Stability and Control characteristics of the Early Mark Spitfires

[CaptainDoggles]

Coming back to the Navy textbook quote and FBW systems for a moment:

I think that they ascribe an inverse relationship to stability vs maneuverability because their aircraft have FBW capabilities. If the airframe is actually unstable, but you have a computer making corrections thousands of times per second, then all of a sudden your aircraft appears very stable to the pilot. In this context, the quote is accurate.

Obviously this lets them combine agility and maneuverability into one, and I think this is why the quote says what it does.