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During the late 1940s and early 1950s,indigenous swept-wing fighters – the F-86,MiG-15, Hawker Hunter and Dassault Mystere –began to dominate the arsenals of the major powers.
But there was one swept-wing fighter during this period that is overlooked, because
come from a major power and never entered active service – the Argentinean I.Ae. 33 Pulqui II.
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This sleek, swept-wing fighter was an offshoot of a design by the German designer Kurt Tank, famous for numerous World War II German aircraft, especially the FW-190 family. By the end of the war, Tank had a number of jet fighter projects in the first stages of construction, notably the swept-wing Ta 183 Huckebein (a cartoon troublemaking raven), but the war ended before they could be completed and flown.
In the years following World War II, Argentina’s president, Juan Perón, offered sanctuary to manyNazis as well as German aeronautical designers, and gave them a chance to rebuild their professional lives designing military aircraft as “the wings of Perón.” Tank collected a team from the Focke Wulf design bureau and established
himself in Córdoba, Argentina, in 1947 where he began work on a swept-wing jet fighter based on the Ta153. It was far more advanced than the first Argentinean jet fighter, the straight-wing I.Ae. 27 Pulqui I, (pulqui meaning “arrow”’ in the language of the Mapudungun Indians of central Argentina). It had been designed by French
aircraft designer Émile Dewoitine, who had left France when he was condemned in absentia for collaboration with Nazis.
Tank’s Pulqui II had high-mounted, negativedihedral (down-drooped) wings swept back 40°, a long circular fuselage with the single Rolls- Royce Nene II engine buried inside near the center of gravity, and a huge, swept-back “T” tail.
Its appearance had something in common with the MiG-15 and the F-86 Sabre, both designed by engineers who had once worked for Tank. The advanced design elements of the Pulqui II placed the Argentinean aero industry in the forefront of aviation technology during the late 1940s and early 1950s.
The first flight of the Pulqui II was on June 16, 1950, and made it the first swept-wing jet fighter entirely developed and built in Latin America, as well as the sixth swept-wing jet fighter in the world. The new aircraft was relatively successful in some respects, but it displayed severe handling difficulties at various points of the flight envelope, specifically deep-stall problems at high angles of attack caused by the negative dihedral wings.
The chief test pilot, ex-Focke Wulf test pilot Otto Behrens, characterized the handling
characteristics of Pulqui II as “the worst I had ever experienced as a test pilot” – a fact that was borne out by the fatal crashes of two prototypes during testing, one of which killed Behrens and was witnessed by President Perón. The problems seemed solvable, however, and a newer version correcting these problems was planned.
But in 1953, an economic crisis hit Argentina,forcing the slowdown of flourishing Argentine armament development programs and the high-cost, high-profile Pulqui II project was halted. The halt was meant to be temporary, but the crisis led to open social confrontation, hatred and antagonism that resulted in the 1955 “Liberating
Revolution” coup d’état that ousted Perón in 1955.
The Pulqui II project never recovered and with the end of the Korean War, there were large numbers of surplus American F-86 Sabres available at a fraction of the cost of Pulqui II. Tank left Argentina and moved on to other projects – first trying to return to Germany, then moving to India in August 1956 to work on the Hindustan
(Indian) Fighter, designated the HF-24. It was moderately successful.
Today, the sole Pulqui I and the Pulqui II No. 5 are preserved at the Argentine Air Force’s Museum in Buenos Aires and, despite its failure, the Pulqui project opened the door to more successful Argentinean planes, notably the I.A. 58 Pucara used against the British in the Falklands.
