Category: Aircraft

Here’s What You Need to Remember: Today, the USAF still employs around 177 upgraded F-15C and two-seater D models, and approximately 224 F-15E Strike Eagles.

For nearly three decades, the F-15 Eagle fighter was considered the undisputed king of the skies. Until the debut of its replacement, the F-22 Raptor, the F-15 was the U.S. Air Force’s frontline air superiority fighter. Even today, a modernized Eagle is still considered a formidable opponent, and manufacturer Boeing has proposed updated versions that could keep the airframe flying for the better part of a century.

The F-15 traces its roots to the air war in Vietnam, and the inauspicious showing of American Air Force and Navy fighters versus their North Korean counterparts. Large, powerful American fighters, designed to tackle both air-to-air and air-to-ground missions, were performing poorly against their smaller, less powerful—but more maneuverable—North Vietnamese counterparts. The 13:1 kill ratio American fliers enjoyed in the Korean War dropped to an abysmal 1.5 to 1 kill ratio in Vietnam.

Contemporary fighters, such as the F-4 Phantom, had been designed under the assumption that the air-to-air missile had rendered dogfights obsolete, and with them the need for superiority maneuverability and a gun for air combat. The U.S. Air Force decided it needed a dedicated air superiority fighter, one that combined two powerful engines, a powerful radar, a large number of missiles and a gun. Above all, it had to be maneuverable enough to win a dogfight.

The Air Force issued a request for proposals for the new FX fighter in 1966, and no fewer than six companies submitted competing paper designs. No prototypes were built. The air service selected McDonnell Douglas (now a part of Boeing) in 1969, ordering 107 full-scale development planes.

The F-15 was a formidable aircraft. Early versions were powered by two Pratt & Whitney F100-PW-100 afterburning turbofan engines, producing 14,500 pounds of static thrust—23,500 with afterburners. This gave the aircraft a thrust-to-weight ratio of greater than one, making it so powerful that it was the first fighter to exceed the speed of sound in vertical flight. The F-15 had so much thrust it could climb to sixty-five thousand feet in just 122 seconds. In horizontal flight, the F-15 could reach speeds of Mach 2.5, and cruise at speeds of Mach 0.9.

The Eagle’s AN/APG-63 nose mounted radar was the most advanced of its day, a solid state radar with “look down/shoot down” capability and a range of up to 200 miles. This allowed the F-15 to pick out low-flying enemies on radar against the clutter generated by the ground. The radar was also the first to incorporate a programmable system processor, which allowed moderate upgrades to be done via software and not intrusive hardware updates.

The Eagle was originally armed with four radar-guided AIM-7 Sparrow missiles for long-range engagements and four AIM-9 Sidewinder infrared guided missiles for short-range engagements. In the air war over Vietnam, USAF F-4C Phantoms, lacking a dedicated gun, missed several opportunities to down enemy aircraft. This was remedied in the F-15 by equipping the plane with an internal M61 Vulcan twenty-millimeter gatling gun.

The F-15 was also designed with long range in mind. Carrying three six-hundred-pound fuel tanks, the F-15 had a range of three thousand miles, making it possible to fly from the continental United States to Europe without stopping or midair refueling. This would make it possible to quickly reinforce NATO air defenses in case of a crisis in Europe, and later would permit the Air Force to quickly dispatch F-15s to Saudi Arabia during Operation Desert Storm.

The first F-15 prototypes flew in 1972, and serial production began in 1973. The plane rapidly began to populate both the U.S. Air Force and friendly air forces, including Israel, Japan and Saudi Arabia. The F-15’s first air-to-air kill was on June 27 1979, when Israeli Air Force ace Moshe Melnik shot down a Syrian Air Force MiG-21 in his F-15A. Melnik would eventually down four aircraft from F-15As and F-15Cs, for a career total of eleven enemy fighters shot down.

