The Dassault Mirage III is a family of single-seat, single-engine, fighter aircraft developed and manufactured by French aircraft company Dassault Aviation.
It was the first Western European combat aircraft to exceed Mach 2 in horizontal flight.
In 1961, Switzerland purchased a single Mirage IIIC from France for use as a development aircraft to support the nation’s intentions to domestically produce 100 Mirage III fighters for the Swiss Air Force.
Accordingly, Mirages were manufactured in Switzerland by F+W Emmen (today RUAG, the federal government aircraft factory in Emmen) under the Mirage IIIS designation.
The Mirage IIIS was intended to perform the attack, interception, and reconnaissance missions in a single model.
