IN THIS EDITION of the Aeroplane Collectors' Archive, we take a look at some of the most iconic fighter aircraft from the Cold War era. Of course, the era that is now known as the Cold War stretched over a period of decades during which great advances were made in the design and manufacture of military aircraft. When the Cold War began, the world had barely entered the jet age. By the time that it ended, our skies were occupied by complex, digitally-controlled masterpieces of computerized technology that can hardly be compared to the simple fighting machines of the 1950s. In Britain, the dark days of the Cold War saw the Royal Air Force still adjusting to peacetime conditions, after the long, grim years of World War Two. Only seven years had passed since the critical summer of 1940, when Spitfires and Hurricanes had battled the Luftwaffe in the skies over Southern England. In terms of equipment and capability, little had changed in those seven years. The RAF's fighters had soldiered on, sometimes modified, sometimes redesigned quite considerably, but little different to those that had fought in the Battle of Britain. But by 1947 the jet age had dawned and the Gloster Meteor was now coming into service, and the days of the piston-engine, propeller-driven fighter were coming to and end.
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