The F-16 was born out of the conundrum experienced by the Air Force in the Vietnam War. Here's What You Need to Remember: If the agile little fighter has any shortcomings, it’s that the American F-16’s radar has fallen out of date, and that the type was never designed to carry a great deal of fuel, limiting its combat radius to just 340 miles on internal stores. The F-16 Fighting Falcon bears an unusual distinctions: it is one of the only top jet fighters in the world to also be cost efficient. Fast and extremely agile, the light fighter does have some shortcomings in range and payload compared to larger twin-engine fighters like the F-15 Eagle, but that was easy to forgive due to costing less than half as much—around $18 million in 1999 ($27 million in 2017 dollars). This favorable bang-for-buck ratio has not been lost on air forces across the world—the F-16 currently remains the most popular aircraft in modern military service: out of 4,500 produced, nearly 2,700 currently remain in service in around twenty-six countries. Needless to say, the cutting-edge fourth-generation fighter of the 1980s will remain with us for a good while longer.