> somebody in the Trump campaign forced somebody at NASA to do this out of some misguided nostalgia.
Trump is a huge fan of Top Gun, there is an article he is nitpicking current aicraft carrier design and pushing them to revert to old tech steam powered hydrolic liftoffs because he thinks it looks cooler. https://nymag.com/intelligencer/article/donald-trump-navy-st...
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/aug/13/trump-aircra...
He also nitpicks where the towers should be located on aircraft carriers and wants them to look more like the ones from WWII: https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2026/08/15/...
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/trump-to-order-redesign...
Bringing back the SR-71 for nostalgia/cool factor tracks reverting to steam hydraulics liftoffs and overhauling the aesthetics and tower location to look like old warships.
'nitpicking' is a weird way to describe 'expects new technology to be reliable, wants to use the tried and true technology until then'
The F-14 got sent to the boneyard because it was so much more expensive to operate than comparable aircraft. The F-14 had only one real mission: carry the Phoenix to defend the carrier from the Russian bombers. And it was a suicide mission--the sprint to launch position would not leave enough fuel to get back to the carrier.