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To: Polybius

What are the "Daggers"? Delta Daggers?

That's fascinating reading.


115 posted on 05/16/2006 4:05:21 PM PDT by headstamp (Nothing lasts forever, Unless it does.)
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To: headstamp
What are the "Daggers"? Delta Daggers? That's fascinating reading.

No, they were not American-built F-102 "Delta Daggers".

They were Israeli designed and built derivatives of the French Mirage 5 named "IAI (Israel Aircraft Industries) Daggers".

The IAI Daggers were flown by G6C Escuadrilla II (Grupo de Caza [Hunting Group] 6, Squadron 2) and G6C Escuadrilla III Grupo de Caza [Hunting Group] 6, Squadron 3).

The British carriers could only launch Harriers for CAP patrols and could not launch Haweyes for EAW. The only warning capabilities were the radars on the Harriers that had no "look down" capabilities.

So, the Argentinians flew their Skyhawks and Daggers at wave top level avoiding detection until the last minute and thus managed to score multiple hits on British ships using "dumb" bombs.

Fortunately for the British, the tactic had the disadvantage that the bombs were dropped at such a low altitude that the fuses did not have time to arm and many bombs therefore failed to explode. Even then, the kinetic energy of the impact caused great damage.

Against a U.S. Navy Battle Group, the Skyhawks and Daggers would have been detected as soon as they took off from Argentinian airfields by our Hawkeyes and the F-14 Tomcats would have splashed them 100 miles before they ever reahed the Battle Group.

184 posted on 05/16/2006 7:39:20 PM PDT by Polybius
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