West of Fort Worth, General Dynamics builds the F-16, a good little fighter plane that could have been great if the Air Force brass had kept their hands off it.
Because the F-16’s design wouldn’t accommodate an all-weather missile system without extensive modifications, the Vought 1600 may have been able to manage carrier operations, but still wouldn’t meet the exacting needs of the branch.
The U.S. Air Force intends to continue flying its 1,200 F-16s well into the 2040s by extending the airframe’s service life from eight to twelve thousand hours.