Dassault Mirage III Mirage IIIO

In 1960 Australia chose the Mirage III to replace its F-86 Sabres in the Royal Australian Air Force, preferring it over the Lockheed F-104 Starfighter. Australia initially wanted to fit the Mirage with the Rolls-Royce Avon turbojet, already used on other of its combat aircraft: a Mirage IIIA was modified for the necessary trials, named Mirage O, with Jean-Marie Saget as test pilot. The first flight with this engine took place on 13 February 1961 and, although performance improved noticeably — from Mach 1 to Mach 2 in 2 minutes 25 seconds — the cost of adaptation proved excessive and Australia abandoned the modification, opting to keep the standard Atar 9C turbojet.

A licence-manufacture contract was then signed with a progressive increase in Australian industrial participation: the first two aircraft were built entirely in France, assembly of the next two was completed in Australia, and from the sixteenth aircraft onward locally produced parts were already being integrated. The Australian aircraft received the designation Mirage IIIO and are equivalent to the French Mirage IIIE, though they incorporate around 180 modifications, mostly minor. The first of the two Mirage IIIO built in France made its maiden flight on 14 February 1963.

Of the 100 aircraft built in total — two in France and 98 in Australia — production was split between 48-49 aircraft intended for the fighter and interception role under the designation Mirage IIIO(F) and 50-51 intended for low-level attack as the Mirage IIIO(A); at the end of 1968 it was decided to bring the whole fleet to a common IIIO(A) standard. The first squadron on the Mirage IIIO was declared operational in August 1965. Complementing the fleet, 16 two-seat trainers were also produced under the bare designation Mirage IIID — without an additional country letter, a special case within the family of export two-seaters — in two batches: ten aircraft in 1966-1967 and six in 1973-1974.

The Mirages were progressively replaced by F-18 Hornets from 1985; the type was officially retired from service in October 1988 and the last flight of an Australian Mirage took place on 8 February 1989. Over 23 years of service around 40 aircraft were lost in accidents. In 1990 Pakistan bought 50 of the remaining Mirages secondhand — 43 single-seaters and 7 two-seaters — which would form part of the pool of aircraft with which the Pakistan Air Force would later undertake the Project ROSE upgrade programme.