Shouldn’t this be in ‘historic’ forum?
Best carrier based fighter of the period was the Phantom, second was the Sea Vixen.
The latter despite being batted back and forth for 12 years between the RN, RAF, and the Air Ministry was an extremely modern and capable aircraft sytems wise, even if airframe was getting on and strictly subsonic.

I like this British patriotism, although I find calling the Sea Vixen “second best” quite a remarkable piece of patriotism. Performance-wise it was outclassed by any FJ-4 Fury, let alone the Tiger or the Crusader (note: the Sea Vixen was introduced in 1959, well after either type).

And? Aside from the fact that judging transonic drag purely based on the shape of the aft fuselage (ignoring area rule) is rather speculative, no fighter is going to stay in transonic for long. The whole point of afterburner being to quickly accelerate past that point. The Super Tiger seems to have had no problem doing that. It could even go supersonic with AAMs and 2 drop tanks (Mach 1.5) which is fine by me.

The integration of a new engine into an existing airframe with the need to make as little changes as possible is always a challenge that rarely pay off. In the 1950ies and 1960ies engine technology developed so quickly that engine changes made sense. Strange enough, none ever really made it into service (aside maybe the British Phantom, where the engine was changed more due to political considerations). Higher drag and CG problems are only one thing. The clumsy addition of a dorsal fin also shows the significant stability problems the aircraft had. On paper it might look good, in reality a clean-sheet design normally excels.

So I would say the F-8E would have been the best choice available to counteract the MiG-21, maybe balancing the slightly inferior performances with the higher average skill of American naval pilots.

We shouldn’t forget that each F-4 version had better performance than the MiG-21, with limitations in the low speed region.

Worse, The whole front section could have broken off.

Bullcrap.
The airplane wouldn’t pressurize under such conditions.
If the aircraft had taken off, it would have returned after a short time.
No real safety issue here.

I’ve always wondered who came up with the daft idea of using the F-104 for low level strike. :diablo: Sure, high wing loading is good for a striker, but THAT high? 😉 The very high landing speed and inferior maneuverability alone must have caused a number of crashes.

Not sure what changes were required for the low level strike role (mostly avionics and airframe strengthening IIRC). Presumably these changes could have been applied to other contenders too, such as the Super Tiger, so I wonder what made the F-104 inherently superior for the role. Dash speed?

The F-104G had many benefits but earned pretty bad reputation (in my eyes not rightfully). Those were a very powerful A2G avionics package (the first INS in a tactical fighter!), a good mix of external stores for the intended job (which was nuclear delivery) and unmatched operational radius at low level at a high cruise speed. Actually, the F-104G could cruise at M0.85+ on the deck and still retain an acceptable range. Of course, it was difficult to fly and was a sitting duck in a dogfight when dragged to low airspeeds (like the F-4B). However, if flown correctly, it could outfly or at least escape any contemporary up the F-15.

The Super Tiger would have had higher empty weight and a not really suitable wing configuration for the job, despite it might have shown lower landing speeds (still far from being short take-off capable). It may have been a good aircraft, but for the job of nuclear delivery the F-104G was better. The Starfighter first of all suited German needs, which were very special. For some nations like Norway, Denmark or whatever the F-11 probably would have been a better choice, as their missions were less dedicated to nuclear delivery.

That’s a harsh thing to say. Not so long ago some military dictatorships like Chile and other similar regimes in South America were favored by the US and most of the West. Today everyone is praising the greatness of democracy. The US are like on a crusade to bring it to every country, no matter if they want, need or can utilize it. Of course those countries, that have been served with American democracy and freedom are not likely to work with China. So China simply works with whoever is interested in serious business, that gives a fortune to the Chinese people. They are not actively running a campaign to evangelize every “partner” to their view of how democracy has to be.

China backs government that clearly challenge Western dominance. The West always arranged with less democratic governments, it had to do it, but it normally didn’t accept countries that actively challenge the staus quo (of course, the West is favored by the actual status quo).
Iran, Venezuela, North Korea … and some African nations. Unlikely China ever supports his “friends” by direct action … unless it feels directly threatened.

It’s all about power politics … democracy is less important in this thing than one might expect. As soon as the West is faced with a real challenger, the preference for democracies yields to support for anybody who’s with the West. In the 1990ies the West could afford to be picky, now Western politicians learn that they cannot afford that anymore.

That would involve total re-design of the aircraft ala F-20, which no-one wanted in 1980, because they would rather have F-16s. I don’t know if you remember the F-16/79, an early F-16 with the J-79 engine of the F-104S, which, at altitude, had similar performance even though its engine was rated 6000 lbst less at sea level (again no-one wanted it since, when Reagan succeded Carter, he was willing to sell ‘real’ F-16s to anyone). An F-104 with a 22000 lbst M-53 could probably do M2.8 and easily zoom climb to 100,000 ft. That’s MiG-31 territory, isn’t it?

The dry thrust won’t help much as long as air inlet isn’t adjusted. Apart from that, the aircraft would run into serious control issues, unsuitable for line pilots. And after all: what you want at 100kft?

The idea of retrofitting an F-104 is nice, when it was 1970 today. An F-104 with a turbo-fan engine and some more avionics would have made an even more decent nuclear striker.
For today’s environment the aircraft is not useful for a variety of reasons. If the F-20 didn’t sell (which was a very well designed aircraft), the Starfighter would never.

To get answers regarding soviet military aircrafts use google to find documents/manuals like “The practical aerodynamics” or “The flight characteristics” of the Mig-21,23,25,29 or Su-22,24,25. Be aware, unlike US flight manuals these are written in Russian, so hopefully you can handle this language.

M

I haven’t found that of the Suchoi 24 yet.
Do you have a link or a hint how I can find it?
Thanks in advance!