This brings up another interesting issue. I dunno if this has been thought of yet - but what if spawn times were regulated?
In other words - if you get shot down, you must wait with all the others who have been shot down to reup again. Set it for something like 3-4 minutes and actually shooting down aitplanes would mean somthing - plus - as it relates to this thread, missions would fill quickly and fully if this was implemented methinks - the target audience is already in the tower and cant up for another X minutes anyway.
I think this would completely change the game - you would have alot of multi-aircraft engagements just happening instead of the congo line fight from base to base.
What do you think?