Close-Air Support (CAS) Aircraft
Since the fighter aircraft was first weaponized in World War 1, major strides have been made in producing dedicated aerial support platforms to help deliver the "rain".
There are a total of 96 Close-Air Support (CAS) Military Aircraft in the Military Factory. Entries are listed below in alphanumeric order. Flag images indicative of country of origin.
1957
The Alouette II helicopter series is billed as a multi-role, light rotary-wing platform charged with a myriad of duties in bo...
1976
The British-Italian helicopter concern of AgustaWestland developed their AW109 model of 1971 as a commercial-level passenger-...
1984
The AT-3 is in a special class of aircraft that specialize in both advanced pilot training as well as light combat and includ...
1917
The Albatros J.I was conceived of as a dedicated ground attack aircraft for use in the "infantry close-support role" during W...
1984
Sensing the growing need for light, jet-powered dual-role aircraft, the Italian concern of SIAI-Marchetti proposed a new airc...
1947
The Antonov An-2 is a multi-role light utility biplane initially produced under the Soviet flag. Despite its 1940's pedigree,...
1967
At its core, the Strikemaster was a jet-powered training platform with inherent light ground attack facilities as secondary. ...
1976
The BAe Hawk has maintained one of the most successful aerial tenures of any lightweight jet trainer aircraft with origins da...
1978
The arrival of the land-based Hawker Siddeley Harrier revolutionized the British military approach upon its inception into RA...
1953
The T-34 Mentor series served the United States Air Force and United States Navy well in training generations of aviators in ...
1944
The XA-38 was a developmental twin-engine heavy fighter produced by the Beech Aircraft firm. By all accounts, she was a stabl...
2006
The Bell ARH-70 helicopter was developed for the US Army as a possible direct replacement to the successful but aged Kiowa Wa...
1941
The Bell P-39 Airacobra is yet another in the long line aircraft studies stemming from World War 2 in the "what-might-have be...
1943
At its core, the Bell P-63 Kingcobra proved a modest improvement over the relative failure that was the P-39 Airacobra. Thoug...
1962
The Blackburn Buccaneer was a low-level, high-speed, carrier-borne strike aircraft utilized by the British Royal Air Force an...
1937
The Breda Ba.64 was a short-lived ground attack platform fielded primarily by the Regia Aeronautica of Italy prior to and dur...
1936
The Breda Ba.65 was a ground attack aircraft serving primarily with the Italian Air Force (Regia Aeronautica) in the years le...
1943
The United States Army Air Corps appreciated the tactical scope of the German Luftwaffe Junkers Ju 87 "Stuka" dive bombers an...
1989
The Britten-Norman Defender is a militarized version of the successful Britten-Norman Islander twin turboprop-powered aircraf...
1939
The CAC Wirraway ("Challenge" in the Woiwurrung native tongue) became one of Australia's primary trainer aircraft from 1939 o...
1951
America's first operational jet-powered fighter became the P-80 Shooting Star of World War 2. The type was a single-engine, s...
1936
A pair of Ca.301 prototypes served as the basis for a new Italian attack aircraft. The original design sported a low-set mono...
1967
The Cessna A-37 Dragonfly was born out of a need for close-support aircraft to assist in the Vietnam War. As such, the T-37 j...
1933
The A-12 was an inter-war product of the Curtiss Aeroplane and Motor Company first appearing in 1933. The type became the fir...
1952
The Dassault MD.450 "Ouragan" (meaning "Hurricane") became France's first home-grown operational, jet-powered, military comba...
1978
The Alpha Jet series of aircraft was a joint Franco-German initiative to produce a highly-advanced tactical trainer with clos...
1946
The de Havilland DH.100 Vampire held two key distinctions concerning aviation history - she was the first jet-powered aircraf...
1942
Discussions of war-winning World War 2 aircraft regularly seem to leave out one of the most famous and successful of the conf...
