How Fighter Jets Fight
Move past cinematic dogfight myths to understand how modern fighter aircraft actually wage air combat. Learn how pilots manage energy-maneuverability, defeat incoming missiles using pure geometry, and execute lethal beyond-visual-range radar intercepts.
Like Duolingo, but for How Fighter Jets Fight. Tomo turns the whole topic into a game you play five minutes a day, until it actually sticks.
A short one: 12 levels across 2 sections, about 24 minutes end to end, roughly 5 days at five minutes a day. It moves through Winning the Close-Range Dogfight and Dominating the Beyond-Visual-Range Arena. It assumes you already know the basics.
Free forever · No credit card · iPhone & Android
Key ideas in How Fighter Jets Fight
- Positive Ps means engine thrust exceeds total drag at the current G-load.
- With surplus energy, a fighter can climb or accelerate while turning.
- Negative Ps forces a pilot to lose speed or altitude to sustain the turn.
- Corner airspeed sits right at aerodynamic lift and airframe G limits.
- Above corner speed, structural G-limits force a wider turning circle.
- Below corner speed, the fighter stalls before reaching maximum G.
- In a one-circle fight, both jets turn toward the same side into each other.
- Two-circle fights turn away from each other and reward pure turn rate.
- Tighter radius wins one-circle, while higher degrees-per-second wins two.
- Pitching up trades forward airspeed for altitude, reducing closure rate.
- Gravity assists the fighter's nose rotation back down toward the target.
- Diving back down trades potential energy back into pursuit speed.
- HOBS missiles allow lock-on well outside the fighter's direct nose line.
- Helmet sights let pilots cue seeker heads simply by turning their head.
- Lethal snapshot envelopes make entering prolonged turning fights risky.
- Head-on target closure adds combined speeds, greatly extending the missile's unpowered reach
You've tried the other tabs
Thirty open tabs. Four facts you actually kept.
You watched. You nodded. By Sunday it was gone.
One answer, then back to scrolling.
Eight weeks. You meant to finish. You didn't.
Tomo gives How Fighter Jets Fight the Duolingo treatment: levels, streaks, and quick quizzes that test what you just learned. That game loop is what the tabs above never had, so it's the one you actually finish.
Here's what playing it feels like
A real question from this course. Take your best guess.
You have banked surplus energy during a steady turn. What tactical move does this surplus allow your jet to pull off?
Get it right to open this lesson and 11 more in the app.
Where How Fighter Jets Fight takes you
- 1
Winning the Close-Range Dogfight
- Energy-Maneuverability and Turn Geometry
- Missile Defense and Defensive Geometry
- 2
Dominating the Beyond-Visual-Range Arena
- The Beyond-Visual-Range Intercept Timeline
- Sensor Fusion, Stealth, and the Electronic Duel
2 sections · 4 units · 12 levels. Built to play, not to enroll.
Tomo is in ChatGPT
Tomo is also a ChatGPT plugin: the same playable courses, built and played inside your chat.
Add Tomo to ChatGPT- What to ask
- “Make me a Tomo course on black holes.” “Turn this chat into a Tomo course.”
- What you get
- Quick questions with instant feedback, hearts and stars, ready to play in about a minute.
- Where it goes
- No sign-up to start. Connect your Tomo account and your streak carries on in the app.
You pick the voice
How Fighter Jets Fight is taught in the Storyteller style: every lesson is a story. Want a different feel? In the app you can spin up the same topic in any of Tomo's teaching styles. Same facts, totally different vibe.
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Start How Fighter Jets Fight today.
Download Tomo, search How Fighter Jets Fight, and play your first lesson in under a minute.