From air superiority to dual-role strike
The F-15 had been created around air superiority. The programme that produced the F-15E asked whether its performance, range and two-seat configuration could support a much broader mission. Demonstration and competition were followed by the demanding work of turning that proposition into a production weapon system.
Conformal fuel tanks, a redesigned cockpit and an integrated radar, navigation and targeting system gave the aircraft the ability to find and attack targets by day or night and in poor weather, while retaining a formidable air-to-air capability.
Combat proved the concept
Desert Storm was the aircraft’s first major combat test. It was followed by sustained operations over Iraq, the Balkans, Afghanistan and later theatres. Experience fed back into tactics, training, weapons and modifications, making operational history inseparable from the technical story.
A continuously modernised aircraft
Later decades brought targeting pods, data links, new processors, precision weapons, AESA radar, electronic warfare improvements and closer cooperation with other aircraft. The result was not a static 1980s design, but a platform repeatedly remade around new missions and a changing battlespace.
The complete story in two parts
Steve Davies divides this continuous history into two complementary books. Be Afraid of the Dark covers 1978–2002; Twenty Years at War continues from 2002–2022. Both draw on original research, programme access and first-hand operational accounts.