Was there ever a more glorious/romantic style of combat?
>>337065
>any combat in world war 1 being romantic.
Are you serious?
It's crazy how this shit started
>As Dickson had predicted, initially air combat was extremely rare, and definitely subordinate to reconnaissance. There are even stories of the crew of rival reconnaissance aircraft exchanging nothing more belligerent than smiles and waves.[8]
>This soon progressed to throwing grenades, and other objects - even grappling hooks.[10] The first aircraft brought down by another was an Austrian reconnaissance aircraft rammed on 8 September 1914 by Russian pilot Pyotr Nesterov in Galicia in the Eastern Front. Both planes crashed as the result of the attack killing all occupants
>Eventually pilots began firing handheld firearms at enemy aircraft,[8] however pistols were too inaccurate and the single shot rifles too unlikely to score a hit. On October 5, 1914, French pilot Louis Quenault opened fire on a German aircraft with a machine gun for the first time and the era of air combat was under way as more and more aircraft were fitted with machine guns.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aviation_in_World_War_I#The_dawn_of_air_combat
>>337065
Competitive penis fencing.
>>337072
>I don't know anything about WW1 aerial combat.
>>337065
>war
>ever glorious/romantic
This is how I know you're 14 years old.
>romantic
>your COs won't issue parachutes because they think it'll make you fight worse
I'd rather fly a Spitfire during the Blitz.
>>337086
> I get my info from video games instead of firsthand accounts from people actually there. Yep it was just like that snoopy cartoon you used to watch.
>>337120
>spit during the blitz
Have fun with the 109s while the hurricanes go fro the 110's and 111's
>>337065
>no parachute
>fumes and oil from the engine spatter over your face
>if the plane catches fire, you will probably suffer horrific burns before the impact mercifully kills you
>open cockpits
>sheer terror and physical exhaustion
nah
>>337138
>Physical exhaustion
No joke. Rise of Flight taught me how tiring it can be to keep a plane straight and level for long periods of time without trim. I can only imagine how horrible it must of been to do in the freezing cold for hours upon hours.
>attrition rate even higher than infantry
The air war churned through pilots at an appalling rate. Romantic my fucking ass.
OP, if you were a pilot during WWI, you probably would've gotten shot out of the sky on your very first sortie by a seasoned ace (who would probably going to die in a month) while having no idea what was going on the entire time. Your body -- if recoverable -- would be a broken mess and your mom would probably explode if she saw your body.
You're a faggot.
>>337172
>OP, if you were a pilot during WWI, you probably would've gotten shot out of the sky on your very first sortie by a seasoned ace (who would probably going to die in a month) while having no idea what was going on the entire time.
Not true. You probably would have died because your plane crashed because they all sucked back then, or were killed by ground fire, something as simple as a jackass from the other side raising his rifle and taking a potshot at you.
>>337110
War before M.A.D. is an inevitability
Death is still inevitable
>>337134
>implying
>>337065
Being stuck in a flying death trap while having to man a machine gun at the same time is not romantic you fucking mook.
>>337134
>who is Manfred von Richthofen
"It is a pity that my collection of trophies contains not a single Russian."
"One can become enthusiastic over anything. For a time I was delighted with bomb throwing. It gave me a tremendous pleasure to bomb those fellows from above."
"I honored the fallen enemy by placing a stone on his beautiful grave."
>tfw will never fly a P-47 Thunderbolt and completely overpowering Japanese aviators flying outdated A6M2 Zeroes and Ki-43c Oscars
>>337275
Now this is podracing
>>337255
And yet he ended mangled and dead. How romantic.
>>339025
>implying survival is required to be romantic in a literary sense
Is it overrated /his/?
>>337201
Still: His point was basically sound. Air Combat in WWI was like the worlds worst FPS server.
You get to connect once, and while you're still learning the controls some bastard who already knows them spawn camps you. He only learned the controls because he survived by sheer luck. Later he'll die to something retarded.
>>340580
>tfw go too fast and the fabric on your wing rips off
>>339025
The people who shot him down cried. Literally sobbing.
>>337065
That's not even the coolest thing in WWI, OP.
>you will never be the captain of a zeppelin bomber
>>340539
>the positioning of that MG
Not sure if romantic, but it seems most WWI aces were very young and most died before the war ended
ww2 had cooler dogfights.
