Saint-Dizier has a long aviation history, with an early French military aircraft landing close to the city on 11 August Seized by the Germans in June during the Battle of France , Saint Dizier was used as a Luftwaffe military airfield during the occupation.
Control of the airfield was turned over to French authorities on 5 July The Dassault Rafale is a French twin -engine , canard delta wing , multirole fighter aircraft designed and built by Dassault Aviation. Equipped with a wide range of weapons, the Rafale is intended to perform air supremacy , interdiction , aerial reconnaissance , ground support , in-depth strike, anti-ship strike and nuclear deterrence missions.
In the late s, the French Air Force and Navy were seeking to replace and consolidate their current fleets of aircraft. In order to reduce development costs and boost prospective sales, France entered into an arrangement with UK, Germany, Italy and Spain to produce an agile multi-purpose fighter, the Eurofighter Typhoon.
Dassault built a technology demonstrator which first flew in July as part of an eight-year flight-test programme, paving the way for the go-ahead of the project.
The aircraft is available in three main variants: Rafale C single-seat land-based version, Rafale B twin-seat land-based version, and Rafale M single-seat carrier-based version. Introduced in , the Rafale is being produced for both the French Air Force and for carrier-based operations in the French Navy.
