I'm late to this one but I'll add my "two pennorth"
The F4 isn't and never was a "dogfighter" - BCM, ACM, WIVR; call it what you will. It can cope in those environments but it depended on good front seaters and, equally good back seaters to play with the kit.
What it comes down to is how good was the weapons system at each stage of its development. My time was great. I flew the aircraft at its peak. It had been introduced to service, the engines were by then working and a few people actually knew how to fight the jet properly. The MCS serviceability was terrible until the reliability package arrived in the early 80s but that was another issue.
The key to all tactics is having a bigger "stick". If your Sparrow is longer range than your opponents Atoll and it works, you win. End of story. No fighter pilot enters a close engagement through choice - F22, F15, Su27 F3, F4.....
So lets look at maturity
Mid to late 70s. A multi role aircraft with a PD radar that gave true look down-shoot down against opponents such as the Mig 21, Mig 23 and soviet bombers. It was training against USAF F4Es, F104s and F5s. Even the USAF didn't have a PD equipped fighter and anyone who's used a pulse set at low level knows how much of a challenged that is; MTI or no. At the time the Fox 1 was discounted so the F4, despite the fact it may have already achieved a "kill", was sucked into an environment it didn't enjoy. The bad news was that despite the head-on option, quite often, ROE meant that the head on shot could not be employed so a visual ident sucked you into a turning fight. Bad news.
Early 80s. The advent of Mig 29 and Su27 (and F15/F16 as blue opponents) in RAFG meant the jet was out-performed but not necessarily out-ranged. Given decent ROE, the jet would have coped. Trouble was the lack of positive identification from the ground meant that the VID was king. VID equalled "eyeballs on" so turning fights were the order of the day. That made the Wildenrath Wing operate at 250ft every day of the week. No one was better down low - so tactics made up for ROE. If the bad guys came in higher we had the look up shot. Come up in height and the scales balanced. Come up to medium level and the fight was lost as airframe deficiencies outweighed pilot/navigator skills. Ok so I discounted the "M1.3 guns a blazin" through the fight option.
Late 80s. The jet wasn't upgraded. Sparrow was too short in range, Skyflash was better but out ranged by later "soviet" missiles. Endex. The myth that the F4 was better than the F3 was just that until the advent of medium level ops. SA was just a quantum leap forward in the F3. An art became a science.
The German F4F with APG65 and AMRAAM was an improvement but never quite matched AI24 and AMRAAM/JTIDS although J79 at height was way better than RB199.
The F3 was great once it was developed to the point when the radar did what it was supposed to do and the weapons (AMRAAM and ASRAAM) allowed JTIDS to get the aircraft into a firing position. Up to that point it was only gaining a reputation that it never really deserved given its role. It never had the charisma of the F4 though.
In short, the airframe is never the driver although F22 and Typhoon go a long way to fixing most of the problems I lived with.
Last edited by Geehovah; 29th Nov 2010 at 19:22.