Like imagine being a russian ace. You have to fight dudes with planes that are superior to your plane in nearly every way imaginable and manage to survive with your vodka cooled scooty puff jr.
>>337135
Considering how the Spitfire was far superior, I will.
>>341513
>Like imagine being a russian ace. You have to fight dudes with planes that are superior to your plane in nearly every way imaginable
That didn't happen, though.
>>341513
>superior to your plane in nearly every way imaginable
this naziboo meme has to stop
>>341952
slavs had equally shit planes lad.
>>341963
equally shitty to russians? What are you trying to say?
The words are coming out, but their meaning...
Fucken naziboos man, tiger was so superior me-109 was so superior german soldier was so superior everything was so superior and godlike but they still lost to Soviet Union somehow..... Hmmm
>>341982
Yes.
>>342019
ah so, slavs had equally shit planes to russian, gotcha...
???
>>339025
Well, he thought it quite romantic based on his own words, didn't he?
>>342026
Don't be pedantic nerd boy.
>>342038
No. He compared it to sport, but shit like quail hunting, where they release the bird in front of your gun.
He was quite open about the fact that he racked up a bunch of kills because he was killing people who had no idea what they were doing.
>>342050
Not him, but I couldn't understand you either.
>>337223
>some crazy blood-hungry bastard's account negates every other piece of evidence
Shiggy
>>342052
That's true enough, but I don't see how that works against my position. He enjoyed war, is it then unfeasible that some other ace would consider it romantic? He was also a bit romantic in that sense - he kept track of enemy aces and longed to face them. He visited some of their graves, too (according to the third quote in the post with his picture). That's a romantic gesture. I myself dislike war and would not like to find myself serving in one. But that is not the case for all people. (professional mercenaries, Lauri Törni, etc.)
>>337081
>>This soon progressed to throwing grenades, and other objects - even grappling hooks.[10] The first aircraft brought down by another was an Austrian reconnaissance aircraft rammed on 8 September 1914 by Russian pilot Pyotr Nesterov in Galicia in the Eastern Front. Both planes crashed as the result of the attack killing all occupants
of course, it makes perfect sense. Only a russian could think of such a thing.
>>342055
>no one who fought a war considered it romantic (the original thesis)
>here's a picture of someone who did
>he's bloodthirsty so that doesn't count
Do you even hear what you are saying?
>>340564
fucking baldrick seemed to like it.
>>342087
>Erich Alfred Hartmann (19 April 1922 – 20 September 1993), nicknamed "Bubi" by his German comrades and "The Black Devil" by his Soviet adversaries, was a German fighter pilot during World War II and is the most successful fighter ace in the history of aerial warfare. He flew 1,404 combat missions and participated in aerial combat on 825 separate occasions. He claimed, and was credited with, shooting down 352 Allied aircraft—345 Soviet and 7 American—while serving with the Luftwaffe. During the course of his career, Hartmann was forced to crash-land his damaged fighter 14 times due to damage received from parts of enemy aircraft he had just shot down or mechanical failure. Hartmann was never shot down or forced to land due to enemy fire.
Holy fucking ass-crackers.
>>342087
The reason Axis pilots have such high kill counts is because of the way they recorded kills, the sheer number of easy targets on the Eastern Front, and the Luftwaffe not pulling aces from the frontlines after a certain amount of time to train new pilots.
>>342095
>the sheer number of easy targets on the Eastern Front
Which was my original point
>>342087
no, because unlike the allies, they did not get rotated back to train new pilots, which hurt the luftwaffe in the long run - they flew until they died basically
also inflated kill counts/claims (seriously)
>>342082
I don't care about the original thesis mayne. You'll find adrenaline-seeking bastards everywhere on the planet and they are most comfortable on the battlefield. Almost 100% of the troops didn't though, not even professional troops.
>>342095
>the way they recorded kills
They were extremely suspect of anyone getting over 100, they double checked Hartman a lot apparently. All his kills were confirmed by soviet reports of missing planes in the same time and areas he claimed a kill in
>>342100
Soviets did pretty much the same thing. This dude flew 330 combat missions for fucks sake.
>>342095
>and the Luftwaffe not pulling aces from the frontlines after a certain amount of time to train new pilots.
This is super important and also applies to the Japanese.
Saburo Sakai got shot through the brain and lost and eyeball, and they still sent him out to fly planes.
