Death of the Luftwaffe | Fatal Mistakes Made By Nazi Germany And The Me 262 Jet Aircraft
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Published 2023-06-13
The Luftwaffe, the German air force during World War II, suffered a significant decline and eventual demise as the war progressed. Initially, it emerged as a formidable force, displaying impressive technological advancements and tactical superiority. Led by skilled commanders such as Hermann Göring, the Luftwaffe played a crucial role in the early victories of the German war machine.
During the early stages of the war, the Luftwaffe's Blitzkrieg strategy demonstrated devastating effectiveness, with a combination of dive bombers, fighters, and tactical bombers wreaking havoc on enemy forces and infrastructure. This dominance was most notable during the invasion of Poland, the Battle of France, and the early phases of the war on the Eastern Front.
However, the tide began to turn against the Luftwaffe as the war progressed. Several factors contributed to its decline. The first was the inability to sustain its initial technological edge. While the Luftwaffe initially possessed superior aircraft, including the renowned Messerschmitt Bf 109 and the versatile Junkers Ju 87 Stuka, technological advancements by the Allies gradually narrowed the gap. Allied forces developed more advanced aircraft, such as the British Supermarine Spitfire and the American P-51 Mustang, which surpassed their German counterparts in terms of speed, range, and firepower.
Another critical factor was the depletion of experienced pilots. The relentless air battles and high casualties took a heavy toll on the Luftwaffe's pilot ranks. The German pilots, who were initially highly skilled and experienced, were gradually replaced by less-experienced and inadequately trained recruits. This loss of skilled manpower diminished the Luftwaffe's effectiveness in combat.
Furthermore, the strategic bombing campaign by the Allies severely hampered the Luftwaffe's ability to project air superiority. Bombing raids targeted German airfields, production facilities, and infrastructure, resulting in the destruction of aircraft and key logistical support. The famous Battle of Britain fought primarily in the skies over England in 1940, was a turning point, as the Royal Air Force successfully defended against Luftwaffe attacks, ultimately preventing the planned German invasion.
The Luftwaffe's decline also resulted from the failure of the German military's overall strategy. Hitler's decision to engage in a two-front war by invading the Soviet Union while still fighting the Allies in the West stretched the Luftwaffe's resources and capabilities to their limits. The vast distances and harsh conditions of the Eastern Front presented enormous logistical challenges, forcing the Luftwaffe to divide its forces and focus on multiple theaters simultaneously. This dispersion of resources weakened the Luftwaffe's ability to concentrate overwhelming force in any one area.
By the later stages of the war, the Luftwaffe was further crippled by fuel shortages, limited production capabilities, and a lack of strategic vision. The air force struggled to adapt to changing circumstances, and its diminished operational capabilities were unable to counter the Allies' overwhelming air superiority.
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All Comments (21)
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My Dad flew B26s out of Sardinia. He almost never spoke of it, but did once tell a story of encountering the ME262 late in the war. They had an escort of Thunderbolts, and when the jets came at them out of the sun they hit two bombers and the fighters were right on their tail in pursuit. At the bottom of the dive, the jets put their noses up and flew back through the formation taking out two more bombers, while the Thunderbolts were down below circling, circling, circling to gain altitude. Meanwhile the jets had to return to base to refuel. We didn't get along well, but he had courage all his life.
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I could listen to Capt. Brown, all day. His expertise and experience is truly amazing.
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Couple of years ago, I met a WW2 veteran at a McDonald's and he said was a navigator on a B-17. I shook his hand and thanked him for his service.
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1. Lack of long-term strategic planning. 2. Lack of an early long-range bomber. 3. Lack of coordination between service branches. 4. Lack of natural resources (aluminum). 5. Lack of a structured, long-terms pilot training program. 6. Lack of top management of production throughout the war. 7. Top management’s inability to delegate and accept the advice of experts.
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One of the best descriptions I’ve ever heard of the luftwaffe was as a too small a blanket on a cold nite. It keeps getting pulled back and forth to try to cover more bed than is possible and eventually gets torn apart.
