in different variants, and 22 Mi-8/17 he-
licopters.
• The Air Force operated 8 Mi-17s, 9 Mi-
8, and around 20 W-3 helicopters, along
with lighter platforms, including 14 Mi-2
and 22 Polish-made SW-4 training heli-
copters;
• The Polish Navy operated 24 helicop-
ters, including four Kaman SH-2Gs.
• GROM SOF unit operated 4 S-70i Black
Hawks.
This brings the total number of helicop-
ters up to 230. Furthermore, the Polish
Air Force Academy (LAW, Lotnicza Aka-
demia Wojskowa) operates light training
helicopters; those aircraft, however, wear
civilian regs. These numbers, sourced
from open sources, only paint a quantita-
tive picture here. The data says nothing
about the availability status. Furthermo-
re, some of these aircraft were transfer-
red to Ukraine - this refers to the Mi-24 in
particular.
As we can see, most of that inventory still
dates back to the Warsaw Pact era. The
above refers primarily to the Mil helicop-
ters: Mi-2, Mi-8, Mi-14, and Mi-24. There
was a brief transition period in the 1990s
when the number of Hinds went up - Po-
land received 18 Mi-24D from Germany.
Furthermore, between 2006 and 2011 a
dozen Mi-17 Hips were procured, to meet
the overseas deployment requirements.
These facts alone depict the issues tied
to those helicopters. They are simply old
and have been in operation for more than
35 years now, and the performance and
technical condition of these overlap - the
problems also pertain to the available
weaponry. Only some of these helicop-
ters underwent an upgrade. That state-
ment is true for the Army and Air Force
Mi-17s that received the M134 Miniguns
as a part of the upgrade. Some of the
Mi-24s and Mi-2s have been modified for
NVG operations.
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