The F-16 is a tough cookie. At an age when other planes are being retired to museums, this General Dynamics fighter-bomber (whose production site in Fort Worth was absorbed by Lockheed in 1993) still comes out on top in international competitions with "5th generation" aircraft. The first F-16 prototype was flown for the first time in 1974 and the operational life of the last planes built will undoubtedly continue beyond 2040. Almost 70 years and still going strong! In between times, the original lightweight fighter designed for day missions became a formidable fighter-bomber, with more than 4400 planes built, used in more than 25 countries.

It would be impossible to try to tell this story in a hundred pages. This is why two volumes will be devoted to the F-16 in this collection. This first volume will deal with the genesis of the plane and with the F-16As and Bs, the founders of the dinasty. The F-16Cs and Ds, which appeared during the 1980s, will be the subject of the second volume.