1946
The Douglas A-1 Skyraider series would have become a major contributor to warplans concerning American involvement in World W...
1961
The B-26K/A-26B "Counter Invader" was based on a highly modified airframe of the World War 2-era Douglas A-26 Invader attack ...
1951
The Douglas Skyknight was a dedicated carrier-based night fighter serving with the United States Navy (USN) and Marine Corps ...
2003
The EMB 314 "Super Tucano" (also "A-29") represents a locally-produced Brazilian aircraft product falling under the then-gove...
1945
The AC-119 series was a modified "G" model of the successful C-119 "Flying Boxcar" transport aircraft. The AC-119's would see...
1947
Fairchild Corporation produced a winner in the post-war world with the introduction of the C-119 "Flying Boxcar". The Boxcar ...
1976
The A-10 Thunderbolt II was designed exclusively to fulfill the Close-Air Support (CAS) role from the outset, perhaps matched...
1975
The impressive-looking, two-seat IA-58 Pucara (meaning "Fortress") was produced by the Fabrica Militar de Aviones of Argentin...
1956
It becomes much too easy to lose track of French military prowess following World War 2 but the Fouga Magister was a product ...
2015
The General Atomics Avenger (formerly marked as the "Predator C") is one of the newer UAV systems to come online with the Uni...
1918
The CL.IV was a further development of the CL.II design, both aircraft a product of Halberstadt Flugzeugwerke of Germany. The...
1969
The subsonic British Harrier "jump jet" became the world's first practical VTOL (Vertical Take-Off and Landing) aircraft afte...
1941
The Hawker Typhoon (affectionate known as the "Tiffie") was initially intended as a dedicated interceptor and set to succeed ...
1936
The Henschel-produced Hs 123 aircraft became the last operational biplane for the German Luftwaffe during World War two. Born...
1942
The Henschel Hs 129 fighter-bomber was built to a 1937 German specification for a twin-engine close-support aircraft with con...
2007
The Islamic Republic of Iran has benefited greatly from their associations with both the United States (pre-1979 revolution) ...
2014
The Shafaq (formally known as the "Integral" and translating to "Before the Dawn") is a two-seat, lightweight-class multi-rol...
2012
The Iranian Shahed 285 light helicopter is a highly modified version of the American Bell 206 Ranger series of helicopters (k...
1994
The Hongdu JL-8 / K-8 is a series of indigenous Chinese lightweight jet-powered aircraft. The JL-8 is a dual-role platform th...
1980
The AH-6/MH-6 "Little Bird" forms an oft-overlook yet wholly vital part of American Special Operations services. This highly ...
1985
Romania went the indigenous route in developing its advanced jet trainer with light strike capability when producing its IAR ...
1944
The Ilyushin IL-10 was a follow-up design to the classic IL-2 "Shturmovik", an armored ground attack aircraft that won the ai...
1941
The Il-2 Sturmovik (or "Shturmovik") was designed as a low-level close-support aircraft capable of defeating enemy armor and ...
1937
Before the Allies would gain air superiority over the skies of France and Germany, the Junkers Ju 87 "Stuka" dive bomber woul...
2005
The T-50 / A-50 "Golden Eagle" is an advanced supersonic trainer and light strike-capable aircraft platform produced jointly ...
1994
The Kaman K-MAX is a general purpose, multi-role, all-weather platform certified for long endurance, repeated external medium...
1944
The two-seat, twin-engine Ki-102 was classified as a close-support/heavy fighter aircraft and developed by the Kawasaki conce...
1972
Since the advent of the airplane as an instrument of war, warplanners have relied on the power of mobile aerial attacks to ke...
1948
During World War 2, all major participants were evolving their jet programs to gain an advantage in the ongoing effort. The m...
1944
The XP-58 "Chain Lightning" was initially envisioned as a larger version of the successful Lockheed P-38 Lightning twin-boom ...
