is the russian hind helicopter any good?

[My2Cents]

MANPAD's were what really got the pilots nervous in the Soviet/Afghan war - as soon as Stingers and to a lesser extent Javelin/Blowpipe came into the theatre, everything had to either fly above 15K feet or under a 100 feet. Anything between tended to have an exciting and possibly short life. A solid burst from 12.7mm could do the job if it hit the internals - there's an old story that Afghan gunners were told to aim just under the star on each side of the Hind as there was a large oil cooler sited there but I don't know if that's correct or not.

As I understand many of the mountains were above the operational altitude of the Hind of that period, unless stripped and operating near minimum load. Flying low in the valley below steep mountains allowed the Afghans to station MANPADs above likely flight paths and shoot down through the rotor, avoiding the heavy armor on the occasions that they did not take off a blade.

Such areas were especially deadly.