Why was the F-14 Tomcat withdrawn from US navy service? Quora opinion piece

by Arthur Hu

".....The decision to replace the Tomcat with the Super Hornet leaves many scratching their heads to this day. That said, the Tomcat was a product of the late 60s utilising the TF30 engines and AWG-9/Phoenix system of the failed F-111B. The result was a supersonic interceptor using the swinging version of the A-6 wing and landing gear. The F-111 was an unfortunate Frankenstein amalgamation of 'gee-whiz' features, some like afterburning turbofans which weren’t mature enough to work very well, and some like ejecting crew capsules, swing wings, and rotating pylons that nobody will be foolish enough to ever design into an airplane again after they went out of fashion. The USAF never had much use for the Hughes AIM-54 Phoenix which was similar to the missile that was meant for the Mach3 YF-12 interceptor variant which also needed to detect and zap bombers from 100 miles away, the USAF never had much success with any of the Falcon missiles which were used in the Delta Dagger and Delta Dart in internal missile bays. Those planes usually only fired in pairs so they only had 2 shots.

In actual combat situations the Phoenix was actually only fired in combat a couple a times, and by Iran at that. It was said that the “dogfight” mode button was the “eject Phoenix missile” buttons. One major advantage of the F-14 vs. the doomed F-111B is while it was a point design that could ONLY carry 6 long range Phoenix missiles that the F-14 was a complete superset of the F-4 - it could carry 4 Sparrows conformally and 4 Sidewinders, plus an internal M61 gatling 20mm gun plus any bomb load the Phantom could carry. The F-111 had a specification list hundreds of pages long, but it wasn’t until Mach 2 F-105 Thunderchiefs were completely humiliated by hit and run subsonic MiG-17s at Dragon Jaw bridge which were upgraded versions of the same MiG-15 so thoroughly trounced by the F-86 over Korea that both the Navy and USAF realized the F-111 would not be able to replace the Phantom in air combat roles. One Navy admiral remarked that all the thrust in Christendom would not make the F-111B a fighter. The Navy started with the idea of a VFAX that would handle dogfighting and bombing, but Grumman just built a VFAX that was big enough to carry the giant AWG-9 radar and heavy Phoenix missiles plus whatever the Phantom could haul.

But if you think the Hornet is from a more advanced era, the Hornet design was pretty much set in place about the same time frame, Northrop took the F-5 design, put in slightly bigger engines, and move the the wing top of the fuselage with twin tails, it was downized to produce the F-17, upsized to the F-18A/B which was somewhat smaller than a Phantom carrying just two Sparrows conformally.

The Super Hornet was proposed to address complaints that the Hornet was a great plane but didn’t have the range of a heavy fighter like the Phantom, Somewhere along the way, somebody had the brilliant idea of using it to replace the subsonic A-6 after the A-12 Dorito stealth plane program cracked up, and one more requirement added was replacing aging Tomcats. One issue was cost and complexity of the swing wing and older systems which cost more to maintain than the newer Hornet.

Two other factors according to one conspiracy theory is that the Mcdonnell Douglas lobby had more clout with the secretary of defense and managed to favor the Super Hornet and destroy all F-14 tooling to boot. Keeping the F-18 designation was a bit of a scam because you can’t just put on a bigger wing, by the time everything including the engine is upsized, pretty much nothing is in common in terms of parts, and it’s a completely new airplane, so it’s more like going from 1st generation to 2nd generation Taurus pretty much only the nameplate is the same and it looks similar. The old F3D had to be redesigned for another engine after the infamous J46 debacle. The original idea of the hornet was to get a plane cheaper and smaller than the F15 Eagle or Tomcat but loaded up it’s about the same weight as size as either plane plus it loses two conformal missle stations.

The downside to the Super Hornet is that it’s basically an upsized lawn dart with a small wing. In fact for all the people that laughed at the F-105 Thunderchief as the worst dogfighter in history, the Super Hornet loaded up is heavier with a wing the same size, but has much more thrust and same radar missile capability as the Phantom which the Thud lacked. It’s much dirtier, especially with “toed-out” pylons than the Tomcat which can also spread out wings for efficient cruise, or pull them back for supersonic cruise, and has wider wing-body effect so you get more lift than just your main wing loading which doesn’t count fuselage area might lead you to believe. Tomcat can carry 4 sparrows conformally in the tunnel between engines or tuck bombs back there and leave the wings COMPLETELY CLEAN WITH A FULL BOMBLOAD where the Super Hornet has to spread them out on numerous pylons across the wings. Depending on which accounts you choose to believe, the Tomcat is much faster and burns much less fuel, and I’ve never heard that the SH had the range to do missions to Afghanistan like the Bombcats did. The F-14 was actually never designed to be a point design like the f-111 which was ONLY a bomber in the A-model and ONLY a fighter in the B Navy, it was designed with hardpoints and avionics, and in Bomcat configuration pretty comparable to the F-111 bomber or Strike Eagle.

