I'm coming at this one a bit late, but the whole point of this thread is flawed from the start - John F, you are not quoting Flight when you say that the USA has 13,902 fixed-wing combat aircraft. That is their entire fleet of all military aircraft categories across all services. Likewise, it does not say that France has 1,200 combat aircraft (it's 283 fixed-wing across the air force and navy, Melchett01); that includes everything in military use, bar VIP types. And the numbers most certainly aren't plucked from the air!