——Similarities——

Emile, you are completely right.

It is explained in the book “Republic’s P-47 Thunderbolt” by Warren M Bodie. This Italian Reggiane Re-2002 is derived from the Re-2000, which was an unauthorized copy of the EP1-68 (which was the export version of the Seversky P-35).

Another funny anecdote is that for the Seversky Company to survive they had to sell 6 P-35’s to a Mr Yamamoto.
Mr Yamamoto saved the Seversky Company, which then continued the design of the P-35 to the P-43, which eventually became the P-47 under the new company name Republic.
That same Mr Yamamoto became a hot shot in the Japanese Navy, which in turn was destroyed with the aid of a lot of P-47’s

If you’re going to design something to do a very particular job(not just aircraft) chances are two designers will finish up with very similar looking end products.

But I guess that could be applied to the Spit and 109, but two very different looking aircraft. The Russians have always been very good at producing dopplegangers of Western types, Rockwell B-1/Tupolev Tu-160, Concorde/ Tu-144, Dc-3/Lisunov Li-2..gosh! The list goes on. Potential of a separate doppleganger thread maybe? 🙂

Regards;
Steve

How about Mig 25 / F15?

If you’re going to design something to do a very particular job(not just aircraft) chances are two designers will finish up with very similar looking end products.

Hmmm interesting because the Swedish air force used both.

Was interesting to read that Roberto Longhi and Antonio Alessio itook definitely took inspiration from the contemporary P-35 which it superficially resembled.

I wonder if the Swedes use of the Re2000 was prompted by its similarity to the P-35 after no-one else would supply them with aircraft early in the war.

I had always wondered about the similarities between these two types. The wiki page states that Regianne “Took inspiration” from the P-35. It would appear that a bit more than inspiration was taken in the look of the Re-2000. When I was a much younger anorak interested in these things, I actually thought they were the same aircraft until I took a closer look! :rolleyes:

Regards;
Steve

Care to name the aircraft? I think I know what the Swedish one is but not sure of the designation of the Italian.