Melnik’s kill was the start of a remarkable string of 104 consecutive air-to-air victories for the F-15, with not a single Eagle lost. Israeli, Saudi and American F-15s were responsible for this impressive streak. Israeli kills included were recorded between 1979 and 1982 and included Syrian MiG-25 Foxbat interceptors, MiG-21 and MiG-23 fighters, and a number of ground attack and strike aircraft. During the 1991 Gulf War, the American and Saudi tally included Iraqi MiG-29 Fulcrum fighters, Mirage F-1 fighters and even an Il-76 “Candid” medium transport. One F-15E Strike Eagle even scored an air-to-air kill against an Iraqi Mi-24 attack helicopter with a laser-guided bomb.

The F-15A was eventually replaced in production by the F-15C, which included a newer AN/APG-70 synthetic aperture radar and newer F100-PW-220 engines. The latest program, nicknamed Golden Eagle, stress tests F-15Cs for wear and tear, and 178 of the planes in the best physical condition with the least receive new APG-63V3 active electronically scanned array radars and the Joint Helmet Mounted Cuing System, allowing rapid target acquisition with infrared guided missiles.

In the late 1980s, the F-15E was developed to supplement—and eventually replace the F-111 fighter bomber as a penetrating, high speed tactical strike aircraft designed to strike deep behind enemy lines in a NATO/Warsaw Pact war in Europe. The E model added conformal fuel tanks to increase range with a heavy bomb payload, the APG-63 radar, and a LANTRIN forward-looking infrared and laser targeting pod. With the retirement of the F-111, the F-15E “Strike Eagle” is now the USAF’s main tactical fighter bomber.

The USAF bought its last F-15 in 2001, but foreign sales have kept Boeing’s production line humming since. The company has twice in recent years tried to again attract the interest of the Air Force, first with the semi-stealthy Silent Eagle in 2010. In 2016, Boeing again introduced a new F-15, Eagle 2040C. Eagle 2040C is designed to carry up to sixteen AIM-120D AMRAAM radar-guided missiles, more than four times the original number. The Talon HATE datalink would allow the upgraded design to network with the F-22 Raptor. One concept of operation would have the stealthy—but relatively short on firepower—F-22 flying among enemy aircraft, passing on targeting information to a Eagle 2040C acting as a flying missile battery.

Today, the USAF still employs around 177 upgraded F-15C and two-seater D models, and approximately 224 F-15E Strike Eagles. F-15s are deployed in forward bases in both Europe and Asia, most notably at RAF Lakenheath in the UK and Kadena Air Force base on the Japanese island of Okinawa. Japanese F-15Js also operate from Okinawa, and were allegedly involved in an aerial encounter in June 2016 involving Chinese Su-30 Flanker fighters. F-15Es are currently deployed at Incirlik Air Base, Turkey, where they are participating in the air war against Islamic State.

In a world still dominated by fourth-generation fighters, the F-15 is an aging—but still formidable—fighter. The lack of sufficient numbers of F-22 Raptors to replace the Eagle has delayed the fighter’s retirement, and it now trains to complement the F-22 on the battlefield. The lack of a current, viable replacement means it will be at least until the early 2030s before the remaining C and E models are retired. The F-15 airframe in all its flavors will almost certainly spend an impressive half-century in active service— a first for a front line U.S. Air Force fighter.

The aircraft has an impressive record but was only really operationally used in the 1990s.

Here’s What You Need to Know: The F-14 was a Cold War plane the Navy didn’t really see a need to keep operating

The F-14 Tomcat was designed to defend the U.S. Navy’s fleets from practically every airborne threat. While it packed long range AIM-54 Phoenix missiles for defense against bombers carrying standoff missiles, it was no slouch in a dogfight either, although early versions were held back by its TF30 engines in that arena.

But for a brief period in the 1990s, the F-14 was used as a strike aircraft. The Navy’s retirement of the A-6 Intruders left a small capability gap until the new F/A-18E/F Super Hornets entered service, and the F-14 could carry more bombs than the new F/A-18A/C Hornet.

Operations in former Yugoslavia and the Gulf showed the need for a heavy strike aircraft in the Navy’s arsenal. But how effective could the F-14 be in that role? While Israel used F-15B and Ds for ground strikes in relatively unmodified configurations, the U.S. Air Force spent a lot of effort developing a dedicated strike version of the F-15, the F-15E Strike Eagle. For the F-14, some small subsystems were installed, and the aircraft was sent on its way. Could it compete?

