The Iranian Tomcats might be airworthy after a complex overhaul, but before the fall of the Shah of Iran, Grumman engineers removed some of the more "sensitive" equipment from the Tomcats to make them less effective, in the event Iran would use them against the US. I got this info from a documentary on the Military Channel here in the US.
Same goes for the M1A2 Abrams sold to Saudi Arabia - they didn't come equipped with the "special armor" package that American M1A2's come with. This is, which I believe, in the event there is a coup de'tat (did I spell that correctly?) in the government.
I still think the Iranian Tomcats would pose a possible threat against US fighters flying over Iraq - the purpose of the Tomcat was Fleet Air Defense and it does possess excellent dogfighting maneuvers ( and this is not because of the movie Top Gun!). At that time, the US Military gave the Shah 2 options - the F-14 and the F-15. Each aircraft had its turn in showing what its capabilities were, and apparently, the Shah was very impressed with the Tomcat over the Eagle. It's a good possibility that a duel between the Tomcat and Eagle would almost be impossible to predict - it would have to come down to pilot ability.
Back to Index
Move to Top 
