Armée de l'Air (French Air Force) Wall Art

Armée de l'Air (French Air Force) — 2 museum-grade prints from this operator. Dassault Aviation developed the Mirage F1 in the late 1960s as a swept-wing successor to the delta Mirage III, entering Armée de l'Air service in 1973 with the Mirage F1C all-weather interceptor equipped with Thomson-CSF Cyrano IV radar and Matra Super 530 air-to-air missiles. Reims-Champagne Air Base (BA 112 Marin la Meslée) became the first operational Mirage F1 station in France and remained central to Savoie squadron history for decades. Dassault designed the Rafale as a true omnirole platform — air superiority, deep strike, reconnaissance, and nuclear-deterrence escort from a single airframe family sharing the delta-canard layout and SNECMA M88 twin-engine package. On 27 June 2006, EC 1/7 Provence at Saint-Dizier became the first Armée de l'Air squadron to fly the Rafale operationally, fielding both Rafale B and C variants as Jaguar units stood down.

Updated 14 Jun 2026