While the F-14 was only used operationally in the strike role by America in the 1990s, the aircraft was designed for it to a limited degree. Grumman showed the prototype carrying bombs, and flight tests were carried out with a rack of 14 Mark 82 bombs.

The F-14D, built with digital computers, expanded on this functionality: integrating more weapons onto the F-14. The F-14D was granted clearance by the Navy to drop bombs in 1992. However, it was the F-14B that would serve as the primary F-14 for ground attack.

The gap between the retirement of the A-6 Intruder in 1997 and the fielding of the F/A-18E/F Super Hornet in the 2000s let the Tomcat step up to the plate as a ground attacker. Anticipating the shortfall in capability, a Navy paper in December 1994 urged the acquisition of targeting pods so that Tomcat could fulfill this role.

Lockheed Martin’s LANTIRN pod was selected for this purpose, as it already was a mature system used by the Air Force. Integration was complete by 1996, mating F-14B airframes with the pod to make the “Bombcat.” The system saw its first operational use over Kosovo in 1999.

The Bombcats proved to be rather potent in usage. While some advanced functionality of the pod (e.g., navigation) was not integrated into the F-14, the images sent from the pod were more clearly seen. This was because pod sent its data to the radar intercept officer’s Programmable Tactical Information Display System (PTIDS).

The PTIDS was a 20x20cm screen with rather high resolution, higher than the displays available in the F-15E. Thus, F-14 weapons officers found it easier to do precision lasing and guidance for bombs than their Air Force counterparts. The F-14 even buddy-lased designated targets with a laser for their fellow naval aviators flying F/A-18s due to the higher resolution and zoom of their LANTIRN pod.

During Operation Iraqi Freedom, F-14As equipped with the LANTIRN and PTIDS were some of the first aircraft in theatre. They covered and designated targets for Air Force F-15Es on Iraqi command and control bunkers. The Navy pilots later trained the F-15E crews to conduct the Forward Air Controller (Airborne)—FAC(A) mission.

That being said, the aging F-14A and B airframes had limitations that had to be worked around and limited their usefulness. F-14As couldn’t integrate with the newest JDAM bomb kits, and the F-14B wasn’t even cleared to use it, although it theoretically could.

The F-14D solved most of these issues and could integrate the high-resolution PTIDS, but the Tomcat’s lifespan was cut short in the mid-2000s when DoD cut funding for all Tomcat upgrades in favor of the new F/A-18E/F. Many have lamented this decision, as the Tomcat’s bigger airframe has advantages in the strike and interceptor role (650nm to the F/A-18E/F’s 475nm) as well as others.

In the words of one author, the F-14 was a Cold War plane the Navy didn’t really see a need to keep operating. The lighter Super Hornet provided much of the same capability while being much cheaper in fuel and maintenance costs. As a strike fighter, most of the F-14’s advantages were nullified by later upgrades to the F-15E Strike Eagle, which improved the avionics. The F-15E already possessed a greater bomb load and range, so the F-14D didn’t really provide any advantage there.

However, Iran still probably trains to use their F-14As in a strike role. Recent news suggests that the IRIAF is integrating new air-to-ground weapons on their Tomcat fleet. The “Bombcat” may have retired for the United States, but it soldiers on abroad.

Here’s What You Need to Remember: In addition to the U.S. military, the F-35 has been adopted by many allied partners, and the aircraft serves as the backbone of allied airpower for thirteen nations and counting. It has played a critical role in joint domain operations, where the fighter has brought unprecedented situational awareness, information sharing and connectivity to the coalition.

With a total cost as high as $1.508 trillion dollars, the Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II Joint Strike Fighter program would be the largest single military contract in history. However, a few things need to be put in perspective—and the truth is this fifth-generation fighter offers a lot of bang for the buck and will be flying for decades to come.

First, the total cost has been estimated in 2070 dollars, when the lifecycle of the F-35 will likely come to an end. That means those fighters rolling off the assembly line could be flying when today’s toddlers are middle aged.

Second, and more importantly, three variants of the F-35 have been developed and produced, and the platform was meant to replace the United States Air Force’s A-10 and F-16, the United States Navy’s F/A-18, and the United States Marine Corps F/A-18 and AV-8B Harrier.

