French Text
Designed in response to the official 1953 program planned to equip the
Armée de l'Air with a light supersonic interceptor, the Mirage III is
universally acknowledged as one of the most remarkable successes of the
French post-war aircraft industry. This delta-winged fighter has a
configuration which has since become the hallmark of the French aircraft
builder, Dassault, and has rapidly demonstrated its qualities beyond its
original frontiers, so much so that 1 400 examples of all variants came
off the production lines, purchased by twenty or so countries. This very
broad subject has been split into two distinct parts, the first volume
dealing with the initial single-seat IIIC and two-seat IIIB versions
equipped with the Atar 9B jet engine and the second deals with the
improved versions of the fighter with a longer fuselage, powered by an
Atar 9C and fitted with a more effective Doppler radar: the IIIE
interceptor, the IIIR and RD reconnaissance versions, the 5 and 50
ground attack versions. In line with the name and aim of the collection
only the planes used by the Armée de l'Air are described in these books.