VF-11 Thunderbolt

The VF-11 Thunderbolt is a fictional variable fighter in the Macross storyline. The VF-11 was designed and created as the replacement unit for the VF-4 Lightning III variable fighter. It began to enter widespread UN Spacy service in 2030 as the UN spacy's main variable fighter. It was deployed with long-distance immigration fleets, colonial defense forces, and deep outer space fleets. The VF-11 is an aerodynamic update and improvement of the VF-1 Valkyrie, the world's first Variable Fighter, introduced 22 years earlier. Unlike the VF-1, the VF-11 did not have known "ace" and "commander" variants.

However, in continuing conflicts with alien enemy units such as the rogue Zentradi "enemy battlesuits" seen in Macross Plus, the decision was made to find a replacement for the fighter. Thus the Project Super Nova competition was created to select the next-generation advanced variable fighter (analogous to the 20th century Advanced Tactical Fighter competition). Two variable fighter designs, the General Galaxy YF-21 and Shinsei Industries YF-19 were selected to compete in the 2040 competition. After the Sharon Apple incident at Macross City, the YF-19 was selected for production as the VF-19 Excalibur. Five years later, the VF-11 was still the mainstay variable fighter although the production VF-19F started to replace it.

The story behind the canards on the VF-11 is an interesting one. Though the canards would slow down the fighter in an atmosphere, it did have the added benefit of increasing maneuverability. Captain Milia Jenius of the Eagle Nest Aerial Tactics Center supported the canard feature with passion. This led to the production of two prototypes: VF-X-11 No.1 without the canards and VF-X-11 No. 2 with canards.

Captain Jenius piloted the VF-X-11 No. 2 in a rescue operation of a UN chief advisor. The data collected on the VF-X-11 No. 2 used in the rescue operation led to the introduction of the canards.