Message posted by Vahe Demirjian (Member since 04/28/2022) on October 11, 2024 at 9:33:04 PST:
The F-19 designation was skipped. Many books in the 1980s speculated that F-19 was allocated to the F-117, but we now know that Northrop had requested F-20 for what was originally called the F-5G to avoid confusion of F-19 with the MiG-19 and market the Tigershark as "the first of a new fighter generation" (i.e., the "20" series). The USAF Standards Branch had wanted the F-5G to be simply designated F-19A, but the DoD went ahead with designating the Tigershark as F-20 rather than F-19.
In Reply to: Re: F-19 posted by Vandalia on October 11, 2024 at 6:53:38 PST:
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