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The Legendary F-14 Tomcat: The Plane America and Iran Both Love
Let's just get this out of the way: Maverick. Iceman. Charlie. Are you done swooning yet? For many, the 1988 film Top Gun caused the F-14 to embody everything cool about fighter jets and the pilots that flew them.And the Tomcat was cool--entering service in 1975, it was arguably the first operational fourth-generation jet fighter that successfully combined the characteristics of high speed, high maneuverability, and sophisticated avionics and armament that are now standard today. However, there’s a profound irony in the Tomcat story. The Tomcat is one of the U.S. fighters that has seen the most sustained and intense air-to-air combat of its generation. And yet, American F-14s only shot down five hostile aircraft. The Tomcat, however, chalked up its extraordinary combat record in the service of one of the United States' bitterest rivals, Iran. Posted by: Blossom Unains5562 2016-10-16 |
| http://www.rantburg.com/poparticle.php?ID=470353 |