Developing a “one-size-fits-all” aircraft didn’t come cheap. Each F-35A variant, including aircraft and engine, cost around $89.2 million; while other variations of the fifth-generation fighter were even more expensive—the F-35B reportedly cost $115.5 million. However, Air Force, Navy, and Marine pilots who have flown a variety of fighter/strike aircraft in combat including the F-35 have reported that it is simply the best platform to date.

Ready for a Changing World

While the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter was developed during an emphasis on the Global War on Terror, the aircraft could be seen as well-suited to address the looming threats from near-peer adversaries including Russia and China.

As a fifth-generation fighter, the F-35 Lightning II could offer advanced stealth along with improved agility and maneuverability, as well as better sensor and information fusion, network-enabled operations and advanced sustainment. This has made the Lockheed Martin-produced aircraft among the world’s most advanced multi-role fighters flying today.

The stealth, multirole fighter’s armament includes a 25mm GAU-22/A 4-barrel rotary cannon with 180 rounds of ammunition. There are four internal and six external stations on the wings. It can carry a variety of air-to-air missiles, air-to-surface missiles, anti-ship missiles and bombs. In a “stealth mode” it can infiltrate enemy territory and carry 5,700 pounds of internal ordnance, and in its “beast mode” it can carry up to 22,000 pounds of combined internal and external weapons.

The Lightning II was also developed with advanced electronic warfare (EW) capabilities that allow the pilots to locate and track enemy forces. In addition, the pilots have the ability to jam radars and disrupt threats, while the advanced avionics give the pilot real-time access to battle space information. The F-35’s warfare and ISR (Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance) capabilities were made possible by the integration of a core processor that can perform more than 400 billion operations per second. It could collect data from the classified electronic warfare suite, developed by BAE Systems, and then identify enemy radar and electronic warfare emissions via an eight sensor Electro-Optical Targeting System (EOTS). In turn, the EOTS could provide the pilot 360-degree coverage, recommending which target to attack and whether he/she should use either kinetic or electronic means to counter or negate the threat.

Moreover, data collected by the fighter’s sensors will be shared with commanders at sea, in the air or on the ground. This provides real-time data on the combat situation, which has made the F-35 a true force multiplier during collation operations.

The F-35 has a range of 1,200 nautical miles and can reach speeds of upwards of Mach 1.6 (1,200 mph). It is powered by F135-PW-100 engines that provide 40,000lb. maximum propulsion.

In addition to the U.S. military, the F-35 has been adopted by many allied partners, and the aircraft serves as the backbone of allied airpower for thirteen nations and counting. It has played a critical role in joint domain operations, where the fighter has brought unprecedented situational awareness, information sharing and connectivity to the coalition.

The F-14 grew out of the F-111 project, pushed by Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara as a fighter that could serve in both the Navy and the Air Force.

Here’s What You Need To Remember: The Navy eventually worked out the problems with the F-14, and the Tomcat became a superlative air defense fighter. Eventually, it even gained a ground-attack mission. The temperamental nature of the design, the collapse of the Soviet Union, and the success of the Super Hornet made the Tomcat superfluous by the 2000s, however, and the Navy now lacks a long-range interceptor.

What if the F-14 Tomcat had never happened? The iconic fighter served the U.S. Navy for more than thirty years before finally (and some say prematurely) being retired in 2006. Over time, the F-14 shifted from its initial long-range fleet air-defense role to a ground-attack mission. But what if the problems that plagued the program in the 1960s and 1970s had proved insoluble? How would the Navy have filled the gap?

The Problem:

The F-14 grew out of the F-111 project, pushed by Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara as a fighter that could serve in both the Navy and the Air Force. USN and USAF needs differed, however; the Navy wanted for a long-range carrier-based interceptor came from concern over Soviet air-launched cruise missiles. Soviet bombers could strike American carrier battle groups from great distance, without entering the envelope either of ship-based SAMs, or short-range fighters. This disrupted the layered missile, interceptor, and gun systems that the Navy had developed for air defense since World War II.

Here’s What You Need to Know: But for a brief period in the 1990s, the F-14 was used as a strike aircraft.

