Just look at what Janes's says about SA-2/3/4/5...

What does it say?

I see
Guidance is by course correction command signals from the associated `Square Pair' radar with the missile's own active radar terminal homing seeker being activated near to the projected intercept point.

Link

This is from Jane's of 1994...

By the way, that's what Jane's said about an S-125:
"The first recorded combat use of the S-125 was in 1970 when PVO-Strany units, including several `Goa' missile regiments, were deployed to Egypt with twin launchers to form a joint Egyptian-Soviet air defence network to cover the Suez Canal Zone during the last phase of the 1968 to 1970 Egyptian-Israeli War of Attrition.
Although a large number of men and much equipment was lost to Israeli air attacks, the PVO-Strany units shot down a total of five McDonnell Douglas F-4E Phantoms with the S-125 and were instrumental in forcing on the Israelis the 7 August 1970 UN ceasefire.
The next combat use came in late 1972 when the North Vietnamese used small numbers of S-125s against American aircraft during the Linebacker raids. Their first and only recorded kill was also against an F-4 Phantom of the US Marine Corps."

Is this true? Did they actually downed five Phantoms over Egypt and one - in Vietnam?

At that point decoys may not have been very effective. HARM is constantly upgraded - but maybe you are right, who knows ...

And yes you are correct - the main dangers to USAF and IAF have been SAMs. But that doesn't stop them from being speed bumps for those air-forces. I think it says more about the opposing air forces than the SAMs. Any time that the airborne opposition was not competitive, air power did a lot of damage despite SAMs being around - and this is exactly what I mean by 'speed bumps'. I don't mean you can ignore them.

Also to consider the other side of the coin...
...no (fighter jock) in any F-16/15 was ever able to engage any incoming SCUD missile.

Maybe not this day, but an F-15 fighter jock HAS shot a sattelite out of orbit

There was some idea proposed by Ratheon to arm F-15's with PAC-3's, but it was a silly idea.

I don't think you could reasonably expect a fighter to counter SRBMs or MRBMs anyway, for sure.

Big problem is that hostile nations towards the west are more and more investing into SRBM technology, instead of MiG-29's.
(After the expert Serbian MiG-29 drivers suffered severe punishing, while Serbian SAM crews mostly survived during OAF.)

In my opinion, West needs to invest more into ATBM-SAM technology, than into TOP GUN...

And they do! Patriot PAC3, Standard SM3, THAAD, GBI, Israeli Arrow - all are dedicated anti-BM weapons! Even Franco-Italian PAAMS/SAMP-T has a substantial anti-TBM capability: http://www.eurosam.com/ground.html I wouldn't say that they do not invest enough, in fact I'd say quite the opposite!

^^^^

Yep, exactly. Also, THAAD aside they have minuteman missiles converted into ABM, IIRC.