McNamara spits out his dummy... and inflicts the F-111B on ADC!

[Spinners 15,986]

Grumman F-111B 'Defender' - 186th Fighter Interceptor Squadron, Montana Air National Guard, 1980

 

On November 24th, 1962 the US Defense Departement issued a press release announcing the award of the TFX programme to General Dynamics ahead of Boeing. There was an immediate outcry at this decision as only a few weeks earlier the Air Force Council had stated their declared preference for the Boeing submission as had the Chief of the Navy although the US Navy had, in fact, rejected both explaining that neither were fully compatible with carrier operations and neither had adequate CAP loiter endurance. It was not until March 21st, 1963 when Robert McNamara (Secretary of Defense) was called as a witness to the 'McClennan hearings' where McNamara explained the evaluation groups preference for the General Dynamics submission based on the higher degree of commonality when compared to Boeing's submission adding that, in their view, Boeing were proposing two different airplanes. After the dust had settled General Dynamics and the US Air Force battled on with their version of the TFX which would eventually lead to the F-111A entering squadron service (and operational service in Vietnam) in 1968. 

 

However, for the US Navy things were different. Initially, by appointing Grumman to develop the naval version of the TFX (as the F-111B) the US Navy had hoped that this experienced and trusted contractor would turn the heavy tactical bomber into something that would meet their carrier-based interception requirement and at least they also had Hughes onboard for the radar/missile system with the promising AWG-9 radar and AIM-54A missile. But by early 1964 the Navy were determined that the F-111B would not proceed except without major changes and asked that the manufacture of the F-111B development aircraft should be halted until the aircraft was redesigned but this was overruled by the Pentagon. Even the first flight of the F-111B on May 18th, 1965 failed to provide any comfort as the TF30 engine compressor stalls were evident from the start. By October 1965 the Navy Preliminary Evaluation considered the aircraft to be grossly underpowered, range was less than half of the requirement and the engines were judged to be a significant flight safety problem. Furthermore, the fixes required to bring the F-111B into something at least marginally capable of flying the mission brought commonality down from 80% down to 29% and during early 1966 the Navy became increasingly vocal about wanting to bail out but it was not until after a new and particularly scathing Navy Preliminary Evaluation held in March 1967 that they did so. 

 

McNamara was incensed and instructed General Dynamics and Grumman to revert back to the original '80% commonality' F-111B and develop it for use as an interceptor by the USAF's Aerospace Defense Command Interceptor Squadrons as a replacement for the F-101 Voodoos and F-102 Delta Daggers and to supplement the F-106 Delta Darts. Almost as a way of denying failure, McNamara instructed the Defense Department not to allocate a new designation but to keep the F-111B designation for the Air Force interceptor. With an immediate order for 288 F-111B's a reluctant Air Force at least had some use for the short-nosed F-111 and put the aircraft to good use but the real winner was McDonnell Douglas who gained new orders from the Navy for the F-4J Phantom and also the swing-wing F-4S 'Super Phantom' ordered instead of the VFX (Tomcat).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Alternate camo version 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited January 12, 2014 by Spinners

[Stratos 3,192]

Hey Cool!

 

can we have a Alaska ANG version? Will match Bering Straits perfectly.

[Spinners 15,986]

Hey Cool!

 

can we have a Alaska ANG version? Will match Bering Straits perfectly.

Sorry mate. I'm not really interested at this moment in time.

[Stratos 3,192]

Rgr.

[+Geary 1,889]

Nice, Spinners,

 

  Are those new skins and weapons loadouts?

[Spinners 15,986]

Nice, Spinners,

 

  Are those new skins and weapons loadouts?

Yes, they are new skins derived from Fast Cargo's templates. Tip! Create a layer with the F-111B nosecone (copied from one of the existing F-111B skins) and it works fine.

 

The loadouts simply use the stock AIM-54A's for which you have to add the specific station code from the AIM-54A entry in the WeaponData.ini

[Spinners 15,986]

 

Corrected 'Montana' tail markings

[Spinners 15,986]

Grumman F-111B Bobcat - 178th Fighter Interceptor Squadron, North Dakota ANG, 1976

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I'll be making an 'as is' release of the F-111B 'ADC' in the near future.

[Spinners 15,986]