Northrop F-5 NF-5A

An order for 105 aircraft for the Royal Netherlands Air Force was signed in early 1967: 75 single-seat NF-5As to replace the Republic F-84 and 30 two-seat NF-5Bs to replace the Lockheed T-33. The plan to use some single-seaters for photo-reconnaissance in place of the Lockheed F-104G Starfighters never materialised.

European production of the F-5 had originally been planned with Fokker and SABCA, for the Dutch and Belgian air forces, but Belgian hesitancy led the Netherlands government to order under a production sharing agreement with Canada. Under that agreement the centre fuselages for all but the first 31 aircraft were built by Fokker in the Netherlands. The first NF-5 was rolled out on 5 March 1969.

The Royal Netherlands Air Force took delivery of its first aircraft, an NF-5B two-seater, in October 1969, the first unit formed being 313 Squadron at Twente, initially as a conversion unit training pilots on the new type. The NF-5 served with four operational squadrons: 313 and 315 Squadron at Twenthe, 316 Squadron at Gilze-Rijen and 314 Squadron at Eindhoven. The last NF-5 was delivered in March 1972.

From 1986 the squadrons began converting to the licence-built General Dynamics F-16, and the last NF-5 was stood down in March 1991. Most surplus aircraft were sold to Turkey, many of them to the Turkish Stars display team, and to Venezuela, while others were retained for spares support. A dozen aircraft were donated to Greece.

The NF-5As and NF-5Bs that reached Turkey later entered the F-5/2000 modernisation programme, run by Israel Aerospace Industries and Turkish Aerospace to turn the NF-5A/B and F-5A/B fleets into lead-in trainers for the F-16C/D. The upgrade covered two areas, a structural rework and an avionics modernisation with a MIL-STD-553 datalink, head-up display, multifunction displays, HOTAS controls, a radar warning receiver, GPS+INS and an ASELSAN communications and navigation system. Aircraft so treated still fly with the Turkish Stars display team.