No Mirage

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What if.....Dassault or perhaps the entire French aeronautical establishment decide against using a tailless delta design, as OTL became the Mirage I, II, and successful III?
What alternative(s) would be selected instead?
 
So early competitors were.
Durandel
Trident
Morane-Saulnier MS-1000
SNCAN (Nord) -5000 Harpon
Breguet Br.1002
 
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Yep by 1956 Dassault had three options to go supersonic. All three with the same engine Atar 101E /G
- SMB-4
- Etendard IV
- Mirage III-01

Very much the same "Atar rump" with different wings and intakes around it.

If Mirage I / II are aborted circa 1955 and the Mirage line with them - then Etendard IV can provide a slightly different Mirage F1 a decade before the date.
Give it mices in the intakes and an AB Atar 8 that is: an Atar 9.
 
It would be a bit like a S.E except supersonic... adapted intakes and afterburning Atar. Not sure it would match a F1 in range and bombload, the low wing and undercarriage are standing in the way...
 
If I were still in a 1/72 modeling craze as I was before 2007... I would buy a bunch of Heller Mirages Etendards and SMB and create hybrids of them...
- Mirage III (delta wing, side intakes)
- SMB-2 (swept wings, frontal intake - SAMBAD - Israeli nickname)
- Etendard IV(swept wing, side intakes)
...
- SMB-2 pure delta (delta & front intake, like a XF-92) (SAMBA)
- SMB-2 tailed delta (like a MiG-21) (SIMBA)
- low swept wing / high tail: a supersonic Super Etendard (ETRANGE)
- high swept wing / low tail: pre-Mirage F1 or Breguet 1120 Sirocco (MISTRAL)

Mirage, Sambad, Samba, Simba, Etendard, Mirage, Mistral... now we have a complete family.

Note: Google tells me "Sambad" doesn't mean anything in hebrew, it was in fact "Hebrew acronym of Super Mystère B Deux"

French pilots nicknamed it "Bédeux" which didn't meant anything either (although nowadays is sounds like "bédo" which means "ganja" or "weed".)

Samba is the brazilian dance, and Simba of course mean Kfir, pardon, Lion in swahili...
 
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Dassault test pilot Jean Marie Saget remember how the names were found, at Dassault...

"In 1955-56 Dassault cautiously decided to start a serie of prototypes derived from the SMB-2 and Etendard IV, just in case the pure delta Mirage III did not worked.

"And so we got, first, a supersonic Etendard IV borrowing the Mirage intakes and afterburning Atar 9. The Navy was interested, and that hybrid become
ETRANGE
- ETendard
- miRAGE
- and the "N" of "naval"

"And then were derivatives of the SMB-2, one pure delta and looking like Convair XF-92; the other a tailed delta hence akin to a MiG-21.

"At the time the Israelis were buying 24 SMB-2 as interim types, but the name "èssèmeubédeux", as phonetically pronounced in french, was atrocious to their mouths and ears. And so they invented a whole word without meaning for it
"SAMBAD".

"This made us chuckle, as "SAMBA" is the brazilian dance. Then we recycled that very word for the pure delta SMB-2.

"As for the tailed-delta, "SIMBA" came when the Israelis discussed their own variant of the Mirage they called "Kfir". We learned that meant "Lion" in hebrew, and from there, SIMBA was a go, as it also means "Lion" except in swahili (it was years before disney).

"And then was a tentative supersonic Etendard with the wings and tail swapped: high wing, low tail. We found it was outrageously similar to a contemporary Breguet project called "Sirocco" and, as a pun and nod to them, we borrowed the name "Mistral" from the old SNCASE DH.100 Vampires now retired from service.
Sirocco and Mistral are names of winds blowing, one in North Africa, the other in Marseille (and Istres test base nearby) so it made some sense....

"We ended with: Mirage, Sambad, Samba, Simba, Etendard, Mirage, Mistral... a complete family."
 
And then there could be Atar powered Taon or Requin... ?

And maybe just for fun ascaled up twin Atar Etendard?....a Double Etendard ;)
 
It would be a bit like a S.E except supersonic... adapted intakes and afterburning Atar. Not sure it would match a F1 in range and bombload, the low wing and undercarriage are standing in the way...

The Etendard’s wing can carry ~360L more fuel than the Mirage F1´s wing (which is very slim and holds almost no fuel), so that’s a bonus that could offset the Etendard smaller fuselage volume.

The F1 on the other hand has fairly massive fuel tanks forward & behind the wing (where they don’t impact drag too much due to area rule)… I expect some of these tanks could be added to the Etendard too.

Wingtip missile launchers on the Etendard would be ideal.
 
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