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posted by martyb on Saturday March 10 2018, @12:43AM   Printer-friendly
from the Holy-extended-support-Batman! dept.

On April 9, 1972, Iraq and the Soviet Union signed an historic agreement. The USSR committed to arming the Arab republic with the latest weaponry. In return for sending Baghdad guns, tanks and jet fighters, Moscow got just one thing — influence ... in a region that held most of the world's accessible oil.

[...] In neighboring Iran, news of Iraq's alliance with the Soviets exploded like a bomb.[...] The administration of U.S. president Richard Nixon was all too eager to grant the shah's wish in exchange for Iran's help balancing a rising Soviet Union. Nixon and his national security adviser Henry Kissinger visited Tehran in May 1972 — and promptly offered the shah a "blank check." Any weapons the king wanted and could pay for, he would get — regardless of the Pentagon's own reservations and the State Department's stringent export policies.

[...] That's how, starting in the mid-1970s, Iran became the only country besides the United States to operate arguably the most powerful interceptor jet ever built — the Grumman F-14 Tomcat, a swing-wing carrier fighter packing a sophisticated radar and long-range AIM-54 Phoenix air-to-air missiles.[...]Today Iran's 40 or so surviving F-14s remain some of the best fighters in the Middle East. And since the U.S. Navy retired its last Tomcats in 2006, the ayatollah's Tomcats are the only active Tomcats left in the world.

[...] The F-14 was a product of failure. In the 1960s, the Pentagon hoped to replace thousands of fighters in the U.S. Air Force and Navy with a single design capable of ground attack and air-to-air combat. The result was the General Dynamics F-111 — a two-person, twin-engine marvel of high technology that, in time, became an excellent long-range bomber in Air Force service.

[...] But as a naval fighter, the F-111 was a disaster. [...]In 1968, the Defense Department halted work on the F-111B. Scrambling for a replacement, Grumman took the swing-wing concept, TF-30 engines, AWG-9 radar and long-range AIM-54 missile from the F-111B design and packed them into a smaller, lighter, simpler airframe.

[...] Voila — the F-14.

TFA goes on in some depth both about the historical importance of the F-14 as it flew nearly 50 years ago, as well as the challenges Iran has faced in creating an entirely new supply chain, and eventually new upgrades, to keep a fleet of dedicated interceptors from the last century in service.


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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday March 10 2018, @01:23AM (3 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday March 10 2018, @01:23AM (#650325)

    Don't worry, the new F-35s will replace everything with a sleek, unibody design. Inferior moving parts, like service hatches will be a thing of the past. And it will replace all airframes in all branches-- one design to rule them all! Think of the savings we will have with only one supple chain for all and everyone.

  • (Score: 2) by Arik on Saturday March 10 2018, @02:11AM

    by Arik (4543) on Saturday March 10 2018, @02:11AM (#650340) Journal
    "Don't worry, the new F-35s will replace everything with a sleek, unibody design. Inferior moving parts, like service hatches will be a thing of the past. And it will replace all airframes in all branches-- one design to rule them all! Think of the savings we will have with only one supple chain for all and everyone."

    Exactly what they said about the F-111.
    --
    If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?
  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday March 10 2018, @06:03AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday March 10 2018, @06:03AM (#650417)

    with only one supple chain for all

    Of course you realize, a supple chain is only as strong as its most supple link.

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday March 10 2018, @10:59PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday March 10 2018, @10:59PM (#650667)

    inferior moving parts, like service hatches will be a thing of the past

    Eliminating edges is a big thing with "stealth" designs.
    We previously discussed this aspect of plastic airplanes.
    The F-35: A Gold-Plated Turkey [soylentnews.org]

    To do something as rudimentary as replace a fuse, you have to cut a hole in the aircraft, do the required maintenance, then patch the hole with some nasty chemicals.
    After that, you have to wait a few days for the glue to cure before you can fly the aircraft again.

    -- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]