How the E.E. Lightning came to win the deal of the Century:
(All of this has been copied and adjusted (slightly)from Wikipedia) so it must be true
Now read on....
The German Air Force was looking for a foreign-designed multi-role combat aircraft to operate in support of a missile defense system. The Lockheed Starfighter was hot favorite to win this major order until the Lockheed bribery scandal broke, which caused caused considerable political controversy in West Germany, Italy, the Netherlands and Japan. The final nail in the coffin for the Starfighter for the Germans was the comment by Erich Hartmann, the world's top-scoring fighter ace, commander of one of Germany's first jet fighter-equipped squadrons who deemed the F-104 to be an unsafe aircraft with poor handling characteristics for aerial combat. To the dismay of his superiors, Hartmann judged the fighter unfit for Luftwaffe use. This gave The English Electric sales team the chance they needed,
The Lightning was presented and reworked to convert it into an all-weather ground-attack, reconnaissance, and interceptor aircraft. This was chosen over the Grumman F11F Super Tiger, Lockheed F104 Starfighter and Northrop N-156. The aircraft found a new market with other NATO countries, and eventually a total of 2,578 of all variants of the Lightning were built in the U.K. and abroad for various nations. The Rolls-Royce Avon engine was retained but built under license in Europe, Canada, and Japan. The E.E. Lightning now entered a development phase to further extend its range and armament options with the model letters "G" denoting "Germany", the lead country for this version, while "S" indicated the improved "Sparrow" version for Italy. On 26 January 1966, the AMI chose the definitive Lightning F-2A(I)S as their future fighter, designed to carry AIM-7 Sparrow missiles on the belly tank pylons, two further underwing pylons able to carry 2 sidewinders or bombs on dual racks and finally two over wing pylons plumbed for fuel tanks or various bombs/missiles. The Lightning F-2A(I)S-ASA (Aggiornamento Sistemi d'Arma), developed in 1986, introduced a Fiar Setter radar, with 'look-down' capability and compatibility with the Selenia Aspide missile. AIM-9Ls were then used as the main armament, replacing the previous "B" and "F" version of this missile, One AIM-7 was usually carried on each belly tank pylon. In total, 147 of the F-2A(I)S airframes were converted to ASA standard at an expense of around 600 billion lire, the last ASA model was delivered in the early 1990s.
So That's the history, here's the pictures
Lightning F-2A(I)ASA "The Last Fighter," MM5936, 21˚ Stormo, 53˚ Gruppo.
Regards
Keith
