Thanks!

john- yeah but they may have killed heaps germens later with bombing off Dresden/ other . Should hav given them a mercy kill.

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*Bf-109

@@davidewhite69 This has been beaten to death. BF-109 is the 'more correct' name but considering even the Luftwaffe and Messerschmitt used ME and BF interchangably, both should be considered accurate. There are parts literally on the plane that call it a ME-109

@@davidewhite69 German pilots didn't say Bf 109, they said "Die (The) Me" or "Me Hundertneun (109)". Believe me, they told me so (RIP guys!). Official names were BFW Bf 109, Messerschmitt Bf 109 or BFW Me 109. To honor Willy Messerschmitt the official name was at last Messerschmitt Bf 109.

Wasn't he in JG 26?

Glad you enjoyed it

Thanks!

tell me his history.

I think you may be referring to Hans Joachim Marseilles, who shot down 158 aircraft (all his opponents being British and Commnwealth pilots and aircrew), and he was known as The Star of Africa. He wasn't a card-carrying member of the Nazi Party but loved flying - even though he was a shaky pilot at the beginning of his career. Galland rated him as the best fighter pilot in the entire Luftwaffe. Marseilles, against orders, had an African POW as his batman. He also loved jazz music - which Hiter and his Party loathed - and would play "Rumba Azul" over and over in his tent. He was an individualist and was known for his insubordination and playboy lifestyle. Until he was ordered to stop, he also took pains to ensure his opponents were well treated and personally dropped notes on their airfields to inform the RAF of their condition. Marseilles was killed when the cockpit of his Me-109 G2 (a model of Messerschmitt he disliked) was filled with smoke, causing him to bail out. As he left the aircraft, his left chest slammed into the vertical tail fin, which both lacerated his chest and most likely knocked him unconscious. As a result, he fell to his death. Later, they built a pyramid over the spot where he was found. Today, people still visit the pyramid - on it is written one word: UNDEFEATED.

The 🌟 of Africa

When Hans Ulrich Rudel was in flight classes for the Luftwaffe the instructor told the class if he ever heard of one of the students firing on someone in a parachute, he would kill them himself.

Source, please ?! If he really comes from Clostermann, that doesn't add much credibility to his scripts ... (in fact, he looks more like a novelist to me than a chronicler). To my knowledge, this bad episode was reported with pride by a certain Major David Schilling (not that of the Flying Tigers), after he shot a 262 pilot in a parachute, without subsequently receiving any reprimand from his companions on the ground. You can find it in W.W.E. Samuel's "American Raiders for Luftwaffe Secrets" (free Kindle excerpt, location 386 ).

@@sergiogregorat1830 do you speak french? I can find the interview for you but it's not in English? What do you mean ? He's the top scoring french ace of WW2, he flew spits and tempest and ended the war squadron leader, not in a free french squadron but a regular RAF tempest squadron, not many foreigners achieve that kind of level in the RAF.

@@matydrum Thanks for the reply. I don't speak French (not even English, as you can appreciate, but Google works wonders ...), I read Le Grand Cirque (La Grande Giostra in Italian) in 1959, enjoing the non-fanatic tones of the narrative, but at the same time remaining rather dubious on some incidents (for example the crash landing of a companion and his subsequent horrible burning death). It was my first chance to get to know new types of aircraft, on both sides (Typhoon, Tempest, Long Nose Doras, Ar 232, Do 335). Yet to this day, I can't understand why the author confuses Nowotny with that other Luftwaffe ace (Oesau? Ostermann?) who saved some Allied POWs from being shot.

@@sergiogregorat1830 I don't see what's so extraordinary about his friend burning in the cockpit, unfortunately that happened. Also his book is quite famous, he would have been called out on that if it didn't happened. They are however things in the book that he got wrong, and he also talks about it in that long interview, he says for exemple that he claimed a long nose fw 190 in a place and at a time in the war where he found out later that it was not possible. He chose to leave it " because it was from his war diary and wanted to leave it as he lived it". By the way his friend Jaques Reminger, the guy who shot Romel's car in Normandy, who flew a lot as his wing man, survived the war too and there are some interviews of him as well.

I agree. Thank you

i agree, i have the utmost respect for any airman in WW2, allied or axis.

My grandmother was a young girl living in Liverpool, England during the bombing raids of WWII. Years later, after marrying my USAF airman grandfather, she would at some point, not only be living on a U.S. airbase in Germany, but one of her neighbors was the Germany-born wife of another USAF airman. My grandmother and the neighbor, from what I'm told, got along just fine as neighbors despite their respective birth-country's relatively recent, wartime-adversary relationship.

@@skyden24195 Wow yeah. My German grandmother left Nuremburg as a refugee the day before it got firebombed, then married my grandfather who was an American from the signal corps. Her uncle died on the eastern front and my other grandfather flew corsairs and hellcats in the Pacific. So wild. Guess some good came of it because we're here huh?

@@derekzimmermann2551 lol. Apologies, as I understand there are not so humorous events mentioned in your comment, but that last part about us being here really made me laugh, and not just because the statement itself is funny. Understanding the history of how I came to be (so to speak) I've long since considered myself the product of two wars: WWII, due my grandparents meeting each other in the aftermath. The other war being Vietnam, which forced my dad to enlist and get accepted into the USAF. My dad would be assigned to the same US air base that my USAF grandfather was assigned to. That, if you haven't guessed, would be where my dad would eventually meet my mom.

