"tim gueguen" wrote in message
news:VFPcb.23773$TM4.15531@pd7tw2no...

"Flub" wrote in message
...
When the US Navy is going to retire all of its F-14 Tomcats, what will
happen with the feared long-range Pheonix missile?

Its debateable how feared the Phoenix is.

Tim,
except in the US and Russian (i.e. Soviet at the time) _public_ (and, of
course, all the possible internet forums and news groups), it was never
"debatable" how "feared" the Phoenix is.

To express it in the words of an Iraqi Su-22-strike leader, in reaction to
one of the Mirage F.1EQs that was escorting his forumation being blown away
by a "non-functioning/not serviceable/useless/can be used only against
bombers" Iranian AIM-54A, in February 1987:
- "F-14! Yalla! Yalla!"...

(translation: "F-14! Run! Run!")

Tom Cooper
Co-Author:
Iran-Iraq War in the Air, 1980-1988:
http://www.acig.org/pg1/content.php
and,
Iranian F-4 Phantom II Units in Combat:
http://www.osprey-publishing.co.uk/t...hp/title=S6585