Best Fighter For It's Time

My list of revolutionary fighters

Fokker Eindekker (guns through the propeller arc, monoplane, wildly successful for it's time)
I-16 (I'm told this one)
Me-109 (first low-wing retractable gear used in large quantities)
Me-262 (First jet used in large quantities)
Harrier (VTOL)
F-117 (Stealth)

My list of other revolutionary aircraft
Bell Huey (first helo used in large numbers????)
AH-1 (first custom attack helo)
V-22 (first tilt-prop if it gets fielded)
B-70 (huge performance over other bombers but never fielded)
SR-71 (huge performance over any fighter)
E-4 AWACS (unique for it's day)

What's missing is the first fighter with a real AA missile/radar system that worked well.
Would that be the Mig-21/F-4/MirageIII or something else?

Finally, note I'm tempted to put the F-22 on this list not because of it's stealth or it's
performance (since these things have been done before) but because of it's networking
abilities. Would this be reasonable?

"Charles Talleyrand" wrote in message
...
My list of revolutionary fighters

Fokker Eindekker (guns through the propeller arc, monoplane, wildly
successful for it's time)
I-16 (I'm told this one)
Me-109 (first low-wing retractable gear used in large quantities)

Hardly, the I-16 was a low wing monoplane with retractable gear
even if we discount that the Me-109 development was pretty
much in step with the Hurricane

The first Me-109 flight happened flown on September 5 1935
and enetered service in July 1937

The Hawker Hurricane first flew November 6,1935
and entered squadron service December 1937

Me-262 (First jet used in large quantities)

As has already been pointed out the Meteor entered squadron
service BEFORE the Me-262

Harrier (VTOL)
F-117 (Stealth)

My list of other revolutionary aircraft
Bell Huey (first helo used in large numbers????)

Incorrect the Bell 47 preceded it by almost a decade
and remained in production until 1976

Keith

In article ,
Charles Talleyrand wrote:
My list of revolutionary fighters
I-16 (I'm told this one)
Me-109 (first low-wing retractable gear used in large quantities)

First low-wing, unbraced, retractable-gear monomplane fighter to be used
in large quanitities was the i16..

--
Andy Breen ~ Interplanetary Scintillation Research Group
http://users.aber.ac.uk/azb/
Feng Shui: an ancient oriental art for extracting
money from the gullible (Martin Sinclair)

My list of other revolutionary aircraft
Bell Huey (first helo used in large numbers????)

Incorrect the Bell 47 preceded it by almost a decade
and remained in production until 1976

Still, the Huey was a revolutionary aircraft because it was the first
to demonstrate that air-mobile warfare was practical. Not for nothing
that the whomp-whomp-whomp of a Huey's rotors is the seminal sound of
Vietnam.

I spent more Huey time skiing in the Canadian Rockies than I did
tootling around Vietnam, but still it's the rain forest and paddy
fields that I see whenever I hear those blades thumping. The Huey and
the M-16 are the tools with which we fought that war, and each was a
revolution, for the U.S. Army if not for combat generally.

all the best -- Dan Ford
email: www.danford.net/letters.htm#9

see the Warbird's Forum at http://www.danford.net/index.htm
Vietnam | Flying Tigers | Pacific War | Brewster Buffalo | Piper Cub

Finally, note I'm tempted to put the F-22 on this list not because of it's
stealth or it's
performance (since these things have been done before) but because of it's
networking
abilities. Would this be reasonable?

Haven't the mig-31's had this for ages?
And I tought that finnish f-18's had this too.

"John Carrier" wrote:

Not bad as a recce aircraft according to a Reserve General friend.

R / John

The RF-101 certainly carried a recce burden during the early years of
SEA, but it was pix only and didn't offer near the product that came
from the RF-4C.


Ed Rasimus
Fighter Pilot (ret)
***"When Thunder Rolled:
*** An F-105 Pilot Over N. Vietnam"
*** from Smithsonian Books
ISBN: 1588341038

Ed Rasimus wrote in message
My first encounter with a Tom while in a Phantom (an exercise in the
Med against America around '77) was to be intercepted during a low
(very) altitude attack on the boat. The -14 got vectored against me
from the left front quadrant--I picked him up visually at 10 o'clock
with about 150 degree heading crossing angle. Because I was (as usual)
very fast, I told the WSO--"no sweat, he's going to overshoot big
time" --followed immediately by an absolutely amazed, "holy ****, did
you see that" as the Tom did an incredible bat-turn into firing
parameters.

