On the 30 March 1951 a "Top Secret Order of Distinct Importance", issued by the Chief of the People's Armed Forces established the 26th Independent Air Reconnaissance Regiment, concentrating the three squadrons of Petlyakov Pe-2s at Graf Ignatievo Air Base airfield.

In order to keep the operational skills of the flight crews 3 Ilyushin Il-14 transport planes were transferred to the regiment for training purposes.

In 1969 six MiG-21R entered service, along with some MiG-21F-13, being previously flown by the 2nd Squadron of the 19th Fighter Air Regiment (from Graf Ignatievo airfield).

A MiG-25RBT was lost in flight due to bad meteorological conditions and consequent lack of fuel in 1984.

The last MiG-17 left the air force's inventory in 1989, At that time the 2/26th RAR was an elite air unit of the Warsaw Pact, comprising 22 pilots-1st class being superbly trained in airborne reconnaissance, guided weapons ground attack and even Air-to-Air combat, utilising the R-60 AAM, with about 120-130 flight hours yearly.

The last remaining MiG-21R were withdrawn from service and because of that some more MiG-21MF were optimised to carry their dedicated re-con pods and so were denominated to MiG-21MF-R.