Why not the early 60's the US military was getting clobbered in all the NATO air gunnery meets , some where in my "archives" I have the results for all the NATO gunnery meets" Guynemer Trophy " during that period of time and the results were poor .
Please find them even though this has nothing to do with the claim in the article. And I'd like to see the basis on how its determined that the USAFE did "poor."
And as far as I know the Guynemer Trophy was awarded for air-to-air gunnery against a
towed target. Yes, Canada won it in 1958 and 1959 (and probably in later years) flying Sabers. 5 years later the game changed drastically.
An F-86 shooting at a towed target? I think pretty easy pickins and that said without taking anything away from the pilots who flew them during that period.
BTW - how does this even equate to air combat over North Vietnam where almost all air-to-air combat on the US side was conducted with aircraft that did not have guns, with the exception of the F-8 Crusader???
BTW the Crusader's Score in Vietnam? 18 confirmed kills to 3 losses, and of those 18, only two were gun kills. So much for that poor showing in NATO competitions! Maybe the plane had something to do with it!
At worse the USAF had a 2 to 1 kill ratio over the NVNAF and this being partially due to "rules of engagement" and other BS imposed by MacNamara and LBJ. The Navy came out slightly higher, all this prior to 1972.
From what I understand the worse years came in late 1967 and 68 where the NVNAF became real good with hit and run tactics just across the DMZ. US pilots for the most part were not trained to react to a threat as such and the US were not "going north" to engage MiGs.
Again, all that changed in 1972
Back to the article - there was no fighter weapons school operating at Miramar until 1969. I don't know the backgrounds of those pilots interviewed but for the most part, this article is a load of rubbish.