U.S. Navy’s WWII Radar-Guided Bat Glide Bomb

Striking enemy ships with airborne munitions became a priority after World War I. While the challenges were monumental at the time, the rewards for success were too great to pass up. However, bombs and torpedoes dropped by early naval strike aircraft stood little chance against armored warships b...

By Tom Laemlein •

McDonnell F3H Demon: Troubled Transition to Supersonic Flight

The McDonnell F3H Demon was a single-seat, carrier-based jet fighter developed for the United States Navy in the 1950’s. This aircraft represents a critical but troubled chapter in American naval aviation: one that pushed the McDonnell Aircraft Corporation toward design philosophies that would ...

By Richard Johnson •

Mikoyan MiG-29: The Reactive Fulcrum?

Military aircraft design of the Cold War era could be described as akin to physics, or, more specifically, to Newton’s Third Law of motion, which states, “For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.” From lessons learned in the Vietnam War, the United States Air Force determi...

By Peter Suciu •