The F-14 Tomcat was designed to defend the U.S. Navy’s fleets from practically every airborne threat. While it packed long range AIM-54 Phoenix missiles for defense against bombers carrying standoff missiles, it was no slouch in a dogfight either, although early versions were held back by its TF30 engines in that arena.

But for a brief period in the 1990s, the F-14 was used as a strike aircraft. The Navy’s retirement of the A-6 Intruders left a small capability gap until the new F/A-18E/F Super Hornets entered service, and the F-14 could carry more bombs than the new F/A-18A/C Hornet.

Operations in former Yugoslavia and the Gulf showed the need for a heavy strike aircraft in the Navy’s arsenal. But how effective could the F-14 be in that role? While Israel used F-15B and Ds for ground strikes in relatively unmodified configurations, the U.S. Air Force spent a lot of effort developing a dedicated strike version of the F-15, the F-15E Strike Eagle. For the F-14, some small subsystems were installed, and the aircraft was sent on its way. Could it compete?

While the F-14 was only used operationally in the strike role by America in the 1990s, the aircraft was designed for it to a limited degree. Grumman showed the prototype carrying bombs, and flight tests were carried out with a rack of 14 Mark 82 bombs.

The F-14D, built with digital computers, expanded on this functionality: integrating more weapons onto the F-14. The F-14D was granted clearance by the Navy to drop bombs in 1992. However, it was the F-14B that would serve as the primary F-14 for ground attack.

The gap between the retirement of the A-6 Intruder in 1997 and the fielding of the F/A-18E/F Super Hornet in the 2000s let the Tomcat step up to the plate as a ground attacker. Anticipating the shortfall in capability, a Navy paper in December 1994 urged the acquisition of targeting pods so that Tomcat could fulfill this role.

Lockheed Martin’s LANTIRN pod was selected for this purpose, as it already was a mature system used by the Air Force. Integration was complete by 1996, mating F-14B airframes with the pod to make the “Bombcat.” The system saw its first operational use over Kosovo in 1999.

The Bombcats proved to be rather potent in usage. While some advanced functionality of the pod (e.g., navigation) was not integrated into the F-14, the images sent from the pod were more clearly seen. This was because pod sent its data to the radar intercept officer’s Programmable Tactical Information Display System (PTIDS).

The PTIDS was a 20x20cm screen with rather high resolution, higher than the displays available in the F-15E. Thus, F-14 weapons officers found it easier to do precision lasing and guidance for bombs than their Air Force counterparts. The F-14 even buddy-lased designated targets with a laser for their fellow naval aviators flying F/A-18s due to the higher resolution and zoom of their LANTIRN pod.

During Operation Iraqi Freedom, F-14As equipped with the LANTIRN and PTIDS were some of the first aircraft in theatre. They covered and designated targets for Air Force F-15Es on Iraqi command and control bunkers. The Navy pilots later trained the F-15E crews to conduct the Forward Air Controller (Airborne)—FAC(A) mission.

That being said, the aging F-14A and B airframes had limitations that had to be worked around and limited their usefulness. F-14As couldn’t integrate with the newest JDAM bomb kits, and the F-14B wasn’t even cleared to use it, although it theoretically could.

The F-14D solved most of these issues and could integrate the high-resolution PTIDS, but the Tomcat’s lifespan was cut short in the mid-2000s when DoD cut funding for all Tomcat upgrades in favor of the new F/A-18E/F. Many have lamented this decision, as the Tomcat’s bigger airframe has advantages in the strike and interceptor role (650nm to the F/A-18E/F’s 475nm) as well as others.

In the words of one author, the F-14 was a Cold War plane the Navy didn’t really see a need to keep operating. The lighter Super Hornet provided much of the same capability while being much cheaper in fuel and maintenance costs. As a strike fighter, most of the F-14’s advantages were nullified by later upgrades to the F-15E Strike Eagle, which improved the avionics. The F-15E already possessed a greater bomb load and range, so the F-14D didn’t really provide any advantage there.

However, Iran still probably trains to use their F-14As in a strike role. Recent news suggests that the IRIAF is integrating new air-to-ground weapons on their Tomcat fleet. The “Bombcat” may have retired for the United States, but it soldiers on abroad.

