BAe Sea Harrier
The arrival of the land-based Hawker Siddeley Harrier revolutionized the British military approach upon its inception into RAF service in 1969. The system allowed for vertical take-offs and landings by providing the hovering ...

Beechcraft XA-38 Grizzly / Destroyer (Model 28)
The XA-38 was a developmental twin-engine heavy fighter produced by the Beech Aircraft firm. By all accounts, she was a stable and fast aircraft comparable to even the single engine speedsters of her day. As promising as her ...

Bell P-39 Airacobra
The Bell P-39 Airacobra is yet another in the long line of aircraft studies stemming from World War 2 in the "what-might-have been" category. The system had all the looks of a top performer, armament that could go head to hea...

Bell P-63 Kingcobra
At its core, the Bell P-63 Kingcobra proved a modest improvement over the relative failure that was the P-39 Airacobra. Though the P-39 developed into a useable platform, she never lived up to the original specifications than...

Cessna A-37 Dragonfly
The Cessna A-37 Dragonfly was born out of a need for close-support aircraft to assist in the Vietnam War. As such, the T-37 jet trainer was converted for the role and became the A-37 series of aircraft. The system would go on...

Curtiss A-12 (Shrike)
The A-12 was an inter-war product of the Curtiss Aeroplane and Motor Company first appearing in 1933. The type became the first quantitative monoplane aircraft in service with the United States Army Air Corps upon its incepti...

Dassault-Dornier Alpha Jet
The Alpha Jet series of aircraft was a joint Franco-German initiative to produce a highly-advanced tactical trainer with close-support capabilities. The French firm of Dassault-Breguet generated the initial evaluation model u...

Douglas A-1 Skyraider
The mammoth Skyraider series would have been a major player in the Second World War if it were designed and produced a few years earlier than it had. Regardless, the system would prove itself quite a capable close-support air...

Douglas B-26K Counter Invader / A-26A Nimrod
The B-26K Counter Invader was based on a highly modified World War Two-era A-26 Invader aircraft. What set the Counter Invader apart from it's predecessor was that the Counter Invader was featured without any turret systems, ...

Embraer EMB-314 Super Tucano / A-29
The EMB 314 "Super Tucano" (also "A-29") represents a locally-produced Brazilian aircraft product falling under the then-government run EMBRAER banner. The aircraft is a turboprop-powered light attack, reconnaissance and surv...

Fairchild AC-119 Shadow / Stinger
The AC-119 series was a modified "G" model of the successful C-119 "Flying Boxcar" transport aircraft. The AC-119's would see service throughout the Vietnam War fulfilling a dual-role capability based on model type. "Shado...

Fairchild C-119 Flying Boxcar
Fairchild Corporation produced a winner in the post-war world with the introduction of the C-119 "Flying Boxcar". The Boxcar was derived from the C-82 "Packet" transport - looking ever more like the identical to the final C-1...

Fairchild Republic A-10 Thunderbolt II (Warthog)
The uniquely-designed A-10 Thunderbolt II (its namesake derived from the World War II piston-engine fighter/bomber - the P-47 Thunderbolt) was specifically developed as a close-support anti-tank killing machine. The A-10 woul...

FMA IA-58 Pucara (Fortress)
The impressive-looking, two-seat IA-58 Pucara (meaning "Fortress") was produced by the Fabrica Militar de Aviones of Argentina. The aircraft was classified as a counter-insurgency ground-attack system capable of rough-field o...

Fouga CM.170 Magister
It's easy to lose track of French military prowess following World War 2 but the Fouga Magister was a product of the years that followed. Developed towards closing years of the 1940's, the Magister became a principle jet-powe...

Halberstadt CL.IV
The CL.IV was a further development of the CL.II design, both aircraft a product of Halberstadt Flugzeugwerke of Germany. The CL.II was found to be a perfect platform when used in the close-support role and, as such, the CL.I...

Hawker Siddeley Harrier / AV-8A
The subsonic British Harrier "jump jet" became the world's first practical VTOL (Vertical Take-Off and Landing) aircraft after the perfection of its vectored thrust turbofan engine. While other aircraft manufacturers of the t...

Hawker Typhoon
The Hawker Typhoon (affectionate known as the "Tiffie") was initially intended as a dedicated interceptor and set to succeed the 1930's-era Hawker Hurricane and was first drawn up in 1937. The system was designed to a British...

Henschel Hs 123
The Henschel-produced Hs 123 aircraft became the last operational biplane for the German Luftwaffe during World War two. Born from a German requirement for a dive-bomber aircraft as early as 1933, several Henschel Hs 123 test...

