Quote:The appearance of turbojets during the 40s allowed the design of airplanes capable of flying at Mach 0.7, although only Germany had carried out theoretical studies on the behaviour of swept wings at high speeds.
By mid-1944 the Oberkommando der Luftwaffe (OKL) had to accept that the Messerschmitt Me 262, specifically designed as heavy fighter to destroy bombers, left a lot to be desired when used in dogfight against the conventional Allied fighters. To overcome these deficiencies, the OKL announced to the German aeronautical industry the emergency fighter contest Jägernotprogramm.
The Blohm und Voss Company had specialized in the construction of flying boats and lacked experience in the design of fighters but was forced to participate in all competitions to ensure its existence in difficult times. The firm invested a considerable amount of research and development work in a highly unusual scissors-tail configuration. The outboard elevator surfaces also served simultaneously as ailerons and allowed the landing flaps to extend across a greater part of the wingspan.
It was expected that the minimum "batwing" surface and lowest overall weight would allow to reach high speeds. But the flight control of a "batwing" airplane at high speed was above the technical capabilities of 1944. That was only achieved when having the Boeing computer controlled Bird of Prey in 1996.