The real "Top Gun" ....Smithsonian

[westwall]

Smithsonian sponsored a documentary about the real Top Gun program compared with the movie and it was a quality and informative show. They showed modern training and gave the history of the real Fighter Weapons program that started out in a junk trailer somewhere out in the Nevada desert. Smithsonian got a couple of aging Vietnam vintage pilots to reminisce and it was done well except for one thing. The only fighter Ace in the Vietnam war and arguably the founder of the Top Gun program, Randy "Duke" Cunningham was missing like he was erased from history. Congressman Cunningham was convicted of accepting bribes from lobbyists and sentenced to 8 years in federal prison but he was pardoned by President Trump. Is it right to dismiss his contribution to military history and his heroic flying because he was convicted of a crime? It should be noted that Navy pilot John McCain was also implicated in a lobbying scandal (the Keating five) but they gave him a break because of his military history (and the fact that the other four senators were democrats).

You are missing a few, Jeff Feinstein, Chuck Debelvue, Steve Ritchie, and Driscoll.

 

[Stryder50]

Smithsonian sponsored a documentary about the real Top Gun program compared with the movie and it was a quality and informative show. They showed modern training and gave the history of the real Fighter Weapons program that started out in a junk trailer somewhere out in the Nevada desert. Smithsonian got a couple of aging Vietnam vintage pilots to reminisce and it was done well except for one thing. The only fighter Ace in the Vietnam war and arguably the founder of the Top Gun program, Randy "Duke" Cunningham was missing like he was erased from history. Congressman Cunningham was convicted of accepting bribes from lobbyists and sentenced to 8 years in federal prison but he was pardoned by President Trump. Is it right to dismiss his contribution to military history and his heroic flying because he was convicted of a crime? It should be noted that Navy pilot John McCain was also implicated in a lobbying scandal (the Keating five) but they gave him a break because of his military history (and the fact that the other four senators were democrats).

Looks like we need a revision~correction here;

Top Gun Founder Tells How He Started Elite Fighter Pilot School, Rewrote Book on Air-to-Air Combat​

...
There’s no doubt fans of “Top Gun” were thrilled with Maverick’s silver screen comeback. But the real-life story behind that elite fighter pilot school is mind-blowing in equal measure.

Or maybe way more mind-blowing.

The Navy’s Advanced Fighter Weapons School (or Top Gun) was spearheaded in dire times during the Vietnam War by Dan Pedersen, 86, the “Godfather of Top Gun.” It started from nothing—no classroom, no funding, no mechanics or aircraft of their own—just a few top-notch pilots he hand-picked, and a tight deadline.

Their mission? To reclaim air superiority from the Soviet-trained North Vietnamese, who knew how to tangle in the skies.

Pedersen’s book “Top Gun: an American Story” sets out that riveting backstory. The Hollywood blockbuster, he told The Epoch Times, is “great public entertainment” but “very unrealistic about Top Gun, how it existed years ago, and as it is today.”

Now 53 years on, Top Gun is “still going strong,” he added.
......
...
Pedersen faced a grave situation in Vietnam: American fighter pilots were being shot down—killed—at a staggering rate.

One American was lost for every two enemy. The North Vietnamese were adept at pushing the limits of their vastly outdated Russian MiGs in air-to-air combat—what fighter pilots call “dogfighting.”
......
Mentored by WWII ace Eugene Valencia, Pedersen, then 31, was called to turn the tide. He picked eight elite fighter pilots—all in their twenties—including his righthand man, Mel Holmes, and set about literally rewriting the book on air combat at the Naval Air Station in Miramar, California. It was experimental, serious, and dangerous.

“We were given 60 days,” he said. “This was a graduate school. … This had to be something we knew would win.

“When Top Gun was formed, in the beginning, all of us had made two combat cruises on carriers to Vietnam. It was very serious what we were doing.”

Nobody was going to furnish them new planes with greater capabilities; they relied on what they had: the F-4 Phantom, a “great airplane” with “two very reliable high powered engines,” said Pedersen. “I’ve flown that plane 2.47 mach. … At that point, the airplane would come apart due to heating.”

