In the early 1950s, neutral Sweden set out to build a supersonic interceptor unlike anything else in the world — a fighter with a strange, folded ‘double-delta’ wing. It was such a radical idea that no one could be sure the shape would even fly safely at low speed. So before betting a national fighter programme on it, Saab built a little one to find out.

That aircraft was the Saab 210, affectionately nicknamed the ‘Lilldraken’ — the Little Dragon — and it quietly made one of the most important aircraft of the Cold War possible.

A flying scale model

Under designer Erik Bratt, Saab was pursuing a double-delta layout: a sharply swept inner wing blended into a less-swept outer wing, giving good high-speed performance and internal volume without a tail. On paper it was brilliant. In reality, no one knew how such a planform would handle at the slow speeds of takeoff and landing.

The answer was the Type 210: a roughly 70%-scale research aircraft, about 20 feet long, powered by a modest Armstrong Siddeley Adder turbojet. Test pilot Bengt Olow took it up for the first time on 21 January 1952.

887 flights to prove a wing

Over hundreds of flights, the Lilldraken explored the double-delta’s behaviour across the flight envelope — especially the low-speed regime everyone worried about. It handled well.

From little dragon to full dragon

The data flowed straight into the full-size fighter: the Saab 35 Draken, which entered service in the late 1950s, reached Mach 2, and became one of Europe’s most distinctive and capable Cold War interceptors. Its unmistakable silhouette — that same double-delta — came directly from the little jet that tested it first.

The Lilldraken never fired a shot or set a record. It did something quieter and arguably more valuable: it removed the doubt. Sometimes the most important aircraft is the small one that proves the big one will work.

Sources: Saab; Vintage Aviation News; Flygvapenmuseum; Wikipedia.