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Marcel Dassault
1892–1986
By Thomas v. Jones
Marcel Dassault died on April 18, 1986, in Paris at the age of ninety-four.
The father of French aviation and a graduate of that nation's first aeronautical
engineering school, Dassault was the longtime director of Avions Marcel
Dassault-Breguet Aviation, one of Europe's largest aviation companies. In that
capacity, he created and produced such high-performance combat aircraft as the
Mystère and delta-winged Mirage, a family of planes that today is among the
most respected and widely operated fighter-bombers in the world. Dassault also
made important contributions to commercial aviation with his Falcon family of
executive transport jets.
From 1951 until his death, Marcel Dassault served as a member of the
French Parliament. He held France's highest military award, the Grand Cross of
the French Legion of Honor. He was elected a foreign associate of the National
Academy of Engineering in 1976 for his "remarkable achievements in the design
and development of new aircraft for military and commercial use."
Marcel Dassault's vision and extraordinary engineering talents helped to
shape the first century of aviation history. He was a true pioneer whose
imagination, persistence, and management of advanced aerospace technology are
indelibly blended into the tricolor banner of the French nation. Despite
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the formidable obstacles and great personal dangers encountered in his ninety-
four years, Marcel Dassault remained a man of uncommon strength and
unwavering principle with a deep faith in the idea that technology and
commitment can overcome almost any challenge.
Born in Paris on January 22, 1892, Dassault developed an early interest in
design and scientific inquiry. At the age of nineteen, he received a degree in
electrical engineering and then began to specialize in the new, little-known field
of aeronautics.
In the years just prior to World War I, Dassault put his technical skills and
aviation ideas to work in the service of the French Corps of Engineers. He was
selected to improve the design studies of the Caudron G-3 biplane and, later, to
manage its manufacture. He also developed new designs for more efficient
propellers. By 1916 he was producing them, first for the Caudron G-3 and then
for the Hélice Eclair, the Spad credited with giving French fliers a distinct flying
advantage during World War I.
After World War I, Dassault set out to fulfill a dream that had begun in the
courtyard of his primary school with his first glimpse of an airplane circling the
Eiffel Tower. French aviation was about to begin in earnest, and Dassault
gathered a small team of design engineers and housed them in an old furniture
factory. Soon he had built up a highly successful aviation company, Avions
Marcel Dassault-Breguet Aviation, to the point at which the French government
nationalized his operations in 1936. In 1940 he produced the Languedoc 61, a
four-engine civil transport plane. A somber shadow was cast on its maiden
voyage, however: The Germans marched into Paris, and the occupation of France
began.
Authorities in Nazi Germany's aviation industry quickly offered Dassault a
position to design and build a fleet of aircraft in exchange for his personal freedom
and protection. He defied the German high command, however, and refused their
offer, spending the war years first in Vichy prisons and then at the Buchenwald
concentration camp. At Buchenwald,
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he contracted diphtheria, and post-diphtheria paralysis plagued him throughout
the remainder of his life. When the death camp was liberated on April 19, 1945,
Dassault was frail and weak, but his dream was as strong as ever.
With great courage and a fierce determination, Dassault began again, his
first project the design and production of the Ouragan, Europe's first jet. Later he
introduced the first European plane to break the sound barrier, the Mystère IV,
which was followed by the Mirage III, the plane that opened the era of Mach 2
aircraft. The Dassault Mirage, with its pure aerodynamic shape, high
performance, and uncompromising attention to detail, became the standard for
modern French combat aircraft.
The rest is legend. With the introduction of the Mirage III in 1956, France
began to meet its military aircraft requirements solely through domestic
production. Today, it remains the only European nation with an air force
equipped entirely with domestically built aircraft. In addition, Dassault's Mirage
family of combat fighters remains one of France's best export successes. By 1986
Avions Marcel Dassault-Breguet Aviation had built six thousand aircraft for
sixty-one countries.
Dassault's contributions extend far beyond military aviation. His
commercial business jets are noted for both performance and reliability, and his
leadership and industrial management skills enabled Avions Marcel Dassault-
Breguet Aviation to bring France to the forefront of the European manned
spaceplane program. Always active in French politics, Dassault served his
country for thirty years, as a Gaulist deputy and as a senator for the Union des
Démocrats pour la République.
In 1967 Marcel Dassault was honored with the Grand Cross of the French
Legion of Honor, the nation's highest military award. He was also presented with
the croix de guerre 1939–1945 for extraordinary wartime service.
In paying tribute to Marcel Dassault, we also pay tribute to that small band
of original aviation explorers whose ingenuity
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and perseverance enabled the discovery of practical, enduring solutions to
previously intractable aviation engineering difficulties. Dassault was an industrial
giant, an engineer of exceptional capability, and an aviation genius. Yet most
important, he was an inspiration, a resilient man whose courage and insight,
genius and spirit served the engineering profession, his country, and his fellow
man with extraordinary distinction.
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