Meanwhile the highest scoring American ace didn't see combat until late 1942, got leave in 1943 and 1944, and was promoted to staff work in 1944, and didn't see any combat in 1945.
>>342096
>3 front veteran Heinrich kills Yuriy, the 18 year old peasant who is in the air for the second time
>must be the superior plane
>>342104
...which means that war can be, to some, considered romantic. Thank you.
>>342119
So can fucking any war. There's loads of people who think car bombing is romantic.
>>342120
It's still a fuckton. It's safe to assume Germany and Russia threw men into the Ariel grinder. Nazi's had better planes so they could get more kills.
>>342128
>It's safe to assume
No.
>>342123
Absolutely correct. And so what? To some it was romantic, to most it was not. The only thing I stated, and proved, is that a person who fought in a war can consider it romantic.
>>342137
>trying to prove something no one cares about and is irrelevant
>considering this as a win
>>342136
So you are honestly saying Russia did not throw men into the grinder of ww2?
>>342128
no, you memetic naziboo
There were dozens of variations of various aircraft on the eastern front, some better on the german side and some better on the russian side.
Contrary to autistic beliefs, Russians were and are actually pretty good when it comes to aircraft design.
And even before considering all the points brought up before, you have to take into account literally thousands upon thousands of soviet aircraft being destroyed while parked on the runways in the initial invasion.
>>342150
>trying to give russian pilots credit
>naziboo
Wut?
>>342145
I'm saying I don't know anything about Russian flight rotations, and you know even less.
>>342154
Bitch I know plenty. You fags educate yourselves.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KDmB-qrtvHY
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jCZDsrlBsWE
>>342151
I consider autistically insisting on the superiority of german equipment despite all common evidence as nazibooism lad...
yes, usually germans had better planes than russians (and more importantly, better tactics), but blankly stating
>You have to fight dudes with planes that are superior to your plane in nearly every way imaginable
or
>Nazi's had better planes so they could get more kills.
is idiotic
>>342142
>someone states a thesis
>someone refutes it
>you come along and criticize the way he refuted it
>I call you out, saying the refutal was well done
>I don't really care about the thesis.jpg
>a-autist
Seriously, dude... What is even the point of arguing about something if what we're arguing about is not determined? That's why theses exist.
Towards the end of the war construction began on the Zepplin Straaka e4/20.
All metal 4-engine cantilever monoplane
>>342182
yeah, notice how in the documentary there's a great amount of praise for the La-5 that I posted originally.
Also, most of the documentary is focused on the obsolete Chaikas, I-16s and the 1940 Yak-1.
Meanwhile, the Yak-9s had better operational parameters at low altitudes than its contemporary Bf 109s and the La-5 could optimistically handle Fw-190s.
so, refer to:
>There were dozens of variations of various aircraft on the eastern front, some better on the german side and some better on the russian side.
>>342170
In wehraboo land, a Ju-87 is more advanced then a Il-2, and a BF-109 is more advanced that a Supercobra.
One of the most beautiful biplanes of the war, the exceptionally clean and promising Heinrich Pursuit didn't find enough support for development
>>342209
>Also, most of the documentary is focused on the obsolete Chaikas, I-16s and the 1940 Yak-1.
So planes used during the war?
>Meanwhile, the Yak-9s had better operational parameters at low altitudes than its contemporary Bf 109s and the La-5 could optimistically handle Fw-190s.
Did I ever say that there wasn't a single soviet union aircraft during the war could never have an advantage over an enemy fighter?
>>342218
>Supercobra
Do you mean Airacobra?
If so, they were complete garbage and absolutely shittier than the BF-109.
Yak's and La's were better than those turds.
Don't complain about wehraboos if you're going to say dumb shit yourself.
>>342256
he probably meant the kingcobra?
>>342251
>Did I ever say that there wasn't a single soviet union aircraft during the war could never have an advantage over an enemy fighter?
>You have to fight dudes with planes that are superior to your plane in nearly every way imaginable
>Nazi's had better planes so they could get more kills.
also, the combined total of Yak-9s and La-5s constructed exceeds the combined number of I16s, Yak-3s and Yak-1s constructed.
By almost 20%.
And that's not even counting the La-7 (which was far superior even to the La-5) and so on.
You know, just to get a feeling for how underdogged a russian pilot was...
>>342287
You do realize that dogfights took place before those planes existed?
