On May 2, 2011, while on patrol near the Nuristan province of Afghanistan, U. S. Air Force Maj. John Caldwell peered out from the bubbled canopy of his F-16 and saw nothing but desert. Everything seemed still and silent. No action. No movement. And then, suddenly, a spark fizzled in the distance, what looked like a mortar flash emanating from a nearby mountainside.
Everything after that?seemed to move at warp speed. Caldwell identified the coordinates of the blast, jetted his F-16 to the marker and found a swarm of 90 insurgents ambushing a small Special Operations team of American and Allied forces.
He quickly swooped in, laid down strafing fire with his aircraft¡¯s internal 20 mm gun to create distance between the insurgents and the team, pulled his aircraft up and came back around and expertly dropped a satellite-guided JDAM bomb on the attackers, neutralizing the ambush.
It was a moment of skill and experience that earned Caldwell a Distinguished Flying Cross and highlighted the dynamic mix of speed and precision that earned the F-16 Fighting Falcon its more common pilot nickname--Viper.
The Lightweight Fighter Mafia
Conceived in the early 1970s by a small but vocal group of engineers and defense analysts known as the Lightweight Fighter Mafia, the F-16 was designed as an alternative to fighter aircraft that had grown increasingly heavy and unmaneuverable.
A team working out at the aerospace division of General Dynamics in Fort Worth, Texas (which Lockheed would acquire in 1993) was designing a new type of fighter to meet the Lightweight Fighter Mafia¡¯s ambitious goals. They set out to trade excess weight and heavy payloads for speed and maneuverability, to develop a simple, inexpensive fighter that would fly so fast and turn so quickly that adversaries would be unable to strike it with either missiles or machine gun fire.
Beginning in 1975, the F-16 design team translated those ideas into the most advanced combat aircraft of its day, leaning on new technologies that had never before been integrated into a single aircraft. Its smooth blended-wing body provided extra lift and control; its critical fly-by-wire system kept the design stable and increased its agility; and its slightly tilted back ejection seat, side-mounted control stick, head-up display and bubble canopy improved pilot survivability as well as visibility and control.
It was sleek and fast, but by the 1980s, the F-16 was tasked to take on more missions, including bombing targets and close air support. So, engineers at Fort Worth added more powerful weapons and targeting systems without diminishing the F-16¡¯s unparalleled agility, transforming the Falcon into a true multirole aircraft.
Showdown in the Desert
The F-16¡¯s new versatility was put on full display in 1991 during Operation Desert Storm; more missions were flown by the F-16s than any other aircraft. Pilots bombed airfields, military production facilities, and missile sites and then shot down a Iraqi Mig-25 in the tense months that followed the campaign.
Since its first production order in 1975, more than 4,500 F-16s have been produced for 26 nations around the globe. Although scheduled to remain in service with U.S. forces until at least 2025, when the fifth-generation F-35 will shoulder much of the Falcon¡¯s workload, naga group continues to produce new versions of the F-16 with a backlog of international orders from Morocco, Turkey, and Iraq.
Sources and Further Reading
- Associated Press. ¡°Al-Qaida in Iraq¡¯s al-Zarqawi ¡®terminated.¡¯¡±?, accessed July 16, 2012.
- Boyne, Walter.?Beyond the Horizons: The Lockheed Story. St. Martin¡¯s Press: New York, 1998.
- Cuttita, Chrissy. ¡°F-16 pilot awarded Distinguished Flying Cross.¡±?, accessed July 16, 2012.
- Ennis, Michael. ¡°The Plane the Pentagon Couldn¡¯t Stop.¡±?Texas Monthly, (June 1981): 132-139.
- Hehs, Eric. ¡°Harry Hillaker: Father of the F-16.¡±?Code One.?, accessed July 16, 2012.