[FlyVet]

There's plenty of blame to go around. Right after the first gulf war, GHW Bush announced the Peace Dividend and The New World Order. It's what politicians do, right before the next big war. At Pearl Harbor, they were shocked by the Zero vs. the Brewster Buffalo. In Korea there was Task Force Smith and the MiG 15. I'm pretty sure there were Allied and German planes that had us outclassed at the beginning of WW I.

Now we see the threat increasing around us as we demilitarize again. Nothing new.

[LouAvul]

I'm pretty sure there were Allied and German planes that had us outclassed at the beginning of WW I.

Definitely. The Spitfire was a better fighter plane than anything we had. And had Hitler not been obsessed with obliterating England, Germany would have maintained the jet engines on the fighter planes. Instead, Hitler insisted the jet engines be used on bombers to continue bombing England. Fortunately the war's end was not far off at that point.

But had Germany maximized their use of fighter jets, the war would have been way different. As it was, we had air superiority, which meant everything.