F-5. The Western world's favorite OBSOLETE aircraft

Video from the channel Der Ausländer about Northrop F-5, linked on its Above Ten Thousand entry. Duration: 20:24. Language: Spanish. Video type: Documentary.

Documentary from the channel Der Ausländer about the Northrop F-5, a light and cheap fighter that, against the era's American trend toward large and complex aircraft, ended up in service in numerous countries and still flies in several of them. It reviews its development, characteristics, export and combat record, and the reasons for its longevity.

The starting point was a NATO requirement from December 1953 for a light fighter, combined with the interest of Northrop vice president Edgar Schmued in an aircraft that was cheap to maintain for United States allies in Europe and within SEATO. They were also looking for an upgradable platform that would last at least ten years. The design was built around two General Electric J85 engines, small, cheap, and with a good thrust-to-weight ratio. An initial proposal with the engines under the wings evolved, following a Navy requirement for escort carriers, toward engines housed in the fuselage, a solution Northrop kept even after the Navy abandoned the project. In December 1956 the combat N-156F and the trainer N-156T were defined; in 1959 the Air Force chose the trainer to replace the T-33, while Northrop continued with the fighter on its own. In 1962, during the Kennedy administration, it was approved as the F-5A. In 1965 twelve units were evaluated in Vietnam, flying more than 2,600 missions with only one loss in that period, and in 1967 the survivors were transferred to South Vietnam.

Sales took off from 1965 with the Philippines, Norway, Iran, Turkey, and Greece, and there was licensed production in Canada as the CF-5, with 240 units of which 89 went to Canada itself, and in Spain as the SF-5, whose first example flew in March 1968. Around 1970 the F-5E Tiger II arrived, with more wing area, air-to-air radar, and better electronics; Northrop built nearly 800 between 1972 and 1987, and South Korea, Switzerland, and Taiwan produced it under license. Mexico received twelve, assigned to the 401st Air Squadron, of which, according to the video, only three remain airworthy. Chile upgraded its own as the Tiger III, with new radars and in-flight refueling. In combat, the F-5 was decisive for Ethiopia in the Ogaden war, where its ninth fighter squadron claimed 13 MiG-17s and 12 MiG-21s; it also served Iran in the war against Iraq and Morocco in Western Sahara. Today it is used mainly as a trainer, and Switzerland flies it as an aerobatic aircraft.