There are various arguments as to whether the Tomcat or Super Hornet is a better dogfighter but the F-14 with swing wings and blended wing/body is a very efficient platform across all speeds, and was the first swing wing plane to use wings forward with automatic sweep for dogfighting. The SH has a fixed relatively tiny lawn dart wing that is a compromise at all speeds. The SH loses the Phoenix but it was never really useful in combat, and weighs about the same as an attack bomb load, the Sparrow form factor AMRAAM provides similar active seeker capability where you can fire without having to actively paint the target with your radar with gives away your position and prevents you from turning around to get out of Dodge.

The Soviet Flanker was their answer to both the Eagle and Tomcat, actually a family with carrier and land based and even a FB-111-ski side by side seating bomber and our answer to that is currently the Super Hornet. The Fat Flanker replaces the swing-wing Fencer but keeps the side by side seating. The SH now performs pretty much every job except helo, Hawkeye radar or cargo delivery where in Vietnam you’d have A-4 an A7 light attack, A5 recon, A6 medium attack, A3 tanker, F8 daylight or F4 all weather fighter and A1 ground support attack all over the place and now everything is either a Hornet or Super Hornet. Eventually the F-35 could take over as the one plane that does everything but they’ll have to work out the bugs and expense. The other option if old Robert McNamara were still around would be to ask why the USAF Navy and Marines couldn’t all standardize on Super Hornets for new planes that work until the F-35 kinks are worked out. That’s what happened with everybody flew the F-4 for every mission. There is an enhanced super-duper Hornet which puts fuel in a conformal pack on top of the fuselage and has a pod which works like a weapons bay which can clean up some of the stores that would end up on a pylon, and the Navy is buying some of those gizmos...."


by Joe Duarte


"....In 1989, Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney (during the Bush Sr. administration) refused to procure any more F-14D aircraft. He dismissed the F-14 as “1960s technology”, which was arguably true – the contract was awarded in January of 1969, first flight was in 1970, and IOC was declared in 1973 (but don’t ever believe an IOC declaration). He also derided the F-14 as a “jobs program” (which is unfortunately true of a number of defense projects, like the F-35.).

So SecDef Cheney pretty much killed the F-14, though it took another 15 years or so to retire them completely.

Note also that in 1989 the Cold War was coming to an end, which likely factored into Cheney’s thinking. The F-14D variant was a pretty decent upgrade, but it was unlikely to see much combat.

The F-14 in general didn’t have much of a record of success. In its entire history, it never destroyed a single target with its flagship Phoenix long-range air-to-air missile. The handful of times it launched a Phoenix, it missed. (I'm ignoring the combat record of Iran’s F-14As and their Phoenix missiles in their war with Iraq, since credible data is unavailable.) In American service, all the F-14 ever did was shoot down two obsolete jets – a Libyan Su-22 and Mig-23 in a couple of engagements in the 1980s, plus an Iraqi Mi-8 Hip helicopter. And an F-14 somehow got shot down by an ancient Soviet SA-2 SAM in Iraq – maybe the ECM was defective or something (similarly confusing is how LCDR Scott Speicher's F/A-18C was shot down by an old R-40/AA-6 missile – war is full of mysteries).

The Tomcat didn’t have the stellar kill ratios of the F-15 or F-16. Granted, the F/A-18 family that replaced the Tomcat doesn’t have much of a track record either. The Navy hasn’t had top-tier fighters or attack aircraft in a long time, which could be a problem in the not too distant future. For ground attack, the A-6 Intruder was outstanding, and the A-6F was fantastic, but they never built it. A-6Fs would be great even today in uncontested airspace or supported by Growlers and such (and as A-10 Warthog replacements). For air combat, an F-23 tailored for the Navy would be a doomsday fighter, at least as good as the F-22. It’s faster and stealthier than the F-22, and that was true in the 1990s. They could do even better now, with the lower maintenance stealth coatings of the F-35 program, better sensors, tiny anti-missile missiles (think of something the size of a Stinger or smaller to take out incoming SAMs and AAMs), and other tweaks. (The Air Force chose the F-22 over the F-23 – in the 1991 ATF competition – not because it was better, but because of perceived project management issues, and possibly because the government was mad at Northrop at the time. The F-23 was the better fighter on most variables.)

To add to the cost of service argument, there was also the aircraft's role mission. The F-14 was built strictly as an air interceptor. Other words Air to Air combat only and the Navy had A-6’s to fulfill Its Air to Surface missions. When the F/A-18 (Fighter/Attack) came along it was designed to fulfill both roles. Which eventually fased out the A-6’s. The F-14 was retrofitted to perform ground attack but the plane was not designed with that specifically in mind. The F-14 and also the F-4 were amazing air to air planes. They were brutally fast and agile and did a great job at what they were designed to do. But technology eventually caught up with them and the F/A-18 was just more efficient at the job. Also there is another aspect which is maintenance. If you look on the flight deck now it’s pretty much just F/A -18’s, Helo’s and E-2 Hawkeyes. Hornets have taken over the E/A 6B, S-3 Viking and F-14 roles. Why..well it’s a lot easier to stock parts for one airframe than four. By the Hornet taking over multiple roles, there are that many less “different” parts they don’t have to keep in inventory. That is one of the main goals. One plane that does everything. The F/A-18 has now been fitted for Fighter/Attack, in flight refueling, electronic warfare and probably other platforms that used to take multiple different planes to cover...."