WWII Movie Review: "Battle of Britain"

"Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few", are some of the most famous words spoken by British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, in recognition of the monumental effort of the Royal Air Force in repelling the German Luftwaffe, which in turn prevented the German invasion of Britain.

The 1969 film "Battle of Britain" was the attempt to capture this effort and memorialize the brave men who fought in the battle. With an all-star cast featuring Michael Caine, Robert Shaw, Curt Jurgens, and Laurence Olivier, this film has the recipe to blow the audience away with epic performances.

German bombers begin to bomb British airfields on Eagle Day
 (screenshot)

Some interesting facts about this film are that nearly all of the planes used in this film are actual vintage planes (with the exception of the Junkers 87 Stukas, which were 1:2 scale RC models). Also, in filming this movie, the amount of (blank) ammunition used in all of the takes the director ordered exceeds the amount of ammunition that was used in the actual battle!

Nevertheless, there are some problems with this film. The brief romantic scenes in this movie, meant to show the personal strain the battle had between pilots and their wives and lovers, seemed to be thrown into the mix and not done very well, at times appearing to be an afterthought of the scriptwriters to make this picture something more than a pure war picture, and therefore drag down the picture as a whole. Also, some of the aerial combat scenes tended to be drawn out a bit too long.

Overall, though, this film is a staple for any World War II movie library, as it does a fantastic job in honoring the soldiers who lived and died in the skies above Britain on both sides. Until next time take care, and thanks for reading.

(Image fair use rationale: 1. This image is being used to illustrate the article on the movie in question and is used for informational or educational purposes only. 2. This image is of low resolution. 3. It is believed that this image will not devalue the ability of the copyright holder to profit from the original work. 4. No alternative, free image exists that can be used to illustrate the subject matter.)

Georg Gaertner: The German Who Got Away

In a couple of my previous posts I have talked about the lauded successes of the Allied prison breaks from German POW camps and the few who made it all the way home. This story, however, is of a soldier from the other side and has a far less pleasant ending. His name is Georg Gaertner, and his name is Dennis Whiles. One identity is real, the other fake. Today, even the man himself has a hard time reconciling which is which.

Gaertner was a soldier serving in the Afrika Korps and was captured in Tunis in 1943. He was sent to a POW camp in Deming, New Mexico where he spent the remainder of the war. Upon the war's end, the Germans were going to be shipped to their homes. However, Gaertner knew that his home was in the Soviet zone of occupation and later ceded to Poland, where Germans in the region were pressured out.

Gaertner managed to escape in May of 1945 and spent the next 40 years on the run, assuming the identity of Dennis Whiles. He spent these years trying to live a quiet American life, even marrying. His circumstances finally forced him to confess his true identity to his wife, and later to the country in 1985. Until that point, Gaertner/Whiles was one of the top fugitives on the FBI Wanted list, with his POW picture posted in almost every post office in the country.

Whiles, having spent 40 years suppressing his birth identity, has spent the last 23 years trying to rediscover his past life. He is 93 now, and lives alone in Boulder, Colorado. Until next time take care, and thanks for reading.

(For further details on Georg Gaertner, watch "Hitler's Lost Soldier" from 2006.)

Ghost Army: The First US Army Group

Today is the 69th anniversary of the Normandy landings and one of the defining moments of World War II. Many thousands of brave men died on the beaches due to heavy German resistance in some places, especially Omaha Beach. However, many more men may have died, and indeed the invasion may not have succeeded were it not for Operation Quicksilver: the Allied intelligence operation intended to draw German units away from Normandy and otherwise confuse the Germans into thinking the invasion was going to happen somewhere else.

While the main invasion was at Normandy, the Germans
believed it would come at Pas de Calais to the north.
Map obtained from WikiCommons.

The thinking behind this operation is clearly shown in the 1970 film "Patton", because General George Patton would play a vital role in the deception. In the midst of the fallout from Patton slapping a battle-fatigued soldier in front of the press, Patton was removed from command of the Seventh Army and temporarily relieved of duty.

However, the Germans followed his movements very closely, due to their belief that he was the Allies' best commander and he would be in charge of the eventual invasion of Europe. The Allies sought to use this and placed Patton in 'command' of the First US Army Group.

The group was, in fact, completely fictitious. However, through the use of staged radio traffic, mock-up vehicles to fool air reconnaissance, occasional real units moving in and out of the group, and turned German double agents relaying false information to the German High Command made it seem that the main invasion would come at the Pas de Calais, the closest point in the English Channel (it is possible to see the White Cliffs of Dover from France at this point).

