Bart Senior wrote:
Stealth fighters are not that--they are stealth bombers.
You are comparing apple with oranges and making
loose comparisions that make little sense, like the
rest of your post.
Correct. And I would imagine that the stealth aricraft were withdrawn
from the theater ops once the initial strikes were carried out and more
conventional forces were in place.
The F-18 is a totally differenty type of aircraft.
Agreed. The F-18 is a great plane strike aircraft with air superiority
capabilities. It is hardly an antique, it's service life has not yet
approached that of the venerable F-4.
Most American pilots in the Middle East are flying F-15's
and F-16's with thrust to weight ratios greater than 1, can
accellerate straight up. The F-18 is comparable technology
--which can by no means be compared to the F-4 Phantom
which is 1960's technology.
Except that the F-4 was an exceptional plane in it's day, as is the F-15
and F-18.
The F-15K is the best bird flying today, and flown by the
best pilots in the world..
It's a BIG plane with awesome capabilities... by far the best air
superiority fighter in current service. BTW one of their primary
training bases is Seymour Johnson AFB in Goldsboro NC. We see them all
the time, I'll say hello for you next time we drive by
The F-16 is a fast-turnaround forward deployable joint mission plane
that is intended to be cheaper, easier to maintain, and able to serve in
some ground attack roles. Obviously it has to give up something as a
straight air-to-air fighter, and it does.
All this goobledygook like "forward deployable" sounds like gibberish
but it means something with regard to military strategy & tactics. It's
like describing how knights, bishops, rooks etc move & capture in a game
of chess.
The future?
The F-22, coming soon to a war near you.
http://www.fas.org/man/dod-101/sys/ac/f-22.htm
They were talking about developing a carrier-capable version of the F-22
but I haven't heard about that for a while. It's been in the pipeline
for a long time.
Regards
Doug King