2006-07-10 00:31:00 · 3 answers · asked by redirus92 3 in Politics & Government ➔ Military
Obsolete in the sense that no plane save for the F-14 can use it...the AIM-54 Phoenix is much larger than either the AIM-120 AMRAAM or AIM-9 Sidewinder missiles. In combat its actually quite handy because it can hit targets at least 114miles away (the AMRAAM can only hit 62 miles away at the last model) and before the missiles were removed from service the AIM-54's avionics was still up-to-date. Combatwise it has not been used frequently by USA forces...sadly the two times it has been used against the Iraqis resulted in no kills. The Iranians are believed to have had better success during the 1988 Iran-Iraq war with their Phoenixes...but how much success has yet to be disclosed.
2006-07-10 00:42:37 · answer #1 · answered by betterdeadthansorry 5 · 0⤊ 1⤋
The missile isn't so much obsolete, the only platform that carried it is. The Navy has decided to retire the F-14 Tomcat in favor of the multirole F/A-18. Besides, the Phoenix only had limited success against other missiles, and that is seen as the greatest threat facing todays Navy.
2006-07-10 07:41:58 · answer #2 · answered by cabbie 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Obsolete. The targets it was designed to shoot down (Soviet heavy bombers) no longer exist and it is of marginal utility against smaller targets.
2006-07-10 09:24:53 · answer #3 · answered by MikeGolf 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