By Alistair Bunkall, Defence Correspondent
France has overtaken Britain as the second biggest contributor to the air campaign against Islamic State, Sky News can reveal.
The UK government has long claimed that position but since the arrival of French aircraft carrier Charles de Gaulle in the Gulf last month, the French are putting up more planes on more sorties over Iraq.
French warplanes now fly between 12 and 15 sorties a day, more than three times the amount of RAF jets.
There are more than four times as many French fighter jets involved in the campaign.
The Charles de Gaulle has 21 onboard:12 Rafale and nine Super Etendard; and a further 15 are based on land in Jordan and the UAE.
The UK, in contrast, has eight Tornados based at RAF Akrotiri in Cyprus. They fly an average of two sorties a day, in pairs.
The Tornados are supported by a Voyager refuelling aircraft, which also contributes to the French mission when needed.
The French also have considerably more personnel assigned to the campaign: 3,200 compared to 500 from the UK.
Sky News research undermines David Cameron's repeated claim that Britain is the major partner to the United States in the air effort.
Only last week he told an audience "the second largest contributor in terms of airstrikes and air patrols is Britain by a very large margin. I think you have to add up several other countries to get to the scale of what we're doing".
French officials told Sky News they do not see it as a competition but consider their military to be the second biggest contributor, not the RAF.
In response, the Ministry of Defence said British planes had carried out a greater number of airstrikes.
"We have been focussing our military contribution where it can have the most impact - airstrikes in support of Iraqi forces, providing vital intelligence, surveillance and air-to-air refuelling capabilities to the coalition.
"We continue to fly daily Reaper and Tornado missions and our Voyagers routinely refuel coalition aircraft, including French."
The international coalition has been flying missions over Iraq and Syria for 31 weeks.
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Gallery: Iraq: British Jets Launch First Combat Mission
British jets armed with missiles have taken off on their maiden combat mission over northern Iraq
Two Tornado GR4 fighter jets left RAF Akrotiri in Cyprus on Saturday morning, the day after MPs approved airstrikes against Islamic State targets in Iraq
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