Been there seen that! I did have one fight where my flight of
Phantoms (Chiefs out of S-J), with the help of a couple of Marine
Harriers out of Cherry Point, waxed a pair of Turkeys off some boat in
the Atlantic. Med alt head on setup, ROE was BVR but no Phoenix, we
ran in in tac spread (in mil power on our diesel J-79s) with a Harrier
tucked in tight on each Phantom. Just outside AIM-7 R-Max (I think),
we chaffed and did a 180 and dragged, smoking all the way, while the
Harriers split vertically to the bottom of the block. As planned, the
Turkeys glommed on to us and chased us, giving the Harriers
simultaneous, unobserved,low to high vertical conversions to Aim-9
kills followed by some guns tracking (Amazing how Marines love
shooting at the Navy). At this point we had pitched back, called the
Harriers off, and blazed in for a high speed F0X 1, FOX 2, Snap shot
to a separation. Poor Turkeys never got a shot off. God it was fun!


Kirk Stant
WSO (Ret)

Subject: Best Fighter For It's Time
From: (Kirk Stant)
Date: 7/25/03 9:50 AM Pacific Daylight Time
Message-id:

Ed Rasimus wrote in message
My first encounter with a Tom while in a Phantom (an exercise in the
Med against America around '77) was to be intercepted during a low
(very) altitude attack on the boat. The -14 got vectored against me
from the left front quadrant--I picked him up visually at 10 o'clock
with about 150 degree heading crossing angle. Because I was (as usual)
very fast, I told the WSO--"no sweat, he's going to overshoot big
time" --followed immediately by an absolutely amazed, "holy ****, did
you see that" as the Tom did an incredible bat-turn into firing
parameters.

Been there seen that! I did have one fight where my flight of
Phantoms (Chiefs out of S-J), with the help of a couple of Marine
Harriers out of Cherry Point, waxed a pair of Turkeys off some boat in
the Atlantic. Med alt head on setup, ROE was BVR but no Phoenix, we
ran in in tac spread (in mil power on our diesel J-79s) with a Harrier
tucked in tight on each Phantom. Just outside AIM-7 R-Max (I think),
we chaffed and did a 180 and dragged, smoking all the way, while the
Harriers split vertically to the bottom of the block. As planned, the
Turkeys glommed on to us and chased us, giving the Harriers
simultaneous, unobserved,low to high vertical conversions to Aim-9
kills followed by some guns tracking (Amazing how Marines love
shooting at the Navy). At this point we had pitched back, called the
Harriers off, and blazed in for a high speed F0X 1, FOX 2, Snap shot
to a separation. Poor Turkeys never got a shot off. God it was fun!


Kirk Stant
WSO (Ret)


Great stuff. More. More. More.

Arthur Kramer
Visit my WW II B-26 website at:
http://www.coastcomp.com/artkramer

(ArtKramr) wrote:

Great stuff. More. More. More.

I'd have ya' ****tin' yer pants in my *ultralight*, hardguy.

-Mike Marron

(Kirk Stant) wrote:

Been there seen that! I did have one fight where my flight of
Phantoms (Chiefs out of S-J), with the help of a couple of Marine
Harriers out of Cherry Point, waxed a pair of Turkeys off some boat in
the Atlantic. Med alt head on setup, ROE was BVR but no Phoenix, we
ran in in tac spread (in mil power on our diesel J-79s) with a Harrier
tucked in tight on each Phantom. Just outside AIM-7 R-Max (I think),
we chaffed and did a 180 and dragged, smoking all the way, while the
Harriers split vertically to the bottom of the block. As planned, the
Turkeys glommed on to us and chased us, giving the Harriers
simultaneous, unobserved,low to high vertical conversions to Aim-9
kills followed by some guns tracking (Amazing how Marines love
shooting at the Navy). At this point we had pitched back, called the
Harriers off, and blazed in for a high speed F0X 1, FOX 2, Snap shot
to a separation. Poor Turkeys never got a shot off. God it was fun!


Great story. My comments--you can get away with that in training ACM,
but if it were for real you'd have to have "cojones al piedra" to pull
the trick. Assurance that your R-Max is the same for the bad guys
based pm intel takes a lot of confidence. Second, I'm surprised that a
Harrier can stay with a Phantom "in mil power on our diesel J-79s".
Third, I don't think I'd have the faith that my staunch Marine allies
would make the vertical conversion in a Harrier against a Tom in full
blow pursuit of the Phantoms. Finally, your pitch back, acquisition
and rapid FOXing shows a bit of befuddlement from the Nasal Radiators,
since they should have been face shooting you at the same rate.

All that said, it sounds like a bold plan well-executed. My own
experience in low-tech vs high-tech ACM often did the same thing--a
vertical rather than horizontal split of the element. Seems that young
aggressive warriors fixate on the first target and only sporadically
search for the second (despite the training artificiality of knowing
all the players). They search in sweep for the remainder, but seldom
scroll up and down to find the other threat.

I guess it reinforces what Dudley has already mentioned extensively
here--the training, experience and quality of the driver will often
compensate for the technology of the system.



Ed Rasimus
Fighter Pilot (ret)
***"When Thunder Rolled:
*** An F-105 Pilot Over N. Vietnam"
*** from Smithsonian Books
ISBN: 1588341038