Small Scale Military Headquarters

This is my all me favorite read. I've read it cover to cover and am on my second time around trying to digest all of what is here. The first hand accounts by both Luftwaffe and American aircrews keeps me spellbound trying to visualize the events described. The authors, through research, clean-up some of the errors clouded at times by the fog of war and the excitement of the moment but by and large the accounts are stunning as well as brutally and graphically detailed.

There are multiple accounts of Luftwaffe fighter pilots being shot down, bailing out or crash landing as many as 10 times only to return to the battle after each time racking up impressive kill records against the bomber streams. I have been re-thinking the unthinkable, that shooting them in their chutes or strafing them on the ground, though not honorable, would have been sound military strategy. They would survive and rejoin the fight to kill our guys again. In contrast, shooting up bomber crews in their chutes who have near zero chance of rejoining battle would not only be dastardly but unnecessary.

Thoughts? Opinions?

My reading of these accounts also convinces me that my answer to this trivia question would be correct:

*Which of these aircraft is the number one plane to account for German planes shot down over Germany in WWII?


a. P-38
b. p-47
c. p-51
d. Hawker Tempest
e. None of the above

Your answer?

Another observation....

Interesting that more than one account of 109 pilots suggests they didn't like dogfighting with P-38s because the Lightning had a tighter turning radius than the 109. They had no problem ambushing the P-38 becasue it took longer for the Lightning pilots to go from cruise to combat mode with two of everything related to engines, mixture and props, etc. as the twin was more complex to operate. The 109s would be long gone before the P-38 could react to counter.

I say the P-47.

P-47

My guess is "None of the above".

As fighters go I think the Thunderbolt was king.

I'm thinking it's likely B-17s and B-24s shot down more German fighters over Germany than any escorts did, especially with deep penetration missions of 1943 going unescorted.