A Russian Mi-24 Hind Flies as the Enemy at Twenty Nine Palms, and Why the Marines Want It There

A Russian-built Mi-24D Hind attack helicopter flew as the opposing force in the U.S. Marine Corps Adversary Force Exercise (AFX 4-26) at the Marine Corps Air Ground Combat Center in Twenty Nine Palms, California. According to reporting from The Aviationist, this was not a one-off: since 2020, a pair of these Soviet-designed gunships has provided “threat replication” for the Marine Corps, the Army, and the Air Force. The aircraft is flown by private contractors, not the U.S. military, and its job is to let American troops train against the real thing - the real airframe, the real sound, and the real sensor signature of an enemy helicopter.

What Is the Mi-24 Hind?

The Mi-24 is a Soviet design that first flew in the early 1970s. The Russians call it a “flying tank,” and the crews who fought against it in Afghanistan gave it darker nicknames.

It is unusual by Western standards. Most attack helicopters - like the American AH-64 Apache - are lean, two-seat aircraft built purely to shoot. The Hind is both a gunship and a troop carrier. Behind its two-man cockpit sits a cabin that can carry eight soldiers.

The Soviet concept was an armored machine that could shoot its way into a landing zone, drop infantry, and then stay overhead and keep fighting. Cannons, rockets, anti-tank missiles, and a cabin full of troops - all in one airframe. It is big, loud, and genuinely intimidating in person. That, it turns out, is exactly the point.

Why Is a Russian Helicopter Flying Against U.S. Marines?

It’s easy to read this as a novelty - a Russian helicopter over an American desert making for a good photo. But there is a serious training doctrine underneath it.

When you train troops to fight, the hardest thing to replicate is the enemy. You can put your own people in the opposing-force role and paint their vehicles a different color, but your own soldiers think like you, move like you, and fly equipment you already know cold. The realism only goes so far.

The gold standard is to train against the actual airframe - the real sound, the real radar and infrared signature, the real flight profile. A Marine on the ground with a shoulder-fired missile, or an operator watching a sensor feed, is trained to identify a threat by those cues in a second or two. You cannot fake the acoustic signature of a Hind with an American helicopter; it simply sounds like something else.

That is what threat replication means. When the Marines put a genuine Mi-24D over the range, the troops on the ground are seeing, hearing, and detecting the real deal - not a stand-in. This kind of training is hard to buy any other way.

Who Actually Flies These Hinds?

These Hinds are not flown by the Marine Corps. They are operated by private contractors as part of an industry known as contract adversary air, or contract red air. Private companies buy up former military aircraft, keep them flying, and rent them and their pilots back to the armed forces to play the enemy in training.

For years, much of that work involved fighter jets. Companies acquired retired Mirages, Kfirs, Hawker Hunters, and F-16s and flew them against American squadrons so pilots could practice against a real, maneuvering opponent instead of another aircraft from their own unit. The military found that paying a contractor to be the adversary is often cheaper than burning hours and airframe life on frontline jets.

The Hind represents that same idea moving into the rotary-wing and ground-threat world: a privately operated fleet of former Eastern Bloc helicopters kept airworthy and put to work as the opposing force.

How Do You Keep a Soviet Gunship Flying in America?

Keeping a Soviet-era gunship airworthy in the United States is no small feat. There is no factory support line and no manufacturer sending service bulletins. Parts are scarce, and much of the original documentation was never written in English.

Each of these two Hinds represents a real feat of maintenance and airmanship just to be flightworthy and safe enough to operate on a U.S. range with troops nearby. Anyone who has kept an old airplane flying knows the story: the difference between a warbird in a museum and a warbird that flies is measured in wrenches, records, and patience.

Why This Matters for Pilots in 2026

The following is context and informed analysis, not reporting.

The threat environment is real and current. Attack helicopters like the Hind and its descendants are flying in conflicts around the world today, and the lessons from those fights are being studied hard. The Marine Corps has been reworking how it operates - spreading into smaller, more mobile units that may have to survive under the eyes of a capable enemy, including enemy aircraft.

If that is the fight you are preparing for, training Marines to recognize, react to, and defeat a real adversary helicopter isn’t a novelty - it’s homework. An exercise literally named the Adversary Force Exercise is telling you in its title what it’s about.

What General Aviation Pilots Should Know

The world of contract warbirds and former military aircraft in civilian hands is a real and growing part of aviation, and it operates under a specific set of rules. In the United States, many of these aircraft fly in the experimental category, often under an exhibition airworthiness certificate issued by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA).

That certificate comes with real limits: where you can fly, what you can do, how you must maintain the aircraft, and a requirement to notify the FAA of your operating area. For heavy iron - jet warbirds and complex former military types - pilots need specific authorization and type-specific training. You don’t just buy a gunship and go fly it.

This affects you if you fly near a busy warbird event like Oshkosh or Sun ’n Fun. When you see a Soviet gunship, a P-51 Mustang, or a MiG at one of these gatherings, you’re looking at the visible tip of a large, carefully regulated ecosystem of former military aviation.

The practical takeaway: respect the notices. When one of these operations is working an area - a contract adversary flight near a military range or a warbird practicing an airshow routine - that information shows up in the Temporary Flight Restrictions (TFRs) and Notices to Air Missions (NOTAMs) you’re already required to check. Get the full briefing and know what’s flying in your area before you launch.

Three Stories in One Headline

There are really three stories stacked inside this one event:

The aircraft - a 1970s Soviet “flying tank,” a gunship and troop carrier in one hull, still relevant enough as a threat that the U.S. military wants its people trained against the real thing.

The business - a private contract adversary industry that has grown from renting out fighter jets to fielding a full spectrum of opposing-force aircraft, including two hard-to-maintain Mi-24D Hinds serving three U.S. services since 2020.

The regulation - the experimental certificates, exhibition category, pilot authorizations, and airspace notices that let a Russian gunship fly over California safely, in the same national airspace you fly in. It’s a system, and it works.

The next time you see a photo of something exotic wearing red star markings over an American desert, you’ll know what you’re looking at: not a stunt, but a training tool - bought, maintained, and flown by professionals so that the Marine on the ground has already met the enemy before the day it counts.

Key Takeaways

• A Russian Mi-24D Hind flew as the opposing force in the Marine Corps Adversary Force Exercise (AFX 4-26) at Twenty Nine Palms, California.
• Two Hinds have provided threat replication for the Marine Corps, Army, and Air Force since 2020, flown by private contractors - not the U.S. military.
• Training against a genuine enemy airframe replicates the real sound, sensor signature, and flight profile that troops must learn to identify instantly.
• The aircraft is part of the growing contract adversary air industry, which expanded from fighter jets into rotary-wing and ground-threat aircraft.
• These aircraft fly under FAA experimental/exhibition rules; GA pilots should always check TFRs and NOTAMs before flying near military ranges or warbird events.