In current military parlance, a strike fighter is a multirole combat aircraft designed to operate primarily as an attack aircraft, while also incorporating certain performance characteristics of a fighter for air-to-air combat. As a category, it is distinct from fighter-bombers.^{[citation needed]} It is closely related to the concept of interdictor aircraft,^{[citation needed]} but it puts more emphasis on air-to-air combat capabilities as a multirole combat aircraft. Examples of contemporary American strike fighters are the McDonnell Douglas F-15E Strike Eagle, Boeing F/A-18E/F Super Hornet, and Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II.

History

Beginning in the 1940s, the term "strike fighter" was occasionally used in navies to refer to fighter aircraft capable of performing air-to-surface strikes, such as the Westland Wyvern,^[1] Blackburn Firebrand^[2] and Blackburn Firecrest.

The term "light weight tactical strike fighter (LWTSF)" was used to describe the aircraft to meet the December 1953 NATO specification NBMR-1.^[3] Amongst the designs submitted to the competition were the Aerfer Sagittario 2, Breguet Br.1001 Taon, Dassault Étendard VI, Fiat G.91 and Sud-Est Baroudeur.

The term entered normal use in the United States Navy^[4] by the end of the 1970s, becoming the official^[5] description of the new McDonnell Douglas F/A-18 Hornet. In 1983, the U.S. Navy even renamed each existing Fighter Attack Squadron to Strike Fighter Squadron to emphasize^[6] the air-to-surface mission (as the "Fighter Attack" designation was confused with the "Fighter" designation, which flew pure air-to-air missions).

This name quickly spread to non-maritime use. When the F-15E Strike Eagle came into service, it was originally called a "dual role fighter",^[7] but it instead quickly became known as a "strike fighter".

Joint Strike Fighter

In 1995, the U.S. military's Joint Advanced Strike Technology program changed its name to the Joint Strike Fighter program.^[8] The project consequently resulted in the development of the F-35 Lightning II family of fifth generation multirole fighters to perform ground attack, reconnaissance, and air defense missions with stealth capability.

Modern strike fighters

• Eurofighter Typhoon
• McDonnell Douglas F-15E Strike Eagle
• Boeing F-15SE Silent Eagle
• Boeing F/A-18E/F Super Hornet,
• Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II
• Shenyang J-15S
• Shenyang J-16
• Sukhoi Su-30MKK
• Sukhoi Su-34

See also

• Interdictor aircraft
• Interceptor aircraft
• Fighter-bomber
• Attack aircraft
• Multirole combat aircraft