1.3 KiB
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Private Organization | Dassault is the French aerospace company that jointly developed the Jericho I missile with Israel under a 1963 $100 million contract, providing France's key role in the early Israeli ballistic missile program. | 1929 | Vaucresson, France |
Dassault Company is a French aerospace company. In 1963, Israel paid $100 million to Dassault for the joint development and manufacture of twenty-five medium-range Israeli missiles, which would become known as the Jericho I. These missiles were anticipated to be capable of delivering a miniaturized nuclear warhead to targets three hundred miles away.1
By 1963, the Dassault Company was involved in the joint development and manufacture of the Jericho I missile system with Israel. This missile was designed to deliver a miniaturized nuclear warhead to targets three hundred miles away.1
Charles de Gaulle claimed to newsmen that he had not known of Dassault's contract with Israel until the first field test in 1967 of the Jericho I, although the French firm continued to work with Israelis on the missile program for another year.1
Footnotes
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Hersh, Seymour M. The Samson Option: Israel's Nuclear Arsenal and American Foreign Policy. Random House, 1991. Chapter 3, 9, 13. ↩︎