Yep... The F/A-18 was previously desnigated YF-17. It lost the contract competition awarded to GD for the F-16.
The F-20 was also included in this fly off, and from most of the people that were there at the time they said it won it hands down. The F-16 was chosen for political reasons (same thing happend w/ other air frames that i dont feel like getting into)
[
QUOTE]Interesting story about them. When the IAF first brought them over and were checking the Marines out on them, they put metal shades up over them on the tarmac. As you can imagine, the skin of a plane, not to mention the rest of it, gets pretty hot in Yuma, Arizona on a 110deg day. Just by putting a shade up you can keep exposed metal from becoming untouchable (something I'm well aware of after growing up on a farm and working on the machinery). I bet the IAF guys wondered why the Marines had never thought of that. [/QUOTE]
I was stationed at Yuma for 6 years, and they JUST got cover shelters for the rest of the birds there a couple of years ago
Also, the father of a friend of mine was a Lt. Col. and flew F-18's at the time. He took my dad and I on a tour of the flightline once and took us through the HQ of the aggressor squadron. The walls were covered in Hammer and Sickles, Soviet patriotic slogans and pictures of Stalin and Lenin. The aggressor pilots all wore gold helmets with big red stars on the side.
These guys are a cool bunch. They are acutally Marine Corps Reservists who are awsome pilots. There hangor is a trip all decked up in commie probiganda. They teach american pilots how to deal with soviet era tactics and such. There official designation is VFMT-401. Nowadays they fly F-5E tiger IIs and they are IMPRESSIVE to watch and still have big red stars on there tails and wings.
just some info
