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After having read of Grand Duke Aleksandr Mikhailovich's involvement with aviation in World War One I felt I needed to increase my
understanding of the Russian Airforce . You won't (I think) be surprised to learn that I can't find very much !!! The only aircraft
manufacturer from the Great War whom I can track down is Sikorski , and there immediately I get confused . I assume the current
Sikorsky company somehow evolved from this ? There were , as far as I can see , no Sikorski aircraft in the Soviet airforce of World
War Two . Added to that that the Polish premier was called Sikorski (any relation ?) I was hypothesizing that the original company
Sikorski had been based in Poland and after the break-up of the Russian Empire was no longer available to the Soviet Union . Is that
close to the truth ?
I am also confused by the wealth of Soviet aircraft makes . I am assuming that these are nemaed after their designers as under the Soviet
economy there would be no owners . Perhaps later certain factories became designated as 'Ilyushin' factories so the names survived the
death/retirement of the designers . Does this equate with the truth ?
Soviet companies of the Second World War which I have tracked down so far are Polikarpov , Ilyushin , Tupolev , Lavochkin ,
Yakovlev and Petlyakov . I know that the Yakovlev (Yak) aircraft were named after their designer Alexander Yakovlev and presume the
others were similarly named. Had any of these designers been involved in First World War aircraft design (as for example Heinkel had for
the Hansa-Brandenburg company in Germany) ?
I hope that someone has more information on the Russian WW1 aircraft especially - I have just learnt of the existence of a bomber called
the Iliya Muromez though my correspondent knew little of it specifically .
Best Regards
Jon'
P.S. Apologies that this is the same text as left at Trenches' a few days ago - I was advbised to try for better luck here !
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