1939
The Loire-Nieuport LN.40/LN.401 series of aircraft was a carrier-based dive bomber developed for the French Navy prior to Wor...
1917
The LVG C.V was a general-purpose, two-seat reconnaissance aircraft utilized by the German air service in World War 1. Despit...
1941
The Macchi C.202 Folgore ("Thunderbolt") served as one of the top Italian-designed fighters during the critical middle years ...
1948
The Martin AM Mauler was designed to a US Navy requirement during the height of World War 2. It appeared in competition with ...
1985
While the original Hawker Siddeley Harrier proved revolutionary for its time, and the follow-up BAe Systems Sea Harrier bette...
1937
In the years leading up to and during World War 2, the Messerschmitt Bf 109 was the principle fighter of the German Luftwaffe...
1944
The "parasite" fighter had long held an interest within the minds of aircraft engineers, particularly as new methods of propu...
1975
The Mikoyan MiG-27 "Flogger" was derived from the successful MiG-23 "Flogger" interceptor and made into a dedicated ground at...
1973
The famous Mil Mi-24 "Hind" helicopter stemmed from a Soviet Cold-War requirement for a heavily armed and armored transport h...
1977
The Mitsubishi F-1 fighter aircraft was a milestone design for the small island country as it represented the nations first a...
1941
Since May of 1937, the Empire of Japan - both the Imperial Japanese Army Air Force and the Imperial Japanese Navy Air Service...
1970
As a long time Soviet equipment user, the Chinese were already building the twin-engine Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-19 "Farmer" jet ...
1966
The North American/Rockwell OV-10 Bronco was developed through the United States Marine Corps Light Armed Reconnaissance Airc...
1962
The Northrop F-5 "Freedom Fighter" / "Tiger" / "Tiger II" series was designed from the outset as a low-cost, lightweight, mul...
1934
The Polikarpov I-15 was a biplane fighter aircraft designed and produced by the Soviet Union during the inter-war years. She ...
1942
While much of the romance of World War 2 dogfighting often heads in the direction of the USAAF's North American P-51 Mustang ...
1955
By the late 1940s, the Swedish Air Force (or "Flygvapnet") was reviewing options in an effort to replace its aging series of ...
1954
The H-34 Choctaw was a multi-purpose, radial-powered utility helicopter produced by Sikorsky in the United States. It was dev...
1970
Before the US Army's ubiquitous workhorse transport/utility helicopter - the Sikorsky UH-60 "Black Hawk" - had become a house...
1983
The G-4 Super Galeb (Super Seagull) advanced trainer/light strike aircraft was born out of a Yugoslavian requirement to repla...
1970
The Mach 2-capable Sukhoi Su-17 "Fitter" was a further development of the successful Su-7 "Fitter-A" fighter/fighter-bomber f...
1941
The Sukhoi Su-2 was the first aircraft design of Pavel Sukhoi and became a two-seat light bomber fielded by the Soviet Air Fo...
1981
Since the early 1980s, the Sukhoi Su-25 (NATO codename of "Frogfoot") has served the close-support air strike interests of th...
1957
The Supermarine Scimitar was an oft-forgotten carrier-based, jet-powered, single-seat fighter for the British Fleet Air Arm. ...
1942
When the land-based Hawker Hurricane was successfully converted into the carrier-based "Sea Hurricane", thought was given to ...
1938
The Supermarine Spitfire the legendary British fighter aircraft developed prior to World War 2. The type earned its status as...
2013
For growing military powers like India and Turkey, it behooves these nations to begin developing sustainable indigenous progr...
1942
Russian aviation engineer Andrei Tupolev would lend his surname to a plethora of Soviet-era aircraft after founding his Tupol...
1942
The F4U Corsair series of aircraft was one of the finer fighter developments of the Second World War, primarily seeing combat...
1940
Often overshadowed by its contemporaries in the West (to include the Supermarine Spitfire, North American P-51 Mustang, Messe...
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