TR Traps Last Tomcat from Combat Mission

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Last Time, Baby! doesn't sound as cool as  Anytime...Baby!






We will never forget the greatest fighter of all time!

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*cringes* let's be careful Theis, this is a board of *gasp* aviation enthusiasts after all.

Sad to see it go indeed, but the F/A-18 will do a fine job stepping in.

THe question is: What will (not) replace this aircraft? What will (not) replace the A-6? What will (not) replace the A-10 (that they are 86'ing as well). What will (not) replace the never produced B-1 bomber? They all have a purpose, and that purpose is trying to be completed with aircraft not specificly designed.

Did you know the B-1B is NOT allowed to fly into known icing? Did you know that the A-6 is still one of the most weather impurvious aircraft in the world? Did you know that air cover for a ground battle is not an option for any aircraft we have except for a C-130? What can a C-130 out manuever?

I'm sorry, the F/A-18 is a good aircraft, but it is not an aircraft that can precision bomb in horrible weather like an A-6. It doesn't have the range or the intercept capabilities of the F-14. It doesn't have the payload of the B1.

The U.S.A.F. is getting rid of things they have no replacements for. Dumb dumb dumb dumb.

I thought the main reason for getting rid of the F14 was because the maintenance costs were high and spare parts supply non existant.  It was either do a major upgrade to the aircraft or retire it.  If the US was only worried about mixing up US F14s with Iranian F14s then the much cheaper solution would be to not fly F14s over Iran.

And given that the US doesn't plan on being in armed conflict against an enemy who's naval strategy is massed long range missile attack the long ranged interceptor really is obsolete.  BVR at 100 miles is VERY risky when an aircraft is the target and not a flood of missles.  IIRC didn't Iran learn that the hard way?  God knows what the backlash would be if the US shot down an airliner.  The F18 is just as good (or better) than the F14 for shorter range BVR and VR.

This isn't the cold war anymore.  Of the countries the US can expect to be in immediate conflict with, none of them really has a modern airforce.  And those with a sophisticated air force could be engaged by the airforce with its newer F15 and F22s.  Besides, which air forces can put something in the air roughly equal to an F18?  Is there anyone (except maybe Canada and Isreal) outside of Europe that could do it?  They're pretty much either all US allies, or have good relationships with the US.  

The F14 was a briliant aircraft for the cold war.  Probably one of the bests of all time.  But its role isn't needed anymore.

The F14 is a mans airplane. It has the most striking profile of ANY aircraft ever built (and that includes all russian airfraft of which there are some very pretty ones). It's built out of girders and is as strong as an ox and having stood sentinal over us for thirty years it will keep its lonely vigil in the Arizona desert waiting to be called upon if we should ever need it.

It is and always will be in my eyes the supreme carrier borne interceptor.

I say no more

Gordon

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Davis Monthan airbase Tucson Arizona is where they will reside for the next few years. They will not start destroying them yet. I would imagine it would be quite difficult to smuggle something like a Tomcat out onto the black market.

War with South America?

The world is getting weird. Maybe we can take back what rightfully belongs to us, Cuba!

Besides, the US has nothing to fear from any single South American country.  Who cares if one country gets their hands on a bunch of Russian fighters that are rough equivalents to US fighters if the US has five times more? It's that simple, if the Su-30=F/A-18 and we have five times more F/A-18s, plus F-15s, F-16s, F-22s.... that settles that. There are very, very few countries that could go head to head with the US in an air war and have a hope to win-why? Not necissarily because of pilot skill as much as the simple fact that the US has the largest modern AF in the world.

A South American coalition, on the other hand, could be formidable.

Let's please avoid the US/Russian fighter argument, they've never met in combat, so we really don't know anything.  US fighters have a better record, but they've also been seeing waaaaaay more combat (against weak foes) than modern Russian fighters, essentially nullifying that point.  The argument stalls there, and the rest is all speculation (at least it should stall there). I know it's fun to speculate, but I personally find the 1v1 dogfight speculation irrelevant. Air combat rarely happens like that.

Not to mention we're all completely biased.

Last time I checked Ivan, the only evidence we have of how good the F-22 is in comparison to Russian fighters is the computer generated kill ratios, which have put the F-22 at a 10:1 advantage over modern Russian fighters. Does that mean it'll be that good in RL? Of course not. But you need to stop slinging around opinions like they're fact. The F-22 has not only never met Russian fighters in combat, it's never even met them in mock dogfighting.

The problem with facts like those Ivan, is that, without exception, it goes both ways-someone will chime in with something that NATO has that makes any Eastern fighter toast. It goes in circles, and circles, and circles...

And my point still stands.  Go ahead, send up your Su-30 that can make any NATO fighter toast.  We'll have 8 F/A-18s flying CAP waiting for it. (I started a massive thread on this a while back if anyone remembers, about how regardless of pilot skill, the US does airborne command and control better than any other nation because we've had so much practice)

The Raptor bashing gets old too, considering every unbiased source I've seen has painted it as having a nearly unfair advantage.