The ww1 rotary engine was lubricated with castor oil.Which would spray due to the operation of the engine on to the pilot. A silk scarf was used across the face to try to minimise the amount ingested. And brandy to try to reduce the laxative effect of the oil. The pilots were quite often drunk and had shit themselves.
>>342295
yeah ok, I give up, technical truths give you the right to create blanket statements, we'll worry about misconceptions that inevitably follow from that later...
Is it true that in the early stages of the war bombing consisted of pilots dropping grenades and dogfights consisted of throwing darts and firing pistols at each other?
Because that sounds hilarious.
>>342308
The only blanket statement I made was that ww2 had cooler dogfights. You jerks were the ones insisting that everything else could never be true.
>>342314
apparently so, but I highly doubt the dart part
>>342320
Not in dogfights but when they were taking on Zeppelins British pilots used explosive darts before they got incendiary ammunition for their machine guns.
>>342329
hah, those crazy fuckers
>>337110
You poor coward
>WW1
>Romantic
Dude even the most hardened soldiers had brutal accounts
>>342374
Pilots got treated like royalty relative to diggers, and yeah, there is a romantic aspect to their experiences. Much more to the lives of pilots in WWII, but still applied to some degree in WWI.
>>337072
Are you retarded?
>fix'd
>>337065
>le "air combat in WW1 was knightly"
It's a meme. A meme easy to make when you're a soldier in the trench and look at the sky, and see theses people fighting around and doing incredible movements in the air.
In reality ? It was a dirty combat.
Fighter pilot attacked recon planes, even unarmed. They kept firing even when the enemy plane was going down. They attacked by surprise, and by 1918, they completly stopped "duel" (Who were dirty duels, using the sun to blind your rival for exemple) to use squad formations.
Some numbers : Georges Guynemer, one the aces of WW1, has destroyed 53 enemy planes. Only a dozen or so were armed fighters, the other were planes without any gun.
40% of the planes lost in WW1 were because of accidents. 20% were because of shots fired from the ground.
So no. It wasn't classy, glorious, romantic duels. That's a meme. It was all based around dirty surprise, trapping the other plane, and destroy it.
>>341952
Russian planes were ok, certainly not bad.
It's the pilots who were shit
>>342413
Settle down, autismo.
Just like how the practical reality of all forms of combat more often than not boil down to basic exploitation without any sentimentality, doesn't mean there aren't examples of situations that give rise to romantic interpretations. Which is pragmatically the point of the OP.
Related and entertaining
http://youtu.be/kEbEvp4J68I
>>342427
>Which is pragmatically the point of the OP.
>Was there ever a more glorious/romantic style of combat?
I'd say some light fencing on a warm summer afternoon (ie. sabre wound cause blood loss death within minutes) was much more romantic than shitting yourself from oil ingestion in a drunken stupor, then being pelleted by .303 cals from an unseen enemy, until you die a fiery death on the way down, either from heat shock or suffocation. :^)
>>337065
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M2CBx7x5GCI
>>342645
Holy fuck, anon. That's amazing.
>>342264
Cobra Commander?
>>337072
>Flying back to base in the May mid-afternoon sun, knowing you have a comfortable bed and a decent mess waiting for you.
Th death rates were sky high but it was definitely the most glamorous job in the war. Not to mention you are at the forefront of technological advancement of your time
>>342645
What an amazing landing.
>>342087
>So the top 50 or so aces of the war were on the axis side because of skill?
No. The Germans overreported victories far more than any other belligerent, and it only got worse as their situation worsened.
Take the Crimea (43-44) campaign. Three fighter units - II. and III./JG 52 and II./SG 2 participated in the campaign, claiming somewhere on the order of 4,000 Soviet aircraft between them. Worst of all was the month of April 1944, when III./JG 52, with just 16 fighters, claimed over 1,000 enemy aircraft.
Now compare that to the actual numbers of aircraft committed to the campaign. The two Air Armies flying in the Crimea amounted to fewer than 800 aircraft, and reported Soviet losses were fewer than 200. Even if they were under reporting losses, it's impossible for the Luftwaffe to have downed as many planes as they credited their pilots for.
And then that brings us to the issue of the scores of the aces. The top three aces of the war - Hartmann, Rall, and Barkhorn - all flew in the Crimea. Barkhorn in particular claimed 50 at least 50 victories during that time.
>>343581
>The Germans overreported victories far more than any other belligerent, and it only got worse as their situation worsened.
