Argentinian Stukas

Spoke to an Argentine enthusiast friend of mine, he says he thinks it’s mis-identified Corsairs. He says the nearest Argentina got to the Stuka was Rudel living there after the war!

Argentina placed an order for 100 F4 Meteors in May 1947, becoming the first foreign operator of the type

The Meteor F.4s were part of a bulk order for equipment in exchange for goods and included Avro Lincolns, Bristol Freighters, de Havilland Doves, Percival Prentices, Vickers Vikings and more.

Lincoln

Tank was invited over, among others, including Reimar Horten to work with the Instituto Aeronautico, which eventually became the state run manufacturing concern FMA. These are the two machines that Tank worked on: the Huanquero and Pulqui II:

Huanquero

Pulqui II

And a distinctive Horten shape: Urubu

Pictures from: https://www.flickr.com/photos/147661871@N04/albums/72157680220930504/with/33649306763/

A little more info on the Pulqui II here (scroll down): http://warbirdswalkaround.wixsite.com/warbirds/single-post/2018/05/05/Two-Rarities-Added-Curtiss-F8C-Helldiver-and-FMA-IA-33-Pulqui-II

It’s not impossible that there might have been a Stuka in Argentina, but there are serious aviation researchers on the continent who would have recovered this information by now if there was. I do suspect someone saw the remains of a Corsair; the Argentine navy operated them.

Here is the tail of the Belgrade Stuka that I took poking around the stores in 1990.

Mark

OH HO HO!!
The tail a Tow Hook attached!!
This one was very likely to be used towing DSF assault gliders.

[ATTACH=CONFIG]260320[/ATTACH]

Surely comparisons can be drawn with the Bf109E retrieved from India (and then squirrelled away) in recent years. That was a gift to an Indian benefactor, and didn’t the Fellowship of the Bellows, which I think was Argentinian based, fund a number of Whirlwinds so by the same accord, a Stuka and / or other EA could easily have been sent to Argentina as a gift.

I recall people questioned the rumours of a 109 mouldering away in India but it was proved to be correct. I wouldn’t be too hasty in discounting this particular rumour either.

We didn’t send them a Whirlwind as well when they were withdrawn did we?

I’d go along with a miss-identification of F-4U hulks but anything’s possible, just check-out some of the’old junk’ you lot have horded just ‘because’ 😉

Argentina placed an order for 100 F4 Meteors in May 1947, becoming the first foreign operator of the type; does that really sound like a country that would have any serious operational use for a handful of clapped-out ‘Stukas’?

I’m not falling into any trap, just raising the fact that the movement of arms doesn’t have to be legal and above board and nicely documented and recorded. On the subject of obsolescence, both the French air force and the air component of the BEF had fighters in 1940 when the Stuka was staggeringly successful. Ground forces without a standing CAP would as you say be vulnerable to just about any attacking aircraft including the Ju 87.

Hi
As in my previous post about crashed a/c
maybe they were only for static fund raising during ww2 and not for operational use
then the possibility of axis a/c in south american scrapyards make more sense as they wouldnt have bothered shipping them back to the UK after fund raising ended
jerry

snibble…The Stuka would have been obsolete against any opposition that had any fighters…or even an armed trainers of the T-6 class…which most nations had in the 40s.
If the enemy had no air arm to defend itself from air attack, then just about any aircraft would have made a suitable attack bomber.

It wasn’t the wild west down there. The U.S. limited arms exports to the region to prevent an arms race and I wouldn’t be shocked if other countries did as well, meaning shipments would have to have been clandestine (and likely expensive).

Although Stukas could have been spirited out of Europe, the fact remains they would have been vulnerable to any enemy air opposition and very hard to support.

The only “evidence” of Stukas is the reported scrapped sitting as seen in the OP, no other reports, photos or histories seem to exist.

Don’t fall into the TIGHAR trap by thinking that just because something is possible, that it actually happened…despite lack of evidence or likelyhood.

So what is the current situation regarding Stuka projects?
Cees

Been tried, but only made it to the border

There is a fair chunk of Stuka in Yugoslavia.

Easily enough to form a project.

Getting it out however is a problem.

Bruce

The windscreen looks to be Stuka as well.
Cees

Wasnt Argentinia rumoured to be the birthplace of the Fourth Reich?Many Germans supposedly fled there after the war..

Perhaps something to do with an illegal arms deal? I have no problem with the notion of obsolete warplanes being in unlikely places whilst some shady individual does a deal with some nascent republic or independence movement. Also, a stuka is only obsolete against the right opposition, a road convoy defended only by small arms would have been as vulnerable in 1950 as 1940.

Interesting point about the possibility of using German technology to help local industry…remember Kurt Tank worked for the national aircraft builder and designed aircraft.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/FMA_IAe_33_Pulqui_II

Still, with a designer like Tank around, I’m not sure how a mid-30s design would help them

I wouldn’t dismiss the possibility of something like this being in Argentina so lighty. If you look through the inventory of the Argentinian national aero collection there’s a significant number of items which shouldn’t be there because they’ve no connection with what saw service in that part of the world. I also remember that a very good BMW801 came out of Southern Brazil in the early 90’s;- How did it get there?

I understand that after WW2, items of aero technology were “collected” by Argentina to study in an effort to kick start their local aero industry. There were large quantities of this material quite readily available in Europe, Europe needed food and Argentina had plenty of Beef.

The seat is Stuka. I’ve got a bit of one that matches the photo

Alodining looks right for Stuka.[ATTACH=CONFIG]260247[/ATTACH]

Here is the tail of the Belgrade Stuka that I took poking around the stores in 1990.

These parts may also be Stuka, looking at the stringers.

Mark