Seversky 2-PA "Guardsman" Export Fighter
Model Airplane News Cover Art for March, 1937
by Jo Kotula
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In 1937, Seversky developed a two-seat export version of the P-35 fighter. Designated the 2PA "Guardsman", two were sold to the Soviet Union (and possibly ended up in Spain), twenty to Japan and 52 to Sweden. The Japanese 2PAs were designated the A8V and saw combat in China. Only two of the 52 Swedish aircraft made it to Sweden. The remaining 50 were used by the U.S. Army Air Corps as advanced trainers (designated AT-11).

Seversky 2-PA "Guardsman" Export Fighter
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Here is a video of the AT-11, the domestic counterpart of the Seversky 2-PA "Guardsman" Export Fighter in action:

The "Guardsman" (or the P-35) appeared in great quantity on the October 15, 1938 issue of Liberty Magazine, a weekly that appealed to the solid middle class. Jo Kotula did a masterful job of portraying an echelon of P-35s (or P2As) that reinforced the headline "We need 4,000 New Fighters." While this was, in fact, the case, the argument cut little ice with isolationist America. At the time, Seversky was regarded as a publicity hound. Shortly after the article appeared, his board of directors soon kicked him out of his own company, renaming it Republic Aviation.

  

We need 4,000 New Fighters -- that are bulletproof!
(left) Cover of the October 15, 1938 issue of Liberty Magazine
Art by Jo Kotula
(right) The P-35 in the February, 1938 Popular Mechanics
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Parenthetically, the "Whizzer White" mentioned at the bottom of the cover is All-American Byron White, later appointed to the Supreme Court by President Kennedy.

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