In the summer of ‘90 Big Jack and her airwing, CVW-3 ended up down off Puerto Rico running a little passing exercise (PASEX) with the French carrier FOCH.
The French had these Super Entendards they flew, along with some F-8 Crusaders. For the life of me I can’t remember how the air combat engagements with the Entendards went. With the tanks we had on (making the Tomcat a real pig at times), I’m not certain we did much – if any – real First-Class-A-One-honkin’-big-down-in-the-weeds-knife-fight-in-a-phone-booth type of air combat, but I know we would have turned with them a bit. Regarding the external fuel tanks, usually one of the first steps in a real-world air engagement would have been to pickle the tanks off – just get rid of them. Due to the cost of those suckers, though, you wouldn’t punch them off unless you…like…*really* needed to or they were dry as a bone (any self-respecting carrier aviator is loath to throw away good fuel. I remember checking our fuel ladder once in the Med and telling Rev “We’re fat on gas” and have him reply “You’re never fat on gas”. Rev grew up and cut his teeth in F-4 Phantoms, where fuel management was an art AND a science and essential to bringing that aircraft back to the ship).
The two US – Libyan engagements (83 and 89) saw brief air combat, but neither section of Tomcats punched off their tanks. This, of course, was more due to the ineptitude of the Libyan Air Force pilots than anything else, but had these been 1) competent pilots 2) better aircraft (SU-22 and MiG 23 are not exactly fighters) and 3) a situation in extremis, you’d probably see those tanks hit the water and the Turkey turn into the sleek, svelte Aerospace War Machine that it truly is 
At some point during this 3 or 4 day PASEX, the French lost a F-8. I don’t remember the exact circumstances, but I think it was in the landing pattern (vice departing the aircraft in a dogfight or something similar). The pilot punched out and was recovered safely. We (CAG 3) had one of our officers spending a few days over on FOCH (a small exchange program) and afterward he said when the helo landed back on deck after recovering the pilot, all flight operations were shut down for the rest of the day, the wine was broken out and everyone got drunk as can be. Viva la French!
Papa // Jan 12, 2010 at 1:40 pm
I never got to work with the French in air-to-air combat exercises but I have heard that they’re very aggressive. ALMOST to the level of the Israelis.
And I ‘cut my teeth’ on some aircraft with decently long legs but still learned that the ONLY time you have TOO MUCH fuel is when you’re on fire.
steeljawscribe // Jan 14, 2010 at 2:01 pm
1982 in the Med – we (IKE/CVW-7) were going to host a couple of RF-8’s from Clemenceau. I was in VF-143’s RR when the first trapped. We were mid-way through the brief when the RR door slammed open and the ’sader pilot announced he could “kick any one’s azz” and would be ready, willing and able this launch.
Couple of quick calls and my boring AIC hop just got turned into an DACM flight.
As for the hop, it was — interesting. quick setups for lots of engagements until the RF-8 ran out of gas. The ‘Dawgs were loaded 2-2-2+tanks for the AIC mission so there was the obligatory whining afterwards, but all in all, it was a fun hop and debrief post-ex.
- SJS
Bazooka // Apr 19, 2010 at 9:58 am
Hey, stumbled upon your site today. Great pictures!