The ghost planes class: p40 warhawk

Already have one! Making another soon.

Well, it's not that simple. Just a clarification, based on the Geneva convention if I may: - Firing at a pilot after he bailed out of his airplane is illegal and considered as a war crime since he is not able to fight anymore, so to speak. - On the other hand, firing at paratroopers (or their transport planes) is "legal" since thses paratroopers are on the way to the fight. I'm not saying what is right or wrong: that's just the way it is, "technically" speaking. Regarding Franz Barten, it's clearly a war crime. For Koppen as well, the difference being that usually, when you bail out just on top the people you were straffing seconds before, it's very rare to be welcome with flowers. These people on the ground have a tendancy to be angry, especially if they just lost some friends. So it should not happen but... There are conventions but chivalrous behaviour is outdated, to say the least. Keep in mind that war is pure hell, nothing else.

Possibly, but I suspect it had less to do with seeing themselves as "knights of the air" and a lot more to do with seeing themselves, in a parachute, being shot at by enemy fighters. What goes around comes around.

I remember a story told by an American fighter pilot who said he witnessed a German pilot going from parachute to parachute of downed bomber airmen and blasting them out of the sky and so when the American finally shot the German down and he had to bail he returned the favor and blasted him into another dimension while in his parachute

@@grapegrishnahk8930 Possibly one of the most far fetched stories to come out of the war. Frankly, just absurd nonsense. If you understood anything about late-war air combat you would understand why.

@@grapegrishnahk8930 Yes it's a true story

Source? It sound very stupid to waste time and attention to shoot at a American pilot that parachute over Germany. He will be a prisoner and out of the war. But it make sense to shoot a german pilot, becuse he can be back to the war next day.

@@kirgan1000 kzfaq.info/get/bejne/jMmPha2fvcCciaM.html

Sorry,wheres your source? Weve long been waiting you,to share the source.

What hsppened to your uncle?

@@melianhoover1910 Thank you for asking. My uncle was shot dow 15 May43. You can watch his story on your tube. In summary he saved 4 of his 10 crew but sacrificed his life to do so. Every pilot present past or future would do the same nothing new here. His story can be found on KZfaq “3 days in May 1943”. Uncle Franks is my moms younger brother. He is home in Pleasant Valley Cemetery resting in peace.

@@rogerdailey9357 Thankyou for your answer! I always wonder,how these experts managed to pair the airpilots claims with actually downed planes.

Not unfair. The man was a skilled Luftwaffe ace. He was shot down over German occupied territory. Had Barton been shot down over England, he would have ended up in a POW camp and no longer a threat to Allied pilots and aircrew. Over Germany, he would have been able to take to the air again and resume killing. Just another example of the inhumanity of war.

@ScooterGeorge O.K ,it makes sense what you say ,and yes ,wars are cruel .

Recalling a long-ago class in the Laws of Land Warfare, shooting at a parachuting pilots is legal for ground troops if the pilot is going to land behind his own lines. The justification is that a pilot landing behind his own lines is still able to fight, while one landing in enemy territory is likely to be captured and thus unable to do any more harm. Edit- Oops. Ancient memory playing tricks on me. Seems parachuting pilots are not to be engaged (unless they use whatever weapons they may have). Once landed, they are to be given a reasonable opportunity to surrender. If they land behind their own lines, then they become legitimate targets again, just like any other enemy soldier - unless ill or injured sufficiently to keep them "hors de combat". Sorry for the mistake.

@@rogerrabbit80 Interesting and clarifying information. Thanks for that. The stipulations indicated do make sense.

@@rogerrabbit80 Congratulations on your fairness and honesty. In fact, shooting a parachute (whether it is a pilot or a trooper) without the subject having already fired effectively at you, seems to me a rather incorrect action. But try to tell it to the inhabitants of Crete, who instead are exalted as heroic freedom fighters, or to some good Londoners who have hung from a lamp post the survivor of the famous Dornier 17 rammed by a Hurricane (as learned from an English documentary). It is often forgotten that even civilians must obey certain rules, in war as well as in peace.

@@sergiogregorat1830 Having looked it up to refresh my memory, it turns out shooting at descending paratroopers is legal - just as shooting at enemy soldiers advancing on the ground are legitimate targets. In both cases, armed enemy troops are approaching your position to engage you. The paratroopers just happen to be doing so by falling from the sky.

@@rogerrabbit80 I partly agree with you. A fully equipped paratrooper can be equaled to an advancing soldier, the only difference being that the former is totally defenseless (albeit well armed), while the latter can at least dodge or dig a hole. The question remains with the civilians, who in any case should not participate in the fighting. Sad to say, but children, women, the elderly have no other option than to stay in the hope of surviving. Militarized civilians must be clearly identified by even a simple armband (Volkssturm, France Libre etc.) if they want adequate treatment according to the conventions of war. Spontaneous uprisings have always been used as cannon fodder by self-righteous leaders to discredit opponents. The only way civilians can contribute is to prevent war in peacetime and not clap their hands enthusiastically at the departure of their troops to the front, waiting for the inevitable victory.

becuase the nazis lost, that is why we dont speak with an evil nazi accent.

No that was a different occasion.

Secon

Lol

@@thefightingswallow7613 that was a typo

Erich Hartman

Thanks!