Pushing the F-4 to the very threshold, they outlined new tactics.
......
Knowing MiGs, he also knew how to beat them. One new maneuver involved rocketing straight up, vertically, in full afterburner right to zero airspeed. This would foil the enemy.

“There’s not a MiG pilot in the world that’s going to follow you through that aura,” said Pedersen. “It’ll go up to 40,000 feet like that. And there’s nothing in the MiG stable airplane that’s going to be able to do that.”

That fits into a comprehensive “flying in the egg” tactic, traversing a colossal, vertical circuit culminating in an apex upside-down at the “top of the egg,” the enemy fully visible below, then swooping down from behind for the kill.

“If you can’t get a good shot, you pull off,” Pedersen explained. “If you missed, you went right straight vertical again, right straight up and upside-down on the top of the egg.

“While you’re down there shooting, the other guy, your wingman, is up on top keeping track of the fight watching out for others.”
......
Within weeks, they were ready to rejoin the war. A tight nucleus of new, cutting-edge know-how was dispersed throughout the United States military, and by the war’s end, that kill ratio of 2 to 1 became 24 to 1.

What made this comeback successful was the pilots’ “pushing the envelope,” exceeding safety limits set by the manufacturer; the F-4 could do way more than first thought.
...
“The safety factor that was built into that airplane was fairly large,” said Pedersen. “The airplane was capable of a whole lot more than we had been flying it the first five years of that war.”

So, what did top brass think of their shattering safety protocols?

“Success speaks for itself,” said Pedersen. “When you win to that degree and you go to 24-to-1 kill ratio, nobody would take us on.

“We actually won the air war in Vietnam, who’s going to argue with you?

“Nobody in Washington is going to make an argument.”
......
Numerical superiority in easily serviceable jets, Pedersen says, far outstrips the technological superiority of ultra-expensive weapons that are hard to maintain.

“Sometimes, a $300 million airplane isn’t the answer,” he said. “I personally like to have 8 or 10 lightweight fighters that are maintainable, you got to be in the 98 percent reliability.

“The ‘magic missiles’ [of today] … somebody’s making a lot of profit off this stuff,” he said. “I tend to believe in simplicity. Having flown the MiGs, which were an older generation, the guns work 98 percent of the time.”

The legacy of Top Gun today is as important as it was in Vietnam.
......

Top Gun founder tells how he started elite fighter jet school, rewrote book on air-to-air combat

There's no doubt fans of "Top Gun" were thrilled with Maverick's silver screen comeback. But the real-life story ...

www.theepochtimes.com

 

[Dayton3]

McCain was a POS RINO that almost sunk his own carrier, the USS Forrestal, when his hot dogging on deck launched a missile that killed 134 crewmen.
What a great American.
Good thing he was an Admiral's son & grandson or he might have got in trouble.
McCain, when a Lieutenant Commander in the U.S. Navy was a Navy pilot (they call themselves aviators). July 29, 1967 while on the deck and in his plane on the carrier U.S.S. Forrestal he managed to screw up procedures (officially denied and covered up by him and the Navy and also even promoted on Wikipedia if you care to look–reason to follow). He did a smart ass punk attention getting trick by doing a “wet start” up of his jet.

McCAIN THE HERO NEARLY SUNK AN AIRCRAFT CARRIER & KILLED 134 SAILORS

Via Lew Rockwell McCain, when a Lieutenant Commander in the U.S. Navy was a Navy pilot (they call themselves aviators). July 29, 1967 while on the deck and in his plane on the carrier U.S.S. Forre…

www.theburningplatform.com

"nearly sunk" is a gross exaggeration.

 

[Dayton3]

Smithsonian sponsored a documentary about the real Top Gun program compared with the movie and it was a quality and informative show. They showed modern training and gave the history of the real Fighter Weapons program that started out in a junk trailer somewhere out in the Nevada desert. Smithsonian got a couple of aging Vietnam vintage pilots to reminisce and it was done well except for one thing. The only fighter Ace in the Vietnam war and arguably the founder of the Top Gun program, Randy "Duke" Cunningham was missing like he was erased from history. Congressman Cunningham was convicted of accepting bribes from lobbyists and sentenced to 8 years in federal prison but he was pardoned by President Trump. Is it right to dismiss his contribution to military history and his heroic flying because he was convicted of a crime? It should be noted that Navy pilot John McCain was also implicated in a lobbying scandal (the Keating five) but they gave him a break because of his military history (and the fact that the other four senators were democrats).

