60 Years Ago In Aviation Week - YF-12A

An aircraft unlike any other appeared suddenly on Feb. 29, 1964. President Lyndon Johnson announced the existence of the Lockheed “A-11,” a real aircraft with a purposely fake designation. The aircraft actually revealed in Air Force photos that day was the YF-12A, the interceptor version of the CIA’s still-secret A-12 and the Air Force’s SR-71 spy aircraft.

Seven months after Johnson’s announcement, the Air Force invited the press to Edwards AFB, California, to observe the first public demonstration of the YF-12A—a member of Aviation Week’s engineering team, C.M., Plattner, was there. His assignment: Using only his eyes and engineering training, derive the aircraft’s mission and performance characteristics for a cover story.

Decades later, it is remarkable how close Plattner came. He estimated the aircraft was 95% composed of titanium; in fact, it was 93%. He calculated its speed would be “very close” to Mach 3.5 at about 75,000 ft.—not far from the confirmed data of about Mach 3.2 at 80,000 ft. And Plattner correctly guessed the YF-12A’s purpose as the Air Force’s replacement for the canceled F-108. Indeed, Plattner did not know it yet, but the YF-12A had inherited the radar, missile and mission of the Soviet Republic-designed high-altitude, Mach 3 interceptor.

Lockheed designer Clarance “Kelly” Johnson held high hopes for the YF-12A, but he would be bitterly disappointed. Congress appropriated funding to launch production of the YF-12A in 1966, but Defense Secretary Robert McNamara refused to spend it. McNamara argued the first-strike threat from the Soviet Union had shifted from supersonic bombers, which the YF-12A was designed to intercept, to intercontinental ballistic missiles. And Johnson’s long line of record-breaking operational fighters—P-38, P-80 and F-104—came to an end.

Read the Oct. 19, 1964 issue of Aviation Week & Space Technology.

Read C.M. Plattner's article on page 54.

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