Commissar Geo Bartlette (31st Harakoni Warhawks)

I know first hand this is true. Early in my fighter pilot career (1980 timeframe), our 79th Tactical Fighter Squadron was deployed to Ovar, Portugal for "Open Gate 80" exercise. One of our assigned missions was to take our pair of F-111E jets and try to play the role of "Red Force" with a mission objective to see if we could successfully "sneak up" on the NATO Fleet in the Atlantic Ocean. We carefully calculated the "ducting layer" (where radar energy can be ducted well beyond the horizon) from the atmospheric data over the ocean that day. The ducting layer was calculated to be 340 ft above mean sea level (MSL). So we chose to sneak in supersonic at 400 feet above MSL. We refueled from a KC-135 Tanker to top-off our 34,000 lbs of JP-8 fuel capacity (we would need every drop of it for this mission) before diving down to the deck. We used our Low Altitude Radar Altimeter (LARA) to calibrate our barometric pressure altimeter to precisely match the LARA at 400 ft MSL. We then turned off the main radar, terrain-following radar (TFR) and LARA so we were emitting no electromagnetic energy from our F-111E jets. We cruised as a 2-ship in line-abreast formation where I was positioned 6,000 ft abeam my flight leader. We set our supersonic cruise to about Mach 1.15 so that there was just enough extra thrust left for me to maintain formation with Tiger Lead. I noticed my flight lead's F-111 was totally enveloped in a cloud of vapor from the supersonic shock waves with only the tip of his nose visible and then realized that I must look the same when flight lead looked at me! We managed to reach about 25 miles from the NATO Fleet undetected, but we knew that at that range, hiding just above the ducting layer now would no longer keep us hidden and Fleet radars would soon spot our non-stealthy F-111's. I was doing my best at scanning the skies above and around us for "bandits" when I spotted an F-14A Tomcat roll inverted and do a split-S maneuver that arrived supersonic, co-altitude and co-speed with us. I called out to my Flight Lead on the UHF Radio (not remembering we were now on the NATO Fleet common frequency for safety) and said: "Tiger Lead, Bandit, Deep 6 O'clock, co-altitude, 8,000 feet, stagnated." Then, a voice that was not my Tiger Lead's voice came up on the UHF Radio and said, "Stagnated, eh?" At that point, I watched that Tomcat march up slowly to my left wingtip and we were looking each other eye-to-eye in fingertip formation. He then flipped me the fighter pilot greating ("the bird") then smartly saluted and pitched up and out to head back to the carrier. Don't tell me that a Tomcat cannot fly at Mach 1.2 on the deck with ordnance because I have witnessed it and it was VERY IMPRESSIVE! We were also aware of a Soviet Trawler that was shadowing the NATO fleet while gathering intel. We happened to spot it, and Tiger Lead wing tagged me into close fighting wing formation and we both went to full afterburner and lowered ourselves to about 150 ft MSL and flew directly over that Soviet intel ship at Mach 1.2+ in full afterburners. I am sure we broke some glass and destroyed some surveillance antennas & equipment with that pass. It was a day I can never forget and I can attest fully to what Charles Smith @softwarnet stated about the Tomcat being able to achieve Mach 1.2 (~910 MPH) as ABSOLUTELY true!