The Phantom is like a Dinosaur, it was designed in the 1950's to beat the then superiour Mig-17 Fresco aircraft on which the American F-86 was too weak for. 1000's of Phantoms have then be produced and it was succesfull in the Vietnam war, the Gulf war and even after the milenium many Phantoms still flew. Nowadays it become more and more scare and in Europe only Greece is still flying this beast and furthermore in the world Turkey, Japan, South Korea and Iran.
Although it is old, the design and its history amazes me and if the pilot starts up its two J79 engines, a vibe will go thru your body :)
I googled the Mig-17 Fresco. Holyshit 710 mile/hour (1144 kilometer/hour). And I read after this one the MiG-21 and the MiG-23 where made. Cool stuff. Do you know why Turkey, Japan, South Korea and Iran are flying these? Are there not expensive in maintenance? Or are they cheap.
The tail from the F-4 Phantom is a funny one. Like that detail.
"vibe will go thru your body", that is cool!
I am not 100% sure why these forces still fly this old aircraft, but the only reason I can imagine is that all of these countries spend a significant amount of money on (self) defence as they are all in a (cold) war. As new fighter aircraft cost billions of Dollars, they will keep them flying with spares from the USAF who have thousand of these aircraft stored in Bonyards like AMARG. As an example Turkye and Greece don't like each other, South Korea does not like North Korea and Japan also does not like South Korea. Next to this, both countries also don't like China :) And offcourse we all know that Iran was not able to buy new aircraft since the Iranian revolution so they have to fly these old aircraft. Funny fact on the Iranian Phantoms is that they fly them with self made parts and modifications as the USA is not supporting them anymore since the 1970's. It is a rumour that they fly some of these with Russian engines.
I understand what you are saying about the significant amount of money (budget) and the (cold) war. I also like the other information you are giving!
Do you think a new jet would be superior against a couple old Iranian Phantoms in a fight? Example: couple Saab Gripen againts couple old Phantoms?
The self made parts and modifications are a smart move. I like that stuff.
Do you have the Mirage shot?!
I just looked at this website, did you know about it?
"COMPARED Aircraft specifications and performance"
http://www.aviatia.net/"