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One of the things the United States did that virtually no other nation did, was quickly identify outliers, overperformers, particularly in aerial combat, pull them out of combat, and promote them to instructors. The theory was that it was more valuable to identify the best pilots early, and leverage their skills and experience to train as many as possible to be competent right out of flight schools. This is why American Aces have so many fewer victories than their counterparts on both sides. Those aces were pulled from front line combat and pressed into service as tacticians and trainers. Meanwhile, in all other air-services, the aces were left to attrition, while the training and tactics never changed or adapted to the emerging technology.
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In the early 1960s I was in the Air Training Corps and our squadron was taken to RAE Farnborough on a day outing. As we were being shown around (the non secret bits) we noticed a group of uniformed officers clustered around a jet engine mounted on a trolley. One of them, a naval officer, seeing us in our cadet uniforms, broke off and came over for a chat. He spoke to us very enthusiastically about flying and encouraged us to take it up as a career - of course, he said, you'd get the best flying experience in the Royal Navy! He was called back to his group and when we asked our guide who he was were told "That is Captain Brown, the greatest pilot in the world!" Roll forward 20 or so years and I spotted a quite short figure in Copthorne, a small village near Gatwick airport. I asked him if he was Captain Brown and told him of our encounter at Farnborough. And did you go into aviation he asked? No, because I'm colour blind and couldn't fly. Instead I became a Civil Engineer and was involved in the construction of the Concorde Test Facility at Farnborough. Ah he said, once it gets in the blood it never goes away. Delightful human being. Check out this Wikipedia page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eric_Brown_(pilot)
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Winkle was my dads CO at Lossiemouth, not only a great flyer, also a dammed fine commander, but by far ( to his men) a really nice guy!
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The german jet lead with the me262 was shadowed by the Gloster Meteor. The British had a good test bed in the first jets with the Meteor. The Meteors service life was considerably longer in peacetime and the ME 262 service life faded very rapidly and was replaced quickly by newer second generation jets
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Thanks for replaying these great aerocinema shows
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What caused it to fail? Easy answer, Germany was fuel starved by 1941. Though they weren't completely without fuel/gas but it was a trickle by that time, no longer able to do large scale combined arms blitz maneuvers.
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The allies were incredibly lucky that Goring was in charge of the Luftwaffe. His pride and ignorance were of great benefit to the allied war effort.
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What a thorough and enlightening video. I would note that the Komet rocket plane had a nose cone of cast steel to act as armor, in conjunction with the slab of Lucite we see in the video footage. The device used to move a Komet on the ground was called a Schleppwagen. We even use "shlep" in English meaning to lug or carry something. I think that tow trucks in Germany are also called this. Test Pilot Opitz was an extraordinary glider pilot, and after the war he moved to America where he taught gliding and competed in gliding events in various parts of the U.S.A. Finally, Hannah Reitsch was interviewed whilst in her seventies, and you can see that the spark for flying is still burning brightly within her. You can find the interview on this platform. --Old Guy
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I've always felt that the Luftwaffe, like the rest of military in Nazi Germany, was geared towards a short war. It's equipment and operational doctrine was based around air superiority over the battlefield and providing tactical air support for the ground troops. The problem with that while the Luftwaffe could do excellent against neighboring countries (Poland, Denmark, the Low Countries and France), they didn't have the necessary reach to be effective against more distant opponents.
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At 12:15 - the Luftwaffe did drop a magnetic mine, into tidal water in Kent. RN specialists were able to make it safe, recover it, and study its tecchnical content. And thus ships could be 'degaussed' to make them unlikely to trigger such mines. Ouvry and Baldwin were the two heroes who worked on the unknown mine.
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My father used to say how in awe he and others were of the ME262 in its early forays into combat. They actually had no idea what it was at first, but quickly learned that they had zero chance competing against it when it was just a question of speed. However, it had a lot of disadvantages as well, quite a few of them pointed out in this video, and the P-51 guys, at least, learned in time to take advantage of its lack of good control of its speed, which turned into also not having good control of its maneuverability when it really needed it, and the Allied pilots would take advantage of that vulnerability.
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Just googled Captain Eric 'Winkle' Brown - wow !. His lists of achievements and feats is endless, a very impressive man !. As a fellow Edin-burger I salute you, sir - RIP !
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Outstanding stuff: nice WWII footage and interesting interviews, keep them coming! Bravo!
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This one was really good, great interviews, thanks!