In a March 19th Instagram post, an aviation enthusiast posted several photos of an F-117 flying in Star Wars Canyon in California. The canyon, officially known as Rainbow Canyon, is frequently used by the Air Force for pilot training and is favored by aviation photographers for its favorable vantage points from which to shoot photos.

The photographer only caught a brief glimpse of the F-117. It “circled twice, then [was] gone. And about 30 minutes after, it came back the same area of the sky,” just enough to snap a couple of photographs that clearly showed the F-117’s characteristic highly-swept wings and v-shaped tail assembly.

Type 1000 Storage

Since retirement, F-117s have been kept in so-called Type 1000 storage. According to the Air Force, airframes kept in Type 1000 storage are “to be maintained until recalled to active service, should the need arise,” during times of national crisis—or if pilots need specific training, in this case likely related to the F-117’s stealth characteristics.

Airframes kept in Type 1000 storage are nearly flight-worthy. They “have a high potential to return to flying status and no parts may be removed from them.” Every four years, Type 1000 aircraft are overhauled and checked for preservation quality.

Depending on how long a plane has been in Type 1000 storage, they can be made flight-worthy in 30 to 120 days. And, in order to check if storage protocols are being correctly followed, airframes in Type 1000 storage are sometimes flown to prove their airworthiness. Some F-117 sightings might be simply test flights to prove the efficacy of their Type 1000 storage—though likely not the only reason.

Flight Training

Adding onto flight worthiness checks, some particularly well-preserved F-117s might be used to test stealth-detection ability. Testing radars with F-117s could simulate near real-world flight conditions for AWACS (Airborne Warning and Control System) radars, and could potentially be cheaper than using more modern F-22s or F-35s as testers. Ground-based radars would also benefit from training against a stealth plane.

Postscript

It is unclear how much longer F-117s will be flying for. In 2017, Congress mandated that the Air Force was to begin destroying stored F-117s, possibly only a singly bird was destroyed as a proof-of-concept exercise. Despite the Congressionally-approved destruction mandate, it appears as though relatively few F-117s are resting in boneyards, indicating they are still of some use. But how much longer they’ll have a purpose is anybody’s guess.

Perhaps the White House will offer up F-16s from America’s own stockpiles, a position that the Biden administration has yet to take. So far, the U.S. has announced that it would train pilots at air bases in Arizona and Texas beginning next month.

Apart perhaps from the B-17 “Flying Fortress,” no other World War II aircraft is as famous as the Supermarine Spitfire. The British-made single-seat fighter aircraft was used by the Royal Air Force and other Allied countries before, during, and after the Second World War. It was also the only British fighter to be continuously produced throughout the conflict.

However, there are some facts that even aviation buffs may not know.

It Wasn’t a Long-Range Fighter

While numerous variants of the Spitfire were built, with several wing configurations, it was designed by R.J. Mitchell – chief designer at Supermarine Aviation Works in Southampton – in the mid-1930s to be a short-range interceptor.

A Carrier Variant Was Produced

The Seafire was the carrier-based adaption of the Spitfire that entered service in 1942. However, the idea of adopting a carrier-capable variant had actually been deemed moot by the Admiralty prior to the war. One factor was the overriding priority being placed on the production of land-based Spitfires instead.

The concept was pushed ahead following the Battle of Britain, and culminated in the initial batch of some 140 Seafire Mk IB aircraft. The name was derived from the abbreviation of the longer name “Sea Spitfire.”

Talking Names

The aircraft’s name today may seem iconic, but it was almost named the “Shrew” instead. The Air Ministry had submitted a list of possible names to Vicker-Armstrong for the new aircraft, which had been developed as the Type 300. “Shrew” and “Scarab” were among the choices that Mitchell had preferred, but Sir Robert McLean, director of Vickers-Armstrongs at the time, had another idea.

While the word “spitfire,” which dates from Elizabethan times was meant to refer to “a person with a fierce temper,” it was actually the pet name McLean’s eldest daughter Annie Penrose, who he called “a little spitfire.” The name had been unofficially used for Mitchell’s earlier F7/30 Type 224 design – yet despite that fact, the designer was quoted as saying “Spitfire,” was the “just the sort of bloody silly name they would choose.”

