Dassault-Breguet Super Étendard

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Dassault-Breguet Super Étendard

A Super Étendard ready for catapult launch off the flight deck of the Clemenceau (1997-07-16).
Type	Attack aircraft
Manufacturer	Dassault-Breguet
Maiden flight	1974-10-28
Introduced	June 1978
Retired	2010 (scheduled)
Primary users	Aviation Navale Argentine Navy Iraqi Air Force
Number built	74

The Dassault-Breguet Super Étendard is a French carrier-borne strike fighter in service with the French and Argentine Navies. A small number were also flown by the Iraqi Air Force for a brief period during the Iran-Iraq War.

1 Design and development
2 Operational history
3 Operators
4 Specifications
5 References
6 Related content

[edit] Design and development

It is a development of the earlier Étendard IVM that was originally to have been replaced by a navalised version of the SEPECAT Jaguar, the Jaguar M, until this plan was stalled by political problems. The prototype first flew on 28 October 1974. The French Navy initially ordered 60 of the new model, which were delivered in June 1978 and the Argentinian Navy ordered 14. The Super Étendard had been developed in parallel with a new air-launched version of Aérospatiale's anti-shipping missile, the AM 39 Exocet, and these were supplied to Argentina as well.

[edit] Operational history

[edit] Argentina

Argentine Navy's Super Etendard

The Argentine Navy selected to buy 14 Super Etendards in 1980 after the United States refused replacements for their A-4Q Skyhawks. There was an arms embargo placed due the Dirty War. Argentine pilots had utilized French flight trainers between November 1980 and August 1981 in France, but at the time of the Falklands War, they had received only 45 hours of actual flight time in the aircraft. ^[1] Between August and November 1981, five Super Etendards and five Exocets were shipped to Argentina. All five of the missiles were used during the conflict, with one missile destroying HMS Sheffield and one the supply ship MV Atlantic Conveyor employing two missiles on each of those attacks. The fifth missile was launched against HMS Invincible task group with British sources claiming that was destroyed by a direct hit of HMS Avenger 114 mm cannon. A sixth Exocet, damaged HMS Glamorgan but was a Indigenous land-launched version taken off from the ARA Guerrico corvette by Argentine technicians.

[edit] Iraq

Five Super Étendards were loaned to Iraq in 1983 while the country waited on deliveries of the Dassault Mirage F1s that had been ordered. These aircraft used Exocets to great success against Iranian tankers in the Persian Gulf before being returned to France in 1985.

[edit] France

From 1991, the original Étendard IVMs were withdrawn from French service, and the Super Étendards underwent continuous modernisation through the 1990s to enable them to use the latest generation of laser-guided precision weapons. These uprated aircraft, designated Super Étendard Modernisé (SEM) participated in NATO's "Allied Force" operations over Kosovo in 1999, flying over 400 combat missions. The SEM also flew strike missions in Operation Enduring Freedom.

All Super Étendards are expected to be retired from French service by 2010, to be replaced from 2006 onwards with Dassault's Rafale M.