Quote:
Originally Posted by Schroeder
Does anybody know why this plane has two national emblems which are getting in the way of each other? 
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The A-1 had three dive brakes one on each side of the fuselage just aft of the wings and on the bottom of the fuselage also just aft of the wings.What you are seeing is the side air brakes being deployed the national emblem happens to be painted on the side air brakes.Of course the A-1 when used in Korea and Vietnam rarely ever used the dive brakes it had been designed to be a pure dive bomber that concept faded from use after WWII for the most part.
The A-1 is iffy it was a WWII design but never flew anywhere near a combat or even a supportive situation during WWII.From a technical stand point to me at least that makes it not eligible.It missed the war by over a year as well because it did not enter service with the Navy until December 1946.The A-1 also performed all of its dirty work in Korea and Vietnam in those two wars it more than made up for what it theatricality missed.In a strange way the end of WWII actually saved the A-1 because the Navy needed something to replace its Curtis Helldivers and Avengers planes that served well but where obsolete for post war combat.
I put the A-1 in the same category as the F7F and F8F early post war aircraft even though they where designed during the war and both the F7F and F8F both became active in the last few months of the war it was too late for any of them to see combat they never got a chance to prove their worth until seeing use in other wars.