This is the French R-550 Magic, a High-Explosive-Fragmentation (HE-Frag), aircraft-launched, Infrared-Homing (IRH), short-range, Air-to-Air-Missile (AAM) programme started as a private venture by Matra (now Matra BAe Dynamics, part of EADS) to produce a missile to compete with the American AIM-9 Sidewinder.
The missile carries a HE-Frag warhead initiated by contact and IR-Proximity (IR-PRX) fuzing (Magic I) or contact and RF-Proximity (RF-PRX) fuzing (Magic II).
The missile was presented for the first time at the 1971 Paris Air Show and following a series of drop trials, the first guided launch took place in 1972.
Deliveries of pre-production R550 Magic 1 missiles to the French-Air-Force for evaluation trials started in 1974 and full series production began in 1975.
Magic 1 was limited to tail-aspect engagements only by the lack of sensitivity of the IR detector.
An improved version, Magic 2, entered development in the late 1970s and entered service in 1985.
Magic 2 has many improvements over Magic 1, but principally has an all-aspect engagement capability and it takes less time to prepare the missiles for launch.
