In early May 1934, despite Germany being under a prohibition from the development of new military aircraft, the Reichsluftfahrtministerium (RLM) issued a request for a new single-seat monoplane fighter under the guise that the proposal was for creating a new 'sports plane'.

The Blitz was a single-engine, four-passenger aircraft originally designed for use by Lufthansa, and it, in turn, was inspired by the famous Lockheed Model 9 Orion mail plane.

Like many civilian designs of the time, the aircraft was pressed into military service and was used as a two-seat bomber (although mostly for reconnaissance) and served in this role in Spain.

Ernst Heinkel's He 112 submission was a scaled-down version of the He 70, a fast mail plane, sharing numerous features with it including; an all-metal construction – including its oval cross-section fuselage and two spar monoplane wings which were covered with flush-head rivets and stressed metal skin-, similar inverted semi-elliptical gull wings and retractable landing gear.

[5][6] The wide track of the undercarriage, a result of having outward retraction from the low point of the wing's gull-bend[citation needed], gave the aircraft excellent ground handling for take-off and landing.

The thick high-lift aerofoil and open cockpit of the He 112 generated more drag than the Bf 109, causing its performance to suffer despite being equipped with an identical engine.

The other two competing aircraft, the Arado Ar 80 and the parasol wing Focke-Wulf Fw 159, had problems and performed badly compared to the Bf 109 and the He 112; they were eliminated from any serious consideration.

That design was the Bf 109, which in addition to demonstrating better performance, was considerably easier to build due to fewer compound curves and simpler construction throughout.

In October 1936, the RLM changed the orders for the zero series 112s, instructing Heinkel to complete any A-0s already under construction and then switch the remaining aircraft to an updated design.

Due to the shortage of just about any German engine at the time and the possibility that advanced versions could be blocked for export, various models had to be designed with different installations.

[17] Spain was so impressed with the He 112's performance during evaluation in the civil war that the Spanish Air Force purchased the 12 aircraft in early 1938, and later increased the order by another six (some sources say five).

A similar setback would accompany sales efforts targeting the Dutch Air Force, which was looking to purchase 36 fighters to form two new squadrons.

In June 1938, three pilots of the Magyar Királyi Honvéd Légierö (Royal Hungarian Home Defense Air Force or MKHL) were sent to Heinkel to study V9.

Many maintained that an aircraft driven by a tail thrust would experience a change in the centre of gravity and flip over but Ernst Heinkel offered support and provided an He 112 fuselage shell less wings for standing tests.

Late in 1936 Erich Warsitz was seconded by the RLM to Wernher von Braun and Ernst Heinkel, because he had been recognized as one of the most experienced test pilots of the time, and because he also was technically proficient.

[21] For tests, the RLM lent Neuhardenberg, a large field about 70 kilometres east of Berlin, listed as a reserve airfield in the event of war.

[24] The subsequent flights with the He 112 used the Walter-rocket instead of von Braun's; it was more reliable, simpler to operate and the dangers to test pilot Erich Warsitz and the machine were less.

In August 1938, the armed forces were re-formed, and with Austria (historically her partner for centuries) being incorporated into Germany, Hungary found herself in the German sphere.

Shipments of the Jumo 211 or DB 601 were not even able to fulfil German needs; export of the engine for locally built airframes was likewise out of the question.

By September, the ongoing negotiations with the RLM for the license to build the engines locally stalled, and as a result, the MKHL ordered Manfred-Weiss to stop tooling up for the production line aircraft.

In the summer of 1939, possibly as a result of the He 112B deal having difficulties, it was planned to switch the production lines to build a Hungarian-designed aircraft called the Weiss Manfréd WM-23 Ezüst Nyíl ("Silver Arrow").

The fuselage was made of plywood over a welded steel tube frame, and the engine was a 768 kW (1,030 hp) Weiss Manfréd WM K-14B; a licensed derivative of the Gnome-Rhône Mistral-Major radial.

The Japanese flew the A7He1 briefly during the Second Sino-Japanese War but phased it out of service before the attack on Pearl Harbor in December 1941 in favor of the Mitsubishi A6M Zero.

Looking to secure Romania as an ally, throughout the middle of the 1930s, Germany applied increasing pressure in a variety of forms, best summed up as the "carrot and stick" approach.

Later that month, German and Italian foreign ministers met with Romanian diplomats in Vienna and presented them with an ultimatum to accept the ceding of northern Transylvania to Hungary.

Late in April, a group of Romanian pilots arrived at Heinkel for conversion training, which went slowly because of the advanced nature of the He 112 in comparison to the PZL P.11.

Two of the aircraft were lost, one in a fatal accident during training in Germany on 7 September, and another suffered minor damage on landing while being delivered and was later repaired at SET in Romania.

Losses were heavy, most not due to combat, but simply because the aircraft were flying an average of three missions a day and were not receiving adequate maintenance.

The inline engine and general layout of the German designs were considered similar enough to make it useful in this role, and as a result the He 112s came under the control of the Corpul 3 Aerian (3rd Air Corps).

Data from Messerschmitt Bf 109: The Design and Operational History,[4] Aircraft of the Luftwaffe, 1935–1945: An Illustrated Guide[15]General characteristics Performance Armament