Originally posted by storch
It wasn't "due to politics" it was due to 3-4 times more hours of maintenance for every hour of flight time than the F/A-18. It is a matter of economics not politics.
Actually, it was both politics and money. In the politics side the Hornet was made in more states than the Tomcat and the Hornet mafia did a great job in claiming to be able to do it all with just one guy. Only politicians win the first point and facts don't back up the second. Case in point. During Desert Storm a flight of F-18's were over Iraq and about 50 miles from their target. The Fighter/Attack Guys had already switched to air-to-ground mode when the E-2 started calling bandits approaching at 30 to 40 miles. The E-2 makes numerous calls and is almost shouting before the Hornet pilots buy a clue and comprehend what he's saying. The bandit is within 10 miles now. One Hornet pilot promptly launched an AIM-9 Sidewinder out of range, then, he follows his long shot of his short-range missile with a short shot of his long-range missile, his Sparrow.
In "Fighter-speak" this guy is known as a freaking idiot. If the Iraqi had his xxit together a couple of Hornets could (and should) have been dead meat. Also, by every measure of effectiveness the Tomcat won the competition in Afghanistan even given that not one of the F14's that participated could have possibily been newer than 11 years old and most probably averaged 15.
Speaking of age, greater maintenance manhours per flight hour is only partially true and must be judged comparing apples to apples. F-14D and F-18C with similar numbers of airframe hours and similar parts support were very similar in MMPFH with the Tomcat costing only two to three hours more, not 3-4 "times" more. Problem was that there were very few F-14's with total hours similar to the Hornets in the fleet at the time (specifically the 54 F-14D's made in 1989-91, the last brand new F-14 airframes ever built). Also, many F-14 parts were no longer being produced which meant the community had to continuously swap parts between planes. VX-4 had a mix of both old and new Tomcats (A, A+ and D) and Hornets (C and D). Old airframes were hard to maintain. New airframes were much easier. This is what we call "intuitively obvious to the casual observer." The maintenance cost was a red herring and would have been eliminated had they spent the money for the F-18E/F "Stupor Hornet" on new, 1990 technology Tomcats.
Bottom line though is that there is really only one substantive reason the Hornet was chosen over the Tomcat...1 vs 2 crewmen. The RIO was the biggest cost difference given his projected pay, medical and retirement. This was much more expensive than the few MMPFH difference in similar aged planes and a piss poor reason to pick the Hornet, especially given the proven effectiveness of a two-man crew in a high workload, high threat environment as well as the obvious advantages the Tomcat held in range, speed, payload, loiter, bringback, etc. The USAF suffers because it needs ground bases. Naval Aviation suffers because of the Hornet. Guess I should really right a book about this...lol.
Mace
