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Senior Member
Yes, it shows how stupid some "engineers" can be, because they do not bother to find out the actual requirements of the end user...Originally Posted by 1_click_off
Tracers have been a staple of the infantry since their invention, and not just in machine guns.
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Its not unusual for certain guys, such as WSL, to carry a mag loaded with just tracers for marking targets.
RLTW
“What’s New” button, but without GD: https://www.m4carbine.net/search.php...new&exclude=60 , courtesy of ST911.
Disclosure: I am affiliated PRN with a tactical training center, but I speak only for myself. I have no idea what we sell, other than CLP and training. I receive no income from sale of hard goods.
Senior Member
The issue with Macnamara was he was brought in to simplify / improve mil procurement.
Led to stuff like: why does the US mil need:
- 4 different fighters across branches? Led to forced selection of the F-111 as a 1 size fits all. Immediately failed with the navy requirements. Later failed as fighter, became a fighter/bomber, then just Electronic warfare platform
- multiple rifles? Led to M-16 rush adoption
- Uniforms? Radios? Etc.
Not entirely bad ideas at the surface, but in practice had unintended consequences.
And very clearly they were fighting entrenched bereauocrocies with their own agendas, etc.
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Also, the idea of “body counts” which definitely in Vietnam, and I venture to guess still today to some extent, led to outright lying at every level of military rank as people “estimated” and kept estimating higher every time the next rank had to file the report.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McNamara_fallacy
Way off topic, but here’s another item from near t he top of the google list:
https://www.counterpunch.org/2009/07/09/mcnamara-s-other-body-count/
Last edited by JediGuy; 01-10-20 at 10:46.
Senior Member
1) The F-111 was from the outset a USAF program to replace the F-105 nuclear strike fighter, started in 1960. It was never intended to be a "fighter" in the sense of an F-4 or F-15. It was shoe-horned into the Navy's "fleet defense fighter", because the Navy, at the time, did not see maneuverability as major requirement, and felt that an advanced missile platform would be all that was needed. Later experience in Vietnam would reverse that belief, and thus the Navy changing the requirements that the F-111 could not meet. As a "strike fighter", aka, an attack aircraft, the F-111 was very good, just also very expensive. It was however, pushed into combat prematurely in 1968, and did not preform well and was withdrawn after a few months. In 1972, now fully developed, it went back to Vietnam and performed admirably. The F-111 was one of the best night attack aircraft in the war, except maybe the A-6.
2) There was a story about how McNamara once visited an aircraft carrier, and as he was shown around, he asked, "Why are there so many different types of aircraft? Wouldn't it be easier if there were only one type?" And everybody looked at him like he had two heads. (There were at least 10 types in the inventory: a carrier might have on it 2- fighter squadrons, F-4s or F-8s, 2- day-attack, A-4s or A-1s, 1- all-weather attack, A-6, and detachments of heavy reconnaissance, RA-5, electronic warfare, A-3, airborne early warning, E-1, later E-2, anti-submarine patrol, S-2, later S-3 and several types of rotary wing SH-2, SH-3, H-47 on the carrier or on the attendant escort ships).
Fast forward to 2015 and later, there are two types of fixed wing aircraft on a carrier: Super Hornet types, F/A-18E/Fs and EA-18G performing all role except the AIrborne early warning role which is still done by the E-2 and the C-1 a cargo variant of the E-2, and one rotary wing type, the SH-60. He was correct, in that fewer types was the way to go, it was just at the time, the limits of technology made that a fools errand.
3) And one aircraft across both branches of service, the Navy and Air Force, is not just a McNamarian dream, there were a few aircraft that did this prior to him, notably the B-24/PB4-Y-1 and PB4Y-2, F-86/FJ-1, and A3D/B-66. Even in WW2, there were trials of a P-51 launching and recovering from a carrier, that were quite successful.
Last edited by lysander; 01-10-20 at 17:29.
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Humpy70...these recounts are great reads! Please keep them coming.
ETC (SW/AW), USN (1998-2008)
CVN-65, USS Enterprise
Senior Member
Yes, though refered to as a fighter, it was more of a FA, FB, or Strike fighter in modern terms.
And yes, the air force wanted a penetration fighter to replace the 105, leading to some rough specs.
But make no mistake, the F-111 was developed from the onset as as a triservice fighter under Macnamara's TFX program. (Not by AF or Navy choice)
Very clear to me the navy was full of NIH, and effectively sabotouged the plane for the F14. Which ironically early on had the same teething issues the F-111 had seen.
I'm kind of a fan of the plane, for its day. The one guy I knew who flew one had nothing but good to say, and since it was in service right at 50 years its a respectable platform.
In the dual/tri service platforms only the phantom came close in lifespan.
Multiple books have been written about "Macnamara's fighter", and it still comes up in modern discussion of the F35 situation.
By the way, in college I got to fly a Thud (F-105) simulator as they were flown by the local guard TAC wing at the time. Respectable platform in its own right.
Senior Member
The F-111 and the F-14 shared the same problem, the Pratt & Whitney TF30 turbofan. This engine was very sensitive to uneven pressure distribution on the compressor face, and prone to stalling.
The General Dynamics F-111 design was optimized to the USAF SOR-183, which predated McNamara by a year. So, even though the program was a joint fighter, the GD design was not. The Navy did not have to have a bias against not being the lead in the design. There were a number of features of the F-111A (and F-111B) that made the aircraft incompatible with the Navy.
1) The distance from the nose gear strut to the rear of the engine tail feathers was longer than the distance from the catapult hookup to the JBD. This is a rather basic requirement that shows the GD design did not even look at the Navy's requirements prior to even preliminary design work.
2) The aircraft was considerably heavier than what the Navy carriers could handle. Another instance that the F-111 design was never intended for the Naval use.
3) The visibility over the nose was poor for carrier operations.
In order to meet the Navy's requirements, Grumman figured about 5 feet of fuselage would have to chopped off, the forward fuselage narrowed and the cockpit raised to a tandem seating arrangement, the bomb bay omitted, the ventral fins removed for rotation clearance.
The major problem with the F-111 was not that Air Force and Navy aircraft are so different that cannot be the same air frame*, but that the design work on the F-111 was too far along when the Navy's requirements were thrown at it.
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*The Jaguar/Jaguar M, the Rafale/Rafale M, MiG 29/MiG 29K, and Su 27/Su-33 show that as long as the requirements are the same, or effort is put forward early enough in the design development, you can be quite successful in cross service aircraft. Oh, and the AD, F-4, and the A-7
Last edited by lysander; 01-11-20 at 16:10.
Member
The 60’s were an interesting time in the Pentagon with the different weapon systems which came from the era. The two biggest ones are in this thread. Here is a good article on the F-111B which I found. http://https://www.airspacemag.com/m...b-1-180969916/
Senior Member
Air & Space Magazine, September 2018, "Was the Navy’s F-111 Really That Bad?"
The problem with both of these programs was they did not follow the normal (and correct) procurement cycle of 1) establish requirements, 2) design and develop a product based on those requirements, 3) test all aspects of the product, 4) evaluate.
The F-111 missed #2 for the Navy, and the M16 missed #3.
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