Military Aircraft Top 10 list This list of the Top 10 military aircraft of all time aired on the Military Channel in late October 2005 (note: It will re-air on Jan. 29 at 3 p.m.): P51 D mustang F-15 Eagle F-4 Phantom F-86 Sabre MIG-15 Spitfire ME 262 Sopwith Camel Harrier F-22 Contributors to the Garrison listserv had some criticisms of the list. I checked out the Military Channel web "top 10" lists. The 10 Tanks, 10 Bombers, and 10 Fighting Ships. Interesting. I was a little confused by some of the choices with the tanks, then again with the Bombers, but by the Ships I had it figured out. The Military Channel top 10 lists must be done with a close connection to British TV. Every list is 50 percent or more US stuff, then a bunch of questionable British stuff. They then put only the minimum number of German and Russian items possible on each list, and nothing else from any other nationality if possible. Top 10 Fighter Planes, 5 US planes, 3 British, 1 German, 1 Russian. Top 10 Fighting Ships, 6 US, 2 British, 2 German. Top 10 Bombers, 5 US, 3 British, 2 Russian, 1 German. Top 10 Tanks, 2 US, (US tanks sucked in WWII, so it was a stretch to get even 2 on this list) 3 British, 2 German, 2 Russian, 1 Israeli. I am not sure any additional commentary is necessary after looking at these list side by side. One would have to believe that the British consistently had better military equipment then the Russians and Germans combined! Not much chance of that. The US has had a huge advantage in technology and production, but consistently better military equipment then the whole rest of the world combined? I donât think so. -Kamikazi Assur-resal: I was surprised that there weren't more German fighters on the list. I also think the F-14 tomcat is better than the eagle, but it is a Navy plane and there may be some preference of Air Force to Navy on the show. Kamikazi: think the "Military Channel Top Fighter List" is a little suspect. Any list has to take into consideration how revolutionary a plane was at the time it was introduced, and what impact it had on all plane designs that followed it. Also it should be considered in light of the actual impact it had in battle. Without these considerations the most recent fighter will always be at the top of the list, because it can beat all the planes that came before it. I noticed there was only one WWI plane on the list. It seems to me that the Fokker Tri-plane would be a contender as it was so dominant and distinctive. Though, some of it's superiority was due to the Germans being first to come up with better group tactics. It is hard to imagine that the war that invented fighters, had only one "top 10" substantial breakthrough in fighter design worth mentioning. The Me 262 (#7) is on my top 10 planes list. It had four 30mm cannon in it's nose, which was more accurate then wing mounted guns, and just one shell could blow up a fighter or bomber. As the first operational jet it was an amazing accomplishment, and could have been completed a year earlier if Hitler had not been "anti-fighter". He just wanted "bombers, bombers, bombers!" (a translation of an actual Hitler quote), in order to punish England. When the Jet was completed secretly and then shown to him he loved it, and had it converted into a bomber!, crippling it's speed, and making it's already short fuel capacity a bigger weakness. When it finally took on US air raids, it scared the crap out of P51 pilots, but it was just too late, and too few to have a huge impact on the war. The favorite US strategy against them was to tail them till they were forced to land for fuel, and then safely strafe them on the ground. The Spitfire (#6) was a very good plane, but it was the fact that it saved England that made it so significant. I think that it's worth counting actual battle impact for a top 10 list, but I think there were other significant planes that were better. Personally, I think the FW 190 was better as a fighter, and the best "all-around" fighter of the war, but that includes the fighter-bomber and bomber-destroyer roles, which may not have been included on this program. For naval fighters of WWII, I am a fan of the Corsair, which had cool bent wings, and was very fast, maneuverable, and well armed. The TV show about the Black Sheep squadron could be a plus or minus depending on your opinion of the show. The Zero was a very good fighter plane at the start of the war, and often overlooked. One other thing about this list that I have a problem with is all these modern fighters on the list. Modern fighters are really just very fast "weapon targeting platforms", (though hats off to Art Harvey for his weapons systems), but it is not the same as real fighting. I guess I am just an old fart, talking about the "good old days", but it seems to me that modern fighter planes are "best" in a conceptual way, but they never really get to fight for real. -Assur-Resal In defense of modern Jet fighters there have been some good challenges in the the air recently. Vietnam provided an endless supply of air to air battles which kept the Hanoi hilton full of POWs like John McCain. The Phantom was the prime culprit here. It did NOT have cannon at first. It was supposed to be he next generation of fighter that would take us to the next level with Sparrows and Side-Winders. But if the NVA Migs closed quick enough they could splash it with a burst from its cannon. The Phatom was detested at first by U.S. Pilots until it was retro-fitted with cannon. Then after working out its missile guidance system problems it suddenly became the toughest affordable fighter in the world.. for 20-25 years... no other fighter has had such a long life-span as the dominant fighter, the Mustang was obscolete by the end of the WWII once the ME 262 took off. In its own way the F-4 was like those first German jets way ahead of its time. The Israeli's also added a simple but significant piece of hardware to it... rear-view mirrors. The Phantom was supposed to be completely radar guided but again if MIGs closed quickly it was vulnerable. The Iran-Iraq war. 8-years of war between well-equipped Iran v. well-supplied Iraq. The F-14s in Iran proved once again that even a no-frills version of the U.S. plane was tougher than Soviet, French and Italian air. Iran had to cannibalize for spare parts but their fleet maintained air-security without replacements for the whole war. I remember reading Aviation Week about it. U.S. experts were pleasantly surprised, especially Grumman who made the jet. The Gulf War, There was a short period where F-15s and F-16s dueled with Iraqi airforce before it fled to Iran to escape the Coalition and Saddam's wrath. the F-22 is probably as far aehad of its times as the ME-262 and the Phantom. The Arab Israeli Wars, I believe Israel was equipped with western jets in the 60s and 70s. Important because their enemies are so close they need immediate response time. They got F-16s in the 1970s (f-16s are sort of like the modern Zero, the most manueverable fighter jet in the world). The shot that destroyed Iraq's nuclear reactor came from an F-16. It was a big deal when Saudi Arabia and Egypt purchased F-15s and F-16s in the late 1970s, Israel feared losing its air superiority and demanded assurances from the U.S. in case of attack. I donât know what Israel has now. Again I tend to agree that you can't compare the power of a modern fighter with older ones when making a list of the best within their respective eras. An interesting comparison is the British Battle ship "Dreadnaught." The day it rolled off the docks at Scappa flow it obscoleted very ship in the world, but It never saw a second of combat. You couldn't call it the best of an era. .........................
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