Henschel Hs 129
The Henschel Hs 129 fighter-bomber was built to a 1937 German specification for a twin-engine close-support aircraft with considerable armor protection for pilot and crew and the ability to field twin 20mm cannons at least. T...

Ilyushin IL-10
The Ilyushin IL-10 was a follow-up design to the classic IL-2 "Shturmovik", an armored ground attack aircraft that won the air war for the Soviets in the East Front of World War 2. Visually similar to its predecessor, the new...

Ilyushin IL-2 Sturmovik
The Il-2 Sturmovik (or "Shturmovik") was designed as a low-level close-support aircraft capable of defeating enemy armor and other ground targets. Hardly the fighter, the system was exclusively engineered to take an enormous ...

Junkers Ju 87 (Stuka)
Before the Allies would gain air superiority over the skies of France and Germany, the Junkers Ju 87 "Stuka" dive bomber would reign supreme. The system, for a time, became the terror of both civilian and soldier alike, as th...

Lockheed AC-130H Spectre / AC-130U Spooky
Since the advent of the airplane as an instrument of war, warplanners have relied on the power of mobile aerial attacks to keep an enemy on its toes. From the simple dropping of flechettes on entrenched enemy positions in Wor...

Lockheed T-33 Shooting Star
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Lockheed XP-58 Chain Lightning
The XP-58 "Chain Lightning" was initially envisioned as a larger version of the successful Lockheed P-38 Lightning twin-boom design capable of downing hordes of enemy bomber formations in single burst shots. The fear covering...

McDonnell Douglas (Boeing) / BAe Systems AV-8B Harrier II
While the original Hawker Siddeley Harrier proved revolutionary for its time, and the follow-up BAe Systems Sea Harrier bettered the type's original design with the inclusion of radar and improvements in out-of-the-cockpit vi...

Mikoyan MiG-27 (Flogger)
The Mikoyan MiG-27 "Flogger" was derived from the successful MiG-23 "Flogger" interceptor and made into a dedicated ground attack aircraft. The swing-wing capabilities of the original Flogger lent itself well to the low-level...

Mitsubishi F-1
The Mitsubishi F-1 fighter aircraft was a milestone design for the small island country as it represented the nations first all-Japanese design and produced fighter since the closing days of World War 2. Based highly on the e...

Nanchang Q-5 (Fantan)
With China already in possession of what was essentially the Soviet-built Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-19 "Farmer" in the Chinese copy known as the Shenyang J-6, it was decided upon developing a ground attack version of the aircraft ...

North American Rockwell OV-10 Bronco
The Bronco was developed through the United States Marine Corps Light Armed Reconnaissance Aircraft (LARA) program to provide the service branch with a multi-faceted performer that could handle armed reconnaissance and light ...

North American T-28 Trojan
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Republic P-47 / F-47 Thunderbolt
While much of the romance of World War 2 dogfighting often heads in the direction of the USAAF's North American P-51 Mustang or the Vought F4U Corsair, the Republic P-47 Thunderbolt (affectionately nicknamed "the Jug" by her ...

Sikorsky H-34 / CH-34 Choctaw
The H-34 Choctaw was a multi-purpose, turbine-powered utility helicopter produced by Sikorsky in the United States. It was developed as a replacement for the similar Korean War-era UH-19 Chickasaw series of helicopters and de...

Sukhoi Su-17 / Su-20 / Su-22 (Fitter)
The Mach 2-capable Sukhoi Su-17 "Fitter" was a further development of the successful Su-7 "Fitter-A" fighter/fighter-bomber family line detailed elsewhere on this site. The aircraft incorporated a partial variable geometry wi...

Sukhoi Su-2
The Sukhoi Su-2 was the first aircraft design of Pavel Sukhoi and became a two-seat light bomber fielded by the Soviet Air Force in World War 2. Though a relatively modern design at the time of its inception, the Su-2 was qui...

Sukhoi Su-25 (Frogfoot)
The Sukhoi Su-25 "Frogfoot" series of aircraft harkened back to the successes of the Soviet IL-2 Sturmovik close-support fighter-bombers. The Su-25 was quite a departure from traditional jet aircraft designs of the time and i...

Supermarine Scimitar
The Supermarine Scimitar was an oft-forgotten carrier-based, jet-powered, single-seat fighter for the British Fleet Air Arm. The aircraft held a few "firsts" in its service run with the British Royal Navy - it became the fir...

Vought F4U Corsair
The F4U Corsair series of aircraft was one of the finer fighter developments of the Second World War, primarily seeing combat in the Pacific Theater of War. The uniquely designed bent-wings and ever-improving powerplant assur...

Yakovlev Yak-41/Yak-141 (Freestyle)
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