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Enthusiast Joined: Apr 11, 2008 Posts: 42 Status: Offline

Quote:

goatmilk wrote:
I claimed the F-14 was not cleared to carry AIM-120 as I thought it carried AIM-7 up until its retirement.

That is correct, the F-14 never carrried the AIM-120 operationally.

goatmilk wrote:
F-14s have a higher kill ratio than the F-15, claiming 164-1, 159 by Iranian F-14s to 1 loss, citing a Tom Cooper book for the info.

The F-15A/C has never been lost in air to air combat, the F-14 has, so the F-15's ratio is higher. As far as cooper's claims, they are based on interviews with the pilots years after the events in question. Many of the kill claims are based on radar tracks disappearing from the F-14's scopes, and the Iranian government made no effort to confirm them for political reasons. If you know anything about the AWG-9's TWS "performance," especially overland you realize what a shaky basis that is to make a kill claim. As far as the legendary "three in one" kill, again if you understand how an AI radar works, that claim becomes laughable. If three aircraft are flying close enough together to be downed by a single missile, they are too close to be broken out as three distinct radar tracks, and the pilot has no way of knowing there is more than one aircraft there. If they are flying far enough apart for the radar to break them out, then they are outside the blast radius of the AIM-54.

Regards,
Murph

All true but they could have been using the Northrop AAX-1 camera if it was withen the camera range.

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Reference the 1987 RF-4C shootdown: the RF-4C pilot came through T-38 PIT around '94 when I was an IP there. Can't remember his name. He showed us the Tomcat gun camera video, and narrated. I don't remember exact details, but his opinion was that the Tomcat driver was a whack job, and never tried to warn the Phantom crew. Also, he claimed the Tomcat driver's father also shot down a friendly about 20-30 years earlier: sort of "ran in the family", eh?
Maybe someone posting here remembers his name, and can get him to re-tell the story.

Enthusiast Joined: May 19, 2005 Posts: 33 Status: Offline

According to this linky
http://www.tomcat-sunset.org/forums/ind ... pic=1160.0

the Tomcat crew consisted of Lt Tom Dorsey and LtCdr Ed Holland. The RF-4C was serial 69-0381 and crewed by Lt. Randy Spouse and Capt. Michael Ross.

Enthusiast Joined: Aug 20, 2008 Posts: 43 Status: Offline

The Tomcat was cleared for the AIM-120, the funding to make the fleet Tomcats operational with it was used for the Lantirn upgrade. It was a choice of one or the other, and the Lantirn upgrade was much more beneficial to the Tomcat. The Lantirn turned the Tomcat into arguably the finest strike fighter, even F-15E crews That got a chance to fly lantirn equiped Tomcats were impressed with its capabilities.

"the system performed even better than our F-15E benchmark, due to superior displays and controls in our version." Dan" Microshark" Fischoff

Enthusiast Joined: Aug 18, 2007 Posts: 97 Status: Offline

I agree with alaskanmarine1 - the Tomcat was tested with AiM-120 missiles. But clearance for carrying AMRAAM's was never completed due to lack of funding. Also with the Tomcats ability to carry AiM-54 Phoenix missiles, the need wasn't considered as pressing as say for the F/A-18 Hornet.

Enthusiast Joined: Aug 20, 2008 Posts: 43 Status: Offline

Regardless the Tomcat is an Ace and deserves the respect that it's earned over 35 years of dedicated service.

Elite 2K Joined: Jan 14, 2004 Posts: 2807 Status: Offline

There has been so much information, and, more to the point, MISINFORMATION over the Iranian Tomcat program-Post Shah since the Ayatollah seized power that we probably will not know the truth until the time comes that we reestablish ties with Iran. Unfortunately, that will not happen until we have an administration that is willing to appropriately deal with them. As Forrest Gump said, That's all I've got to say about that.

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164-1 F-14 kill ratio claim?