The thing is Cunningham also had a history of disobeying orders and corruption in the military. To the point he probably would've been courtmartialed if he had not happened to have downed those five MIGs

 

[Admiral Rockwell Tory]

McCain was a POS RINO that almost sunk his own carrier, the USS Forrestal, when his hot dogging on deck launched a missile that killed 134 crewmen.
What a great American.
Good thing he was an Admiral's son & grandson or he might have got in trouble.
McCain, when a Lieutenant Commander in the U.S. Navy was a Navy pilot (they call themselves aviators). July 29, 1967 while on the deck and in his plane on the carrier U.S.S. Forrestal he managed to screw up procedures (officially denied and covered up by him and the Navy and also even promoted on Wikipedia if you care to look–reason to follow). He did a smart ass punk attention getting trick by doing a “wet start” up of his jet.

McCAIN THE HERO NEARLY SUNK AN AIRCRAFT CARRIER & KILLED 134 SAILORS

Via Lew Rockwell McCain, when a Lieutenant Commander in the U.S. Navy was a Navy pilot (they call themselves aviators). July 29, 1967 while on the deck and in his plane on the carrier U.S.S. Forre…

www.theburningplatform.com

Lies, lies, and more lies.

You have obviously never seen the flight deck video of the Forrestal fire. The A-4 next to McCain's parked on the waist catapult was hit by a Zuni rocket fired from an F-4 Phantom II near the bow of the aircraft. McCain barely escaped the ensuing fire by climbing over the nose of his aircraft and dropping to the deck and running away.

McCain was a political disaster, but you should not lie about things so easily proven to be a lie.

Then again, that is all you do, isn't it?

 

[Dayton3]

My point is that Duke Cunningham was an integral part of the Top Gun program and the only Navy ace in the Vietnam war but he made a mistake as a congressman and was erased from history by the Smithsonian. It's not right.

Ignoring the obvious. While he was a Navy pilot Duke Cunningham IIRC broke into Navy files to find out how he was being evaluated. When discovered he should have been and probably would've been courtmartialed but the Navy was very reluctant to discipline one of their most heralded pilots so he got a pass.

 

[Admiral Rockwell Tory]

Ignoring the obvious. While he was a Navy pilot Duke Cunningham IIRC broke into Navy files to find out how he was being evaluated. When discovered he should have been and probably would've been courtmartialed but the Navy was very reluctant to discipline one of their most heralded pilots so he got a pass.

That makes no sense as his Fitness Reports are given to him every evaluation period. I don't suppose you have a link, do you? The IIRC was a clue you do not.

 

[Dayton3]

That makes no sense as his Fitness Reports are given to him every evaluation period. I don't suppose you have a link, do you? The IIRC was a clue you do not.

Just over halfway down.

DownWithTyranny!: KITTY KELLEY MEETS AN APPROPRIATELY DRESSED MRS. DUCHESS CUNNINGHAM-- DUKE'S CARMELA SOPRANO?

downwithtyranny.blogspot.com

Satisfied?

 

[westwall]

Just over halfway down.

DownWithTyranny!: KITTY KELLEY MEETS AN APPROPRIATELY DRESSED MRS. DUCHESS CUNNINGHAM-- DUKE'S CARMELA SOPRANO?

downwithtyranny.blogspot.com

Satisfied?

Kitty Kelley has a long history of lies.

Just sayin.....

 

[Dayton3]

Kitty Kelley has a long history of lies.

Just sayin.....

Even liars tell the truth most of the time. Besides if you real the article it doesn't appear that most of it comes from Kitty Kelley.

 

[westwall]

Even liars tell the truth most of the time. Besides if you real the article it doesn't appear that most of it comes from Kitty Kelley.

I read quite a bit, and everything she wrote about him during the navy years was either sourced from previously written sources, or hearsay.

Cunningham was a complete prick. Of that there is no doubt, but his evaluations would have been presented to him, whether good or bad.

She made that piece up. Almost sounds like she stole it from a Star Trek movie, where Kirk admitted to doing something like that.