WI West Germany buys the EE Lighting and not the F-104?

As the title.

I think the Lighting could well have been a better aircraft for W Germany, as in a point to point fighter, than the F-104. If no bribes were involved could W Germany have bought them? If so what could be the pros (less dead pilots for a start) and the cons?

Type about this for a bit
 
As the title.

I think the Lighting could well have been a better aircraft for W Germany, as in a point to point fighter, than the F-104. If no bribes were involved could W Germany have bought them? If so what could be the pros (less dead pilots for a start) and the cons?

Type about this for a bit
I would have a cool icon outside my classroom, rather than a heap of junk.

Unfortunately the Lightning is no more suited to the job the Luftwaffe had in mind than the F-104 was. There were far better contenders for the role of tactical fighter. The only real advantage the Lightning had was a second engine. The rule with any single engine aircraft is that if you lose the engine, you lose the aircraft. Not an issue with the Lightning.
 
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Germans should have bought the Mirage III
The Mirage III was still in development at the time of the competition while the F-104 was available now. That, IMO, was the second-biggest reason for the selection of the Starfighter, the first being the bribes, of course.
 
I think the Lighting could well have been a better aircraft for W Germany, as in a point to point fighter, than the F-104. If no bribes were involved could W Germany have bought them?
The first issue is to prevent British officials from telling the West Germans "Don't buy this".
 
IT could have eben possible top buy the lightning alongside the Buccaneer. The Lighnings would serve as Inteceptors armed with Sidewinders in the 2 Fighterwings while the Bucs would be serving with the fighter-bomberwings and the Marineflieger. Training could be done in England or even in Germany due top the Presence of RAF Germany. The only Problem with this ist the fact that the EE Lightning was in it's early years a Nightmare for every Mechanic. So yeah IT was Possible and would have saved lives
 
IT could have eben possible top buy the lightning alongside the Buccaneer. The Lighnings would serve as Inteceptors armed with Sidewinders in the 2 Fighterwings while the Bucs would be serving with the fighter-bomberwings and the Marineflieger. Training could be done in England or even in Germany due top the Presence of RAF Germany. The only Problem with this ist the fact that the EE Lightning was in it's early years a Nightmare for every Mechanic. So yeah IT was Possible and would have saved lives
Might have been a nightmare, least it not a coffin
 

Riain

Banned
The Luftwaffe looked initially at the SR177, then at the Lightning for 5 minutes with the British saying not to buy it before switching to the F104, this also involved a change of requirement from rapid climbing interceptor to nuclear strike.

If the Lightning has been chosen BAC would have developed the ground attack capabilities of the Lightning from the very start, as well as the electrical integrity and other requirement for US dual-key nuclear weapons delivery. This injection of development funds would have worked wonders for the aircraft, especially since it would have occurred very early in the the development cycle. For
example the Luftwaffe would have gotten the big belly tank from the very start, whereas the RAF didn't get it until the F6 in 1966 and retrofit it to F3 and F2A up to 1970. As such the Luftwaffe buy would likely drive RAF behavior, it's highly likely that when the manned aircraft being obsolescent dogma is dropped in 1960 the RAF turns to the Luftwaffe developed Lightning variants rather than the P1154.

Once the Lightning is in the Luftwaffe there is no need for the Marineflieger to conform, so they likely buy the Buccaneer. It is a better anti-ship platform than the F104, or Lighting for that matter, the Germans were interested in it IOTL and with a big lightning buy the connection with the British is well established.

This is all very interesting for the Germans, it gets them more capable air arms, but the real winner is likely to be Britian. The Luftwaffe got their F104s in mid 1960, so will like get Lightnings in the same period from the BAC production line, generating foreign exchange. Indeed the whole deal will be a huge earner for Britain when they desperately need it.
 

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We had the same debate a couple of years ago. To sum it up: the Lightning did not meet all the requirements Germany had. Whether e.g. being a single engine aircraft was a sensible requirement is a different question. But it existed. And e.g. the firm opposition to a separate airframe for other roles like the navy made sense from a budget pov.
 

Riain

Banned
Did not and cannot are two different things, but we get back to that strange point in history in 1957-67 where Britain was lacking in confidence after Suez and making a litany of bad decisions.
 
The Mirage III was still in development at the time of the competition while the F-104 was available now. That, IMO, was the second-biggest reason for the selection of the Starfighter, the first being the bribes, of course.
What about the F-100 ? They surely had better strike capability ( atleast in terms of weapons)
 
The Mirage III was still in development at the time of the competition while the F-104 was available now. That, IMO, was the second-biggest reason for the selection of the Starfighter, the first being the bribes, of course.

