Curtiss P-6S Hawk

In October 1929, the Cuban Air Force ordered three Curtiss P-6S, variant P-6 equipped with a Pratt&Whitney Wasp. At that time, the Cuban Air Force was undergoing reconstruction under the leadership of the mission of US Captain Rosenham Bean, and several years earlier it consisted of only a few Curtiss JN-4D (literally rotten - at the command of Captain Bean they were immediately burned) and barely airworthy DH-4M-1. The choice of engine was not accidental, at the same time were also ordered reconnaissance Voughty O2U-1A Corsair, which also used Waspy, and Wright star engines also had training Consolidated PT-3, on which Cuban pilots trained. Wasps also used the US Army P-3A and naval F6C-4, so the possibility of building Wasp in Hawk was sufficiently tested. Bean, who initiated the purchase of the Hawks, even in an effort to get the best possible machine for the money, persuaded the US Air Force to compare tests between the P-6S and P-12. Paradoxically, the US Air Force did not recommend the purchase of Hawks in Cuba due to the fact that they have not yet been sufficiently tested in operation. Nevertheless, Cuba took over the machines in January 1930. Given the designations (Hawks were supposed to use the numbers 9, 10, 15, 16 and 18), it is even likely that they bought at least two other machines. The Hawks, along with the Corsairs, stood at the beginning of the Cuban Air Force boom, and it was probably the first variant of the Hawks (due to the peaceful service of the Chileans P-1A), which received a sharp deployment. In August 1931, a small group of revolutionaries landed near the city of Gibara, but they were quickly suppressed by the Cuban air force - three alleged machines, two Corsairs and Hawk No. 16 depicted above, destroyed by ground fire. The remaining machines served in two mixed squadrons (Cuba did not even have more) along with the Corsairs and were probably scrapped in the first half of the 1930s. In 1933, other Hawks were added, this time an export variant Hawk II.


The Cuban Hawks probably flew with an aluminum-colored fuselage, with the upper surfaces of the wings and horizontal tail surfaces painted yellow-orange.


The machine bought by the Japanese company Mitsubishi is sometimes mentioned as a P-6S, but it has a Conqueror engine in the photos and is therefore probably an export P-6.