Use in the Battle of Britain

Today the Spitfire is associated with the Battle of Britain, but in fact, the Hawker Hurricane actually shot down more enemy planes over the course of the campaign.

One reason that people may assume the Spitfire was so prolific in the early stages of World War II may be due to the 1968 film Battle of Britain. Far more Spitfires were available for filming, and few scenes showed the Hawker Hurricanes. As a result, many now believe that the Spitfire was the dominant fighter used at the time.

However, while the Spitfire wasn’t used in as significant numbers, it did earn the respect of the Germans. One of the scenes in the movie depicted an actual exchange that Luftwaffe ace fighter pilot Adolf Galland had with Herman Goering, the head of the Luftwaffe. Goering, upset that the battle wasn’t going in Germany’s favor, asked his squadron leaders what they needed to win. Galland famously responded, “I should like an outfit of Spitfires.”

U.S. and Soviet Pilots Flew Them

The aircraft was operated by pilots of many nations during the Second World War, with many Polish, French, Norwegian, Czech and other “free” aviators at the controls. Less remembered is that more than 600 Spitfires were flown by the United States Army Air Force during World War II, but Yanks had been flying the aircraft even before America entered the war.

The 334th, 335th and 336th fighter squadrons, which were part of the VIII Fighter Command’s 4th Group, were all formed in 1942 out of the remnants of the American all-volunteer RAF formations, the so-called Eagle Squadrons – and they mostly flew the Spitfire throughout the war.

The British also provided the Soviet Union with some 1,200 Spitfires – in addition to 3,000 Hawker Hurricanes. The aircraft, which had been delivered to the Soviet Union via the North Sea, the Far East and the Persian Gulf, came as the result of a personal request from Joseph Stalin to Winston Churchill. Soviet pilots had to adapt to the wing-mounted guns, but a bigger issue was that ground-based anti-aircraft gunners had trouble distinguishing the streamlined silhouette of the British fighter from German BF-109s, particularly the squared wing-tip configuration of the later Mk. LF IX Spitfire.

Efforts were made to more clearly mark the Spitfires with larger and even brighter insignia – notably red stars – yet that had little effect. As a result, the planes were withdrawn to the relative quiet of southern Russia.

It Brought the Beer

Following the D-Day landings, a few resourceful Spitfire MK IX pilots modified their bomb-carrying wings in order that they could carry beer kegs. Those “beer bombs” ensured a welcome supply of altitude chilled beer to the Allied troops on the ground in Normandy.

Innovative Designs

The Spitfire was one of the first aircraft to have retractable landing gear, a feature that proved to be a problem with some pilots, who forgot to put down that landing gear when they came in for a landing.

Brad Pitt Owns One

The Spitfire had its maiden flight on March 5, 1936 and it entered service with the RAF two years later – only to be finally retired in 1955. It was the only Allied aircraft to be built throughout the entirety of the Second World War, and a total of 20,351 were built.

Today, there are less than 250 still in existence (the actual number varies based on the source), but fewer than 50 are still airworthy, including 30 in the UK. Actor Brad Pitt is among the private collectors to own one, for which he reportedly paid $4 million to buy after making the film Fury.

Although the U.S. Air Force B-2 Spirit strategic bomber will eventually be superseded by the upcoming B-21 Raider bomber, America’s flying branch is outfitting the world’s stealthiest bomber with new munitions to give the platform more capabilities and afford commanders greater flexibility.

An announcement by Northrop Grumman gives details on what changes are in store for the B-2 stealth bomber.

“The B-2 successfully released a Joint Air-to-Surface Standoff Missile – Extended Range (JASSM-ER) during a flight test in December. The JASSM-ER further enhances the B-2’s ability to hit any target, anywhere,” Northrop Grumman stated. “The integration of JASSM-ER enables the delivery of a low observable asset capable of traveling greater distances than its predecessor.”

But what is the JASSM-ER? Thankfully, Northrop Grumman explains in detail:

“JASSM-ER is one of three new advanced capabilities being introduced to the B-2 to further modernize the platform. The B-2 fleet, capable of delivering both conventional and nuclear ordnance, is also integrating crypto modernization and a Radar Aided Targeting System (RATS). The latest system advancements are part of integrated functional capability (IFC) P6.4, which was certified last year by the Air Force. RATS will complete the latest phase of nuclear modernization of the B-2 Spirit.”

