The Fokker G-1 was a twin-engined heavy fighter operated by the Royal Dutch Air Force. The aircraft was manned by a pilot and a gunner/observer, housed in the central nacelle, and was armed with eight forward-firing 7.7mm (0.303) and a single rear-firing gun of the same caliber.
The aircraft was intended fot the role "air cruiser", which in the same years was also the inspiration for the Bf-110 Zerstorer. The concept was to join in a single plane the speed of a single-engine fighter and the long range of a bomber, thus creating an aicraft capable of penetrating deep inside enemy airspace, without a fighter escort, and also able to fight back enemy fighters.
On 10 May 1940, when the German launched the Blitzkrieg against France and the Low Countries, 23 G-1s were on service in Dutch squadrons. Around 20 aircraft were destroyed on the ground, so a previous order of fighters for the Spanish Air Force was confiscated, and two units, 4th JaVa and 3rd JaVa fought against the odds, strafing advancing german columns and attacking enemy aicraft. Source are rare and innacurate, but some of them claims the Fokker G-1 might have shot down 10-15 enemies.
Several G-1s were captured by the Germans and tested. On 5 May 1941 Hidde Leegstra, a Fokker test pilot, and Pier Vos, a member of the company's board, managed to escape with their fighter to England while on a test flight. Their aircraft survived the wat, but was unfortunatelly scrapped in 1945.
