While I am sure most of you know how they are used today, nevertheless a good article . The Smithsonian Air & Space magazine is one of the best aviation magazines out there in my opinion.
And, you will learn how many F22 Raptors it takes to kill a Phantom 😉
The Lexicans 
A very good read. There’s a great story in Wilcox’s “Scream of Eagles” about F-4’s, Robin Olds, and TOPGUN. Seems Olds, a one-star star and commandant of The Zoomie School at the time, got to fly a TOPGUN hop in 1969, while the shiny new school was trying to gain enough “heavy” support to stay alive. Olds, credited with four (and hinting of many more) MiG kills in Vietnam, got beat up pretty bad.
Thought it was interesting that the F4 was designed to shoot missiles at bombers – straight and level, and how the MiGs forced design changes
A lot of fighters look sleek and graceful – to me the F4 says “I’m bad”
Watch this start up procedure at the Cleveland Air Show
Can you imagine trying to land that from the rear seat?
That WAS a good read and it makes me wonder why I let my subscription to Air & Space lapse these many years ago.
The good news is Buck you can read virtually everything from the magazine on their web site, http://www.airspacemag.com/ When I get my copy almost all is read within 2-3 days.
OTOH to me Flying magazine is just a husk of its former self. New management, most/all of the decent writers left – that is one magazine I didn’t mind letting go.
It’s too bad a lot of their past writers – Gordon Baxter, Len Morgan – too bad you can’t see their work on the web.
There was NO air show ever–ever!–like the Blues in F-4’s. The thunder you felt in your gut and the raw power of a tight formation of Phantoms just can’t be matched by F-16’s and F-18’s. I’m with Bill, you look at an F-4 and it not only says “I’m bad” you know the Mig bubbas, in whatever language they spoke, were thinking “Day yum” the first time they saw the nose of an F-4 pointed their way.