My thought is that the bribes happen but somehow they're discovered before the deal is finalized, and the backlash causes the Germans to pull out of the deal entirely and choose something else besides the F-104.

With the deal falling through in the last minute and the competition having to be redone (wasting more time), this might end up with the Germans eventually choosing either the Mirage III, the F-11F-1F, or possibly even the F-5A if enough time passes.
 

Riain

Banned
Timing is important here, especially when talking about adopting the Mirage III. The F104 entered sqn service with the USAF in February 1958 and went to Taiwan on operations in October 1958, the first combat RAF Lightning sqn went operational in July 1960 after a leisurely development that could have been sped up and trials ADFS stood up in December 1959. The first Mirage IIIC pure interceptor wasn't delivered to the French AIr Force until July 1961 so the first sqn wasn't stood up until late 1961 or 1962, the first production multi-role Mirage IIIE was not delivered until January 1964.

The Luftwaffe received it's first F104s in July 1960, a year before the French received their first Mirage IIIC and 4 years before they received their first multirole IIIE. Waiting for the Mirage is not really an option, it's likely the F104 or the Lightning are the choices due to the delivery/availability schedules.
 
EE were looking at ground attack Lightnings as early as 1957, with one project carrying a centre line Red Beard in front of the small tank, with the kinked wing and tip tanks.
I've a 72nd one that got as far as the decals on but stalled after that.

Lightning's development probably could and sodding well should have been faster but I doubt blame could be laid at EE/BAC's door - they were scheming projects and improvements left, right and centre - more likely the Treasury and the dead hand of the Ministry of Supply. The former put the kybosh on the solitary P.8 prototype that the Air Staff wanted, whilst the latter insisted on the letter of the spec (F.155) being followed, so P.8 (the Air Staff's choice) being rejected in favour of Fairey's monster delta wing project that needed an entirely new engine to be designed.
 
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Timing is important here, especially when talking about adopting the Mirage III. The F104 entered sqn service with the USAF in February 1958 and went to Taiwan on operations in October 1958, the first combat RAF Lightning sqn went operational in July 1960 after a leisurely development that could have been sped up and trials ADFS stood up in December 1959. The first Mirage IIIC pure interceptor wasn't delivered to the French AIr Force until July 1961 so the first sqn wasn't stood up until late 1961 or 1962, the first production multi-role Mirage IIIE was not delivered until January 1964.

The Luftwaffe received it's first F104s in July 1960, a year before the French received their first Mirage IIIC and 4 years before they received their first multirole IIIE. Waiting for the Mirage is not really an option, it's likely the F104 or the Lightning are the choices due to the delivery/availability schedules.
But what’s the big rush ? F100 is more than enough to deal with mig19
And mig21 is not available in huge numbers until 1965 ( I’m guessing but I know it’s not 1960)
 

Riain

Banned
It all stems back to the decision that manned combat aircraft were obsolescent, and the Lightning would only serve for a few years until replaced by SAMs. Yet in 1958 there was a competition to replace 6 sqns of Venom fighter-bomber and 2 sqns of meteor fighter-recce based overseas, although the contenders were pretty simple aircraft: Jet Provost, Folland Gnat, Hunter F6 conversion.

The ideal path in the 57 DWP would have been to request the Lightning be a tactical fighter, to meet fighter command and as much of the overseas requirements as possible, with the P1127 ultimately meeting the rest, perhaps with some Hunter conversions bridging the gap.
 

Riain

Banned
But what’s the big rush ? F100 is more than enough to deal with mig19
And mig21 is not available in huge numbers until 1965 ( I’m guessing but I know it’s not 1960)

The F100 is obsolescent in 1958, buying it would be a poor investment and a huge waste of taxpayer money.
 

Riain

Banned
Why not better buy saab them?

The first J35A were delivered in late 1959 and the initial wing declared operational in march 1960. However the first 40 were delivered without radar and gunsight, the first radar equipped aircraft were fitted with French Cyrano II the same as the Mirage III in 1961. The Swedish radar equipped all weather fighter F35B wasn't delivered until 1964.

No Draken was cleared for nuclear weapons, like the F104 was and the Lightning was proposed, given Sweden wasn't a nuclear power this would have been a difficult hurdle. The British engine might have been a problem in the export market if Britain itself was keen to compete for Germany's business. Also US, Britain and France were major aircraft manufacturers, used to building in the hundreds and thousands of units whereas Sweden wasn't.
 
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