“The real reason we (Northrop) lost the program was that Lockheed had no new fighter programs at that time, while Northrop had the F/A-18E/F and the B-2.” Shupek reveals. “It was in the national interest of the U.S. to keep Lockheed alive as an airframer. We were told through unofficial channels after the competition, that our design actually met the specs better than the Lockheed design. Believe it or not, Northrop actually won by losing the ATF competition. The Soviet threat that the ATF aircraft were designed for evaporated in 1989 as Humpty Dumpty fell off the Berlin Wall and all the Kremlin’s resources and the Kremlin’s men couldn’t put Humpty Dumpty back together again. After Humpty Dumpty, the U.S Congress reduced AFT funding thus forcing the USAF to reduce the number of F-22s that were to be purchased. Meanwhile the Boeing/Northrop-Grumman team kept on building the F/A-18E/F/G’s and everybody seemed to want some of these aircraft for their tarmac.”