U.S. Marines Buy 22 F-5s From Switzerland

The Marine Corps paid a little less than $1.5 million each for the Cold War speedsters, which will now be used as adversarial training aircraft.

Russ Niles

Wednesday, March 20, 2024 at 09:54 AM ET

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Edited By: tccjeremy

F-5 Tiger tactical fighter. [Courtesy: Northrop Grumman]

Key Takeaways:

The U.S. Marine Corps is acquiring 22 Cold War-era Northrop F-5 Tigers from the Swiss Air Force.
These supersonic interceptors, whose design is 65 years old, will serve as adversarial training aircraft for the Marines.
Each F-5 Tiger was purchased for less than $1.5 million, with the first unit already transported to the U.S.

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The U.S. Marine Corps’ latest airplane acquisition is a supersonic interceptor that first flew off the drawing board 65 years ago.

The Marines are buying 22 Northrup F-5 Tigers from the Swiss Air Force. The first one was loaded on a C-130 on March 18 for the trip back to the U.S., where it will live out the rest of its service life as an adversarial training aircraft along with the others in the sale.