness in April when my daughter decided that Daddy need a present as he hadn't had one during the holiday.......it is such a bad kit..12 parts and yes the wings are back to front....but....they only fit that way.


Here she is





It's been a bit of a laugh......17 aircraft for £18....you cannot go wrong

[Army of One]

Oh mate......somevgreat work there.....what a great back story and some great models there........

[deathjester]

    Brilliant !!

[Tophe]

Looking at the first ones, I was delighted and prepared words to congratulate you, then... the next screen was the Br 5 twin-plane marvel! Such a beauty!
I have not enough words but  

[Dizzyfugu]

That's impressive! WOW! 

BTW: Are you considering therapy? 

[Librarian]

Superb schemes all round. I do like the VVS black/grey/green scheme best. Deserving praise aplenty .

[kitbasher]

Fantastic.  Brilliant.  Such good fun - please don't stop.  Buy some more and keep going. Please!!!

I've seen that range of kits and they are toys.  But who knows how many may turn to the hobby just by throwing a couple of them together.

Was tempted to get the 'MiG-29' in the same range.  Check out the box art though - http://www.theworks.co.uk/p/model-building/mig-29-starter-clip-kit/5015934801765 (and also the 'F-15' http://www.theworks.co.uk/images/5015934982105_Z.jpg) - who knows what's inside??

[thedarkmaster]

This is what is inside the Mig 29 box mate





Got one of those as well

[NARSES2]

What a collection, absolutely brilliant 

[Tophe]

Dear Darkmaster, you politely forgot one point not to hurt our British readers, I understand: the DvBr-23 was so genius, the silly Brits (of that time) pretended it was a derivative of their own Spitfire!!! and not a pure Soviet design all inspired by dear Joseph Stalin (the best man in the Universe, ever)...