F-15EX.

This is coolbert:

Courtesy the tip from Darby an article from Air Space magazine.

"The Shocking Resurrection of the F-15"

"Who says you can’t teach an old eagle new tricks?"

"As the Air Force likes to say, the two-crew F-15E Strike Eagle can fight its way into a target and fight its way out. It has to. A pre-stealth, fourth-generation multi-role fighter, the F-15 can’t hide from radar"

American warplane F-15EX Eagle. Somewhat ancient and venerable but now in a new and much improved version.

An old eagle but not such an old eagle. In the case of the F-15EX brand new.

Comments:

* American air force at this exact moment was supposed to have about one-thousand stealth warplanes in the inventory, up and working? That is combined F-35 and F-22. The total figure NOW is about one-third that desired number? Shocking!

* F-15 in whatever manifestation or block still being manufactured using much advanced fabrication techniques. That warplane first flew in the early 1970's and still going strong. Remarkable.

* Cost for a 4th Generation F-15 about $80 million. Hardly cheap.

* Apparently these are [?] the F-15 to be used with the Loyal Wingman concept. Accompanied into aerial warfare by a drone wingman possessing AI [artificial intelligence] capability. I had thought those F-15 to be used with the Loyal Wingman older planes merely refurbished. I am wrong.

* A rather low number [about eighty] of the F-15EX to come off the assembly line new and ready for combat missions? A paltry number considering the need?

Good enough now [F-15] more important than better tomorrow [F-35]? I guess that is the thought. But not a bad idea on paper at least. A proven winner and yet to be an even more proven winner.

coolbert.