[citation needed]
those other nations with decimalized killcounts?
>literally only talking about the crimea
>And then that brings us to the issue of the scores of the aces. The top three aces of the war - Hartmann, Rall, and Barkhorn - all flew in the Crimea. Barkhorn in particular claimed 50 at least 50 victories during that time.
lol fuck these implications
jesus this is a history board, can you make criticisms without being a complete retard
say it sounds doubtful to you or something, just be honest
>>343602
Everyone overreported, but the Germans were the worst of it. Generally, the more exhausted and desperate pilots are, the less accurate their claims get.
Best examples I know of are the Flying Tigers (they're credited with downing more aircraft that Japan ever committed to Burma) and the Battle of Khalkhin Gol. At Khalkhin Gol, both sides regularly left engagements claiming more victories than there were aircraft involved. However, the disparity with IJA claims rose as the campaign went on (about when direct attacks on IJA airfields began and crews started flying multiple sorties per day) while VVS claims stabilized.
Just about every campaign on the Eastern Front is similar - claims on both sides well exceeded reported losses, and in many cases were far more than the number of aircraft ever committed to the theaters in question. The difference is that German overreporting tended to be more than that of the Soviets, and it got worse as the war went on.
I'm away from home so I can't access the books I'm using as sources right now, but if this thread's still up later today I can dig out some actual numbers for you.
>>343602
> During Operation Bodenplatte the Luftwaffe claimed 55 destroyed and 11 probably destroyed in air-to-air combat (according to document: Fernschreiben II.JakoIc Nr.140/44 geh.vom 3.1.1945). Other German sources (according to document: Luftwaffenführungsstab Ic, Fremde Luftwaffen West, Nr. 1160/45 g.Kdos.vom 25.2.1945), quote 65 claims and 12 probables. Just 31 Allied aircraft were hit. 15 were shot down in aerial combat, two were destroyed whilst on take-off and seven were damaged by enemy action.[42][43]
> Oberleutnant Kurt Welter, claimed perhaps 25 Mosquitoes shot down by night and two further Mosquitoes by day while flying the Me 262, adding to his previous seven Mosquito kills in "hot-rodded" Bf 109G-6/AS or Fw 190 A-8 fighters. As far as can be ascertained, just three of his Me 262 claims over Mosquitoes coincide with RAF records.[40]
>After the Second Raid on Schweinfurt Gunners aboard the B-17 bombers claimed to have shot down 138 German fighters.[30] German records state only 38 were lost.[31] German fighters claimed 121 bombers, the actual figure was 60.[32]
And so on and so forth
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confirmation_and_overclaiming_of_aerial_victories_during_World_War_II
>>343632
>Everyone overreported, but the Germans were the worst of it.
[citation needed]
>Generally, the more exhausted and desperate pilots are, the less accurate their claims get.
[unfounded conjecture from a retard]
>The difference is that German overreporting tended to be more than that of the Soviets, and it got worse as the war went on.
were the proofs
no proofs here
>I'm away from home so I can't access the books I'm using as sources right now
lol nigga you're away from your senses and making shit up.
a mildly educated attitude would be dubiousness. you underestimate the nature of recording. german pilots specifically needed at least one witness to testify for their claim. it's conspiratorial to claim that these wild overclaims were collusion from 'exhausted and desperate pilots'. the desperate pilots were getting tore up with little result on the western front with escort swarms. the larger kill counts resulted from relatively 'easier' targets, and of course there are degrees of overclaiming, but you literally have no basis in calling out germany as 'the worst'. just your own personal issues.
>>343666
>In practice, however, even in the early stages of the war, overclaiming by the Luftwaffe occurred. As the war entered its final, chaotic phase in 1945, many German aces' claims from late 1944 onward were left unvalidated due to the breakdown in administration within the Luftwaffe,[3] and at times bore little relationship to reality.
Combat Kill'; Morgan & Seibel, 1997.
They're probably dirty jews though, we all know how the mighty aryan was worth 1000 subhuman slav pilots
>>343645
yep, where's the part that says 'and germany did it the worst, they overclaimed the most!'
have you quantified it yourself?
that article doesn't help the specific denunciation of german pilots at all
>Some 80 - 90 percent of the claims submitted were confirmed or found to be "in order" for confirmation up to the time the system broke down altogether in 1945.[4]
of course pilots overclaimed.
from all countries.
and of course several pilots could potentially claim the same victory.
but there's an ambiguity to how each nation handles this, not a definitive 'germans such lol'.
because decimalized killcounts aren't exactly of the highest integrity either, now are they?
doesn't mean western pilots were 'the worst' in terms of overclaiming. that would be conjecture.
again, you can make criticisms without being retarded
>>343680
nice meme
did ze germans molest you country, friend?
