Also, the Greek Air Force used the F1C (without any upgrades since 1977) very successfully to intercept turkish F16s until Greek orders of Mirage 2000 and F-16 were completed and up to 2002.

The F1 is a very good aircraft and it was perhaps the best interceptor in the world at the time of its introduction back in 1973.

The F1 had the climb rate of the star fighter, the speed of the phantom, the agility  of the tiger, the bomb load and range of the skyhawk and it was as a fighter superior to anything in terms of performance, handling, readiness and agility.

Someone in here said that the F1 is in the same performance category as Mig-21. That is completely untrue.

The Mig21 has the same performance as the crusader 175 m/s climb and 1.8 mach. Even the mirage 3 was more agile judging from Israeli sources.

The F1 was a very versatile aircraft with great upgrade potential that was overlooked firstly by the french themselves in favour of other designs like the jaguar and later M2000.