History

In the mid 1970s, both the French Air Force (Armée de l'Air) and Navy (Aéronavale) had a requirement (the Navy's being rather more pressing) to find a new generation of fighter (principally to replace AdlA Jaguars and Aéronavale Crusaders), and their requirements were similar enough to be merged into one project. This requirement was initially to be met by the Future European Fighter Aircraft (F/EFA) involving Britain, France, Germany, Italy and Spain.

Differences soon emerged in the project, carrier capability was specific to France only and while France wanted an offensive ground-attack aircraft with secondary air-to-air role the other nations had air-to-air as their primary mission, with varying interest in a secondary air-to-ground role. Dassault was authorised to work on a technology demonstrator in 1983 named the Rafale ("Squall"). The final divergence came in 1985, following French demands for far ranging control of the F/EFA project, including all senior roles within the joint company. France announced its intention to leave the project and committed to the national Rafale. Its former partners continued their collaboration on what was to become the Eurofighter Typhoon.

The Rafale A technology demonstrator was rolled out in late 1985 and made its maiden flight on 4 July 1986, two months ahead of the British Aerospace EAP technology demonstrator which formed the basis of the Eurofighter. The SNECMA M88 engines being developed were not considered sufficiently mature for the initial trials programme to be conducted without risk (though their development status has often been underplayed), so the demonstrator flew with General Electric F404-GE-400 afterburning turbofans as used on the F/A-18 Hornet. The demonstrator impressed the French Ministry of Defence enough to place production orders in 1988.

Source: Wikipedia