Cfrtjryk

In the movie Independence Day, one of the characters ends up saving the day by flying an F-16 (or some type of fighter-jet) into the Alien Mothership.

That character's only previous experience flying was crop-dusting with a small crop-dusting plane (and we can assume he wasn't necessarily the best pilot there, but was competent).

While I understand there are holes, and exaggerations, etc. in the movie, I was curious - Could you train a pilot who has only flown small crop-dusting planes to successfully take off and fly a fighter jet within say, 1 month?

Or for all practical purposes would it be better to simply not use that pilot (because they might crash the plane on takeoff, etc.)?

(I'm unsure if this is a better fit over on Aviation SE or here...)

The character of Russell Casse is currently employed crop-dusting, but this is not his only previous experience flying.

He is a former F-4 fighter pilot and fought in the Vietnam War.

While getting competent in any plane requires some familiarity and training, its a far more likely conversion from one fighter jet to another, than from a propeller driven crop duster to an F-16.

From one copy of the script:

Well, I'm, uh, Russell Casse, sir.
And, uh... after 'Nam,
I got into crop-dusting.
And, uh... been doing that ever since.

Which at the very least implies heavily that he has combat flying experience and transferred to crop dusting after he got out of service, even if there is no specific mention of the F-4.

All Russell said was:

"I can fly, I'm a pilot"

But in an alternate ending Russell flew is biplane into the alien ship...