Key Point: These fighters are top-notch and reliable. They might be aging, but they aren’t going away anytime soon.

According to official releases from Boeing and the U.S. Air Force, the F-15 Eagle has a clear-cut win-to-loss ratio of 104 to zero. But in fact, opposing air forces have claimed, in nearly a dozen cases, to have shot down the iconic, twin-engine fighter.

All the claims have one thing in common. The claimants were never able to provide any evidence for their supposed victories.

The earliest report is mostly unknown to the public. Beginning in 1978, Iraqi sources claimed that an Iraqi air force MiG-23MS from No. 39 Squadron shot down an Israeli F-15 over western Iraq. Former Iraqi air force officers have repeated the claim over the years without ever offering any evidence.

The next supposed F-15 shoot-down, from the spring of 1981, is better-known. Several different versions of the story have circulated over the decades, nearly all of them in Russian media.

In the most frequently cited version, on Feb. 13, 1981, Israeli F-15s ambushed a pair of Syrian MiG-25Ps and shot one down. In revenge, so the story goes, the Syrians set up an ambush on June 29, 1981. The Syrian MiG-25Ps destroyed one F-15 using two R-40/AA-6 Acrid air-to-air missiles fired from the range of 25 miles.

There are problems with this story. Neither the Syrians nor the Russians have ever provided any evidence, such as radar tapes or wreckage. Another issue is that the Syrian air force never actually received any MiG-25Ps. Syria acquired several batches of Foxbats, including two of MiG-25PDS interceptors, but no MiG-25Ps.

While frequently described as a downgraded export variant of the Foxbat, the MiG-25PDS was actually much better-equipped than the early interceptor variant was. In addition to the powerful Smerch 2A radar of the MiG-25P, it had an infrared search-and-track system under the forward fuselage, radar warning receivers in blisters on the intakes and big chaff and flare dispensers in place of the wing fences.

Any source citing “Syrian MiG-25Ps” is of dubious quality.

Furthermore, the Foxbat the Israelis shot down in February 1981 was a MiG-25R – a reconnaissance variant – flying over Lebanon all by itself. This is of particular importance because, in contrast to the Russian claims, the Syrians claim that a MiG-25PDS flying alone shot down the F-15 in retaliation.

According to the Syrian version of the story, the MiG-25PDS mimicked a MiG-25R on a reconnaissance sortie by flying very high and fast in the direction of Beirut. When eight Israeli F-15s rose to intercept, the Syrian pilot fired two R-40s at their leader — one from around 37 miles, the other from slightly less than 31 miles, well outside the range of AIM-7F Sparrows, the longest-ranged air-to-air missiles in the Israeli arsenal in 1981.

According to the Syrians, the stricken F-15 crashed into the sea off the coast of Tire. The Israeli pilot supposedly ejected. Recalling the same encounter, the Israelis reported that their F-15s shot down on MiG-25 with a Sparrow missile.

In a well-known case from late afternoon of June 9, 1982, a Syrian MiG-21 pilot struck an F-15D with a single R-60/AA-8 Aphid missile. Despite severe damage, the pilot of the big U.S.-made fighter managed to fly it back to Israel for an emergency landing, and his aircraft was subsequently repaired.

There are a few more claims from this era worth considering. On July 3, 1982, eight Syrian MiG-21s clashed with four each Israeli F-15s and either Mirage IIICJs or Kfirs over Beirut. While admitting the loss of four own fighters, the Syrians claimed to have shot down an Eagle, too.

There is not one known Israeli publication mentioning this aerial battle, although this engagement was witnessed by dozens of people on the ground and widely reported by the Lebanese media.

Finally, several Russian publications have cited no fewer than three further claims against Israeli F-15s – all in 1983. Supposedly, Syrian MiG-23MLs shot down two F-15s on Oct. 4 and another on Dec. 4. The Russian sources provided no evidence in support of these claims, not even the names of the Syrian pilots who were involved.