Pretty cool video. Some interesting things, besides just the aircraft:
1. IRIAF is like a 1980s USAF, tactics-wise, aircrew equipment-wise, the older HGU-33 helmets, the colorful helmet decorations, etc. Effective, but you can easily see both the dated but heavy USAF influence. If one didn't know any better, these guys carry themselves in nearly every way like USAF pilots/WSOs, since that heritage is still how they are trained and is still passed down......because it works. They do nearly everything the USAF did in that era and with those aircraft, including day/night aerial refueling from both their KC-707s as well as their one-of-a-kind KC-747s.
2. The old-school ordnance. The reworked AIM-54 Phoenix on the Tomcats, the Electro-Optical A/B model AGM-65 Mavericks on the F-4s as well as the AIM-9J/P models. Mk-82 bombs with Snakeye high drag kits (no longer used by USAF, ballute kits used instead). And very interesting are the modifications, such as the 4-abreast Mk-82s carried on the two forward AIM-54 Phoenix fuselage racks by an F-14 taxiing out. The aft-facing video of the F-4s doing a laydown of Mk-82SEs in ripple/single and ripple/pairs on targets, is still pretty cool......
3. The F-4Es with the US-style sharkmouth's on them.
1. IRIAF is like a 1980s USAF, tactics-wise, aircrew equipment-wise, the older HGU-33 helmets, the colorful helmet decorations, etc. Effective, but you can easily see both the dated but heavy USAF influence. If one didn't know any better, these guys carry themselves in nearly every way like USAF pilots/WSOs, since that heritage is still how they are trained and is still passed down......because it works. They do nearly everything the USAF did in that era and with those aircraft, including day/night aerial refueling from both their KC-707s as well as their one-of-a-kind KC-747s.
2. The old-school ordnance. The reworked AIM-54 Phoenix on the Tomcats, the Electro-Optical A/B model AGM-65 Mavericks on the F-4s as well as the AIM-9J/P models. Mk-82 bombs with Snakeye high drag kits (no longer used by USAF, ballute kits used instead). And very interesting are the modifications, such as the 4-abreast Mk-82s carried on the two forward AIM-54 Phoenix fuselage racks by an F-14 taxiing out. The aft-facing video of the F-4s doing a laydown of Mk-82SEs in ripple/single and ripple/pairs on targets, is still pretty cool......
3. The F-4Es with the US-style sharkmouth's on them.
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