>>343666
Sources I'm primarily working with are
>In the Skies of Nomonhan: Japan versus Russia May to September 1939 by Dimitar Nedialkov
>Red Phoenix Rising by Von Hardesty
>Where the Iron Crosses Grow by Robert Forczyck
I'll get you the raw numbers for the various campaigns when I get home, but the general trend with claims on the Eastern Front had the Germans overreporting far more than the Soviets, with the sole exception of the earliest stages of Barbarossa.
The reason I brought up the Crimea campaign was because it involved the three top aces in history along with the two most successful squadrons in history (II. and III./JG 52). The Kuban had similar rates of overreporting (although it's hard to tell just how much because the Soviets are notably silent on their losses), with claims well exceeding the total number of aircraft ever involved.
>>343703
Good chance of that being true. They did that to everybody, including fucking Austria and for a short while they almost went against Switzerland.
>>343703
well yes, but the main point of my butthurt is that le /pol/ molested my boards :^)
>>342374
Isn't this one of the most romantic, optimistic accounts of the war though?
>>341485
What kind of recoil and accuracy you want?
>>343705
it wouldn't even surprise me if the germans did overclaim more than the soviets,
and I would absolutely love to see the numbers that demonstrate
>overreporting far more than the Soviets
on a general basis. but with methods of recording kills varying from nation to nation in the first place, your own claim is still bullshit.
yeah, the crimea is an example with similar parallels in the western front of claims of material losses higher than were in the region of the time. but the implications of inflation, to a high degree, associated back to the highest scoring aces and most successful squadrons shows a fairly transparent attitude.
I would be loath to say
>The Germans overreported victories far more than any other belligerent
more? maybe they did, maybe they didn't.
far more? all nations overclaimed. to say one significantly more than another, let alone more than ANY other, is still a dubious opinion.
>>343820
Overclaiming aerial victories is a proud tradition in aerial aviation shared by all the world for as long as people have been shooting at each other in planes. The USA reported a 10:1 victory record over MiGs in the Korean war. The truth was closer to 2:1. I don't know what the commies claimed, but it was probably equally outrageous.
>>342094
Wow what's crazy is by late 1943 he only had 90 kills out of his 352. So the majority wasn't against 1941 shit slav planes. Very impressive.
>>342095
You have to wonder though how much of it is propaganda. I mean this is the Nazis we are talking about. Look at Kurt Knispel. He didn't play the politic game and never even got his knights cross despite being the top tanker. Even then you gotta question the numbers on both sides.
>>343632
Notice how the majority of the top German aces for tanks and planes are all attractive looking. This is the country that had a ministry of propaganda. They likely selected a few of these guys and made them "movie stars" throughout the war to inspire others.
>>341485
Safer than firing through the propeller desu. It took a while for MG synchronization to become reliable, and even then it only took shitty ammunition (made during the war in a hurry) that ignited just a bit too late to shoot your own plane down.
>>337065
The last American aces are all from Vietnam era combat. That was the last real air war where both sides had a reasonable chance of winning air-to-air. The Phantom must have been a ball to fly, being one of the first fighters that could reach Mach 2.0+
They see me stopping bomb raids
they haiting
trying to catch me leading targets
trying to sandwich the germans
>>344142
>dosent even post a real picture
>>343784
Ernst saw something in war that he describes as positive. The friendships and experiences in such extreme circumstances etc etc. But he doesn't shy away from the utter insanity and horrid conditions.
Ernst was an interesting man. Very much a soldier.
>>344185
Did he have that psyhopath gene that few people have that allows them to enjoy war? I mean doing 4 years in WW1 would be really rough on the mind. I'm surprised anyone was able handle that for so long desu.
>>340654
>flying the lighter-than-air jew
Enjoy your slow and fiery descent towards the ground, Hans.
>>337081
It is pretty hilarious how that stuff goes. It's like some kids today don't even know what dial-up is or how it used to be difficult to get caught carrying a bomb onto a plane. I wonder how fighter pilots nowadays feel about it.
