Folland Gnat - A Missed Opportunity?

[VC10]

I'm now reading Sir Stanley Hooker's , he of RR & Bristol Siddeley, book ' Not Much of an Engineer' and in it he cites an occasion where the Gnat could have been in contention for a role in European Air defence.

In the '50's Gnat designer Petter had become convinced that fighters were becoming too large and heavy and thus too complicated, too expensive and difficult to keep serviceable. He believed that a much smaller,lighter and cheaper fighter could out fly any opponent. many in NATO agreed. Thus the Gnat was born.

At that time the US had a Mutual Weapons Development Program (MWDP)who purpose was to organise projects within NATO, and bring in additional nations who had weak industrial strength. The NATO Supreme Commander, a USAF officer, was very interested in light fighters, partly because they could be dispersed away from vulnerable airfields and partly because they were within the industrial capability of many nations including the rebuilt Italy & West Germany. The Head of the MWDP convened a meeting of NATO aircraft companies and issued a requirement for a fighter weighing 8,000lbs and able to take off and land in less than 2000ft. At the time all fighter required a concrete runway of at least 5000ft.

The NATO requirement was based on Petters Gnat, but the Gnat had one problem, it used high-pressure tyres for concrete runways. Hooker tried to convince Petter to modify the design to use low-pressure tyres, but Petter's response was that he couldn't do it because the larger bays to house the retracted wheels would spoil the drag of his fuselage. The Gnat was then eliminated and the competition was between Dassault, Breguet, Nord and Fiat with no UK company tendering. Nord dropped out leaving the field to the Breguet Taon, the Dassault Etendard and the Fiat G91.

The rest, as they say, is history with the G91 being built in Italy and West Germany. The UK did get something out of this because the G91 used the BS Orpheus engine and under the MWDR scheme the US paid for 75% of the Orpheus development costs provided the building nation paid the remaining 25%. The UK government were not interested in paying so Bristol Siddeley took the gamble and used its own money. The Orpheus going on to be built under licence in Italy, West Germany & India