Best Fighter of all Time

[Godzilla]

What would you say is the best of all time?

I'd say the F-15, with a 104-0 kill to death ratio in air to air combat.

The F-15 being over 30 years old and still being one of the best fighters flying today is pretty impressive as well.

[Gixer]

If we are talking current fighters in service my vote goes to the SU-27 Flanker.



...-Gixer
~Hells Angels~


"The Su-27 is a big long-range air superiority fighter, comparable to the U.S. F-15 but superior in many respects."

[Pfunk]

Muhammed Ali.......opps guess the subject should have read best jet fighter.

[JAWS2003]

Originally posted by Godzilla
What would you say is the best of all time?

I'd say the F-15, with a 104-0 kill to death ratio in air to air combat.

 

So you are saying that no F-15 was shot down in air to air combat. I think i read something about  one of Israel's F-15's being shot down by a Mig-21.

[B17Skull12]

mine would have to go the SU35 thing can fly backwards for a few seconds.

[Wilbus]

In active service? Su27, Mig 29 or JAS 39 Gripen.

[Replicant]

Originally posted by Wilbus
In active service? Su27, Mig 29 or JAS 39 Gripen.

The JAS 39 Gripen is one hell of a nice aircraft!  Got systems linking to the other a/c too so they know exactly what each others status is.

Eurofighter Typhoon will be in service next year and it will be interesting how it competes on the North Atlantic ACM ranges and Red/Green Flag exercises.

Of course it's often tactics that decide just how good an aircraft is.  Take the Tornado F3 - it's a very poor dogfighter but during Red Flag a few years ago it beat F16s, F15s of the USAF.  How?  They used 'Link 16' so RAF AWACs could supply radar data directly to the Tornado so it didn't need to use its own radar.  Therefore it sneaked up on all enemy aircraft undetected, got close enough before flicking radar on and getting missile lock - missile lock would be classed as a victory!  There was one story of a Tornado taxi-ing out to the runway, it got the data from the AWAC and got missile lock whilst still on the ground because it knew exactly where to point its radar.  Kinda cool!

USAF said the RAF cheated but they use Link 16 now!  (US developed Link 16 but didn't utilize it like the RAF).

[Wilbus]

RGR Replicant, much depends on tactics and systems. The Gripen is ment to work together with our new "Visby" stealth class corvette in much the same way as the "Link 16" you're talking about, we'll see how it all turns out

[Godzilla]

I guess I should have said :  What is the best performing or most dominating fighter of all time  in actual combat. That's sort of what I was meaning to say. During actual use in war or conflicts and not limited to jets.....off all time

I was watching the History channel last night and they showed an Isreali F-15 flying with one wing completley blown off, all the way from the wing root. Nothing was left of the wing. The plane flew home and landed normally ( but fast at 200 something knots)

The pilot said that if he had been able to look out and see that he was missing a whole wing, he would have bailed.

[artik]

Originally posted by Godzilla
What would you say is the best of all time?

I'd say the F-15, with a 104-0 kill to death ratio in air to air combat.

The F-15 being over 30 years old and still being one of the best fighters flying today is pretty impressive as well.

from all them 56 - IAF of only 2(!) F-15 squadrons
----------
  27-Jun-79 F-15                     4 MiG-21            Syria
  19-Sep-79 F-15                     4 MiG-21            Syria
  24-Sep-79 F-15                     4 MiG-21            Syria
  24-Aug-80 F-15                     1 MiG-21            Syria
  31-Dec-80 F-15                     2 MiG-21            Syria
  13-Feb-81 F-15                     1 MiG-25            Syria
  29-Jul-81 F-15                     1 MiG-25            Syria
  25-May-82 F-15                     2 MiG               Syria
  07-Jun-82 F-15                     1 MiG-23            Syria
  08-Jun-82 F-15                     1 MiG               Syria
            F-15                     2 MiG-21            Syria
            F-15                     1 MiG-23            Syria
  09-Jun-82 F-15                     1 MiG               Syria
            F-15                     7 MiG-21            Syria
            F-15                     4 MiG-23            Syria
  10-Jun-82 F-15                     5 MiG-21            Syria
            F-15                     2 MiG-23            Syria
            F-15                     1 SA342             Syria
  11-Jun-82 F-15                     4 MiG-21            Syria
            F-15                     2 MiG-23            Syria
  25-Jun-82 F-15                     2 MiG-23            Syria
  31-Aug-82 F-15                     1 MiG-25            Syria
  20-Nov-85 F-15D                    2 MiG-23            Syria
    87-88   F-15                     1 MiG-23            Syria
-----------------------

Looses - As I know (and I know exectly) IAF have not loosed any F-15 in aircombat

By the why first kill in F-15 in histroy was done by IAF pilot when USAF hadn't seen us even one combat

[-tronski-]

Su-30MKI

 Tronsky

[udet]

Tie Fighter!

[DiabloTX]

TIE INTERCEPTOR IS WAYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY COOLER, IMHO.

[cpxxx]

According to the sales department, the one we're selling now:cool:

But of all time, for what it did. I would suggest the P51 Mustang because of it's range and capabilities. Goring reputedly said he knew the war was lost when he saw P51's over Berlin. But then again I like the Spitfire, the Battle of Britain and all that and the way it evolved throughout the war getting better and better. I don't think any other fighter ever changed as much as the Spitfire did from Mk 1 to Mk 24.  So maybe I'll go for the Spitfire instead. But then again the Fw190........................ .

[AKIron]

Everything outside of actual kill ratio is speculation. Which is of course what we do a lot of on these pages.