More about the nearly-Italian-Javelins.
Fabrique Nationale, Fokker and FIAT were all jostling to build the Javelin under Mutual Security Agency funding as the NATO-standard night-fighter. Around March 1953 FIAT were selected as preferred manufacturer, largely on grounds of maintaining an aeronautical workforce in Italy, for an initial $25 million contract.
Brig Gen Al Boyd and Lt Col Dick Johnson flew the Javelin in February / March and it appears to have passed technical assessment.
However the contract was changed to the F-86D in April 1953 as Gloster could not establish the FIAT production line until 1956, a year later than the F-86D. North American received a royalty of $5,500 on each FIAT-built Sabre.
However the British kept heckling for a second, subsidised, production line for the Javelin. Their argument was that the FIAT Sabre production contract was inadequate to meet NATO needs. Through early 1955 Gloster ran advertising for the Javelin in the US press, but despite the unit cost FIAT continued to build the Sabre, additionally supplying France, Netherlands and Norway.