This eventually led to the redeployment of several German units, including the majority of the Panzer units in western Europe, away from Normandy. When the invasion finally came, Hitler and the High Command believed that it was a diversion and the 'real' invasion would still come from Calais.

So successful was this deception that the men who worked to create it would go on to do several diversionary 'performances' in Europe. Their exploits have recently been declassified and can be seen in the new documentary "The Ghost Army" available through PBS. Until next time take care, and thanks for reading.

Trent Park and Candid German Generals

Watch Bugging Hitler's Soldiers on PBS. See more from Secrets of the Dead.

One of the most exciting things that a historian can have happen to them is to discover something that had been lost to history and adds to the understanding of an event. Such is the case with the discovery of 50,000 pages of transcripts from secretly recorded conversations between captured German generals about various aspects of the war.

As the episode of "Secrets of the Dead" describes, great trouble was expended to catch the German generals that the British had captured in giving away some morsel of important information in casual conversation that could change the course of the war. Such information included the confirmation of the existence of the V-2 rockets, the deep divide between the Germans loyal to Hitler and those who weren't, and tragically the deep extent of the Holocaust atrocities.

These files had been buried because the British did not want to reveal the effectiveness of their surveillance techniques in the atmosphere of the Cold War. They were recently rediscovered by accident by a German historian in the Royal Archives in London. This is what historians mean when we say that we aren't done making discoveries about the war, we haven't learned all there is to know about the war, and this is very exciting for us. Until next time take care, and thanks for reading.

Stars and Stripes Review: May 6, 1945

Scanned by Cody Lizotte.

This issue of The Stars and Stripes is interesting in that it was published two days before Germany's surrender, known as V-E Day (Victory in Europe). Of course, at that time they didn't know the exact day the Germans were going to surrender. After all, the Germans had been facing their ultimate defeat for the last two years, ever since the Germans lost their strategic offensive capability on the Eastern Front.

As shown in the headline, the Germans were still fighting like warriors right up to the end. Their last pocket of armed resistance was growing smaller and smaller. Elsewhere on the continent, the war was not over yet. German forces had captured Norway in 1940 and now that Germany was effectively in Allied hands this is where the leaders of German resistance were holed up, including Grand Admiral Karl Doenitz, the successor to Hitler after his April 30 suicide. In the article on Norway, it mentions that Swedish officials regarded rumors of German capitulation in Norway to be "premature". Little did they know...

Of course, the fighting was still far from over in the Pacific, where V-J Day wouldn't come until August of 1945. However, for a historian looking back on this issue, it's cool to see the reports of continued German resistance and to think that the people who wrote those articles had no idea that the war in Europe was that close to being over. Until next time take care, and thanks for reading.

The Main Challenge For World War II Historians

One of the greatest questions that historians face in any field of study is "what was this person thinking before X happened?" Often times historians are forced to make educated guesses based on the person's actions as to what their motivations are.

However, sometimes historians have documentation from a person to give us a glimpse into their mindset during an event. In the field of World War II research, we are fortunate to have some very interesting and enlightening perspectives into two of the war's combatants: Britain and Germany.

Of course, the person that people most want to get into the mind of is Adolf Hitler. Fortunately for historians, Hitler was an avid orator and there are numerous works of his that explain his motivations. People who at the time viewed Germany's aggressive actions as a shock obviously didn't read "Mein Kampf", in which Hitler states that:

"[the Nazi movement] must find the courage to gather our people and their strength for an advance along the road that will lead this people from its present restricted living space to new land and soil, and hence also free it from the anger of vanishing from the earth or of serving others as a slave nation."

Arado Ar 234: First Jet Bomber

An Arado Ar 234 after the war with US markings.
Photo sourced from WikiCommons.

As World War II neared its conclusion in Europe, the Germans were growing increasingly desperate for "wonder weapons", weapons that could turn the tide of war in their favor. Nothing the Germans developed did that but they greatly advanced the field of military technology. One of these technological innovations was the implementation of the jet engine in both fighters and bombers. The fighter was the Messerschmitt Me 262, the bomber was the Ar 234.

The first Ar 234s were introduced in the fall of 1944. At first they were only used in a reconnaissance capacity, but soon they were used as bombers. Since the bomb bay was completely filled with fuel tanks, the bombs had to be mounted externally, an unusual trait for such a plane. Even so, the few missions the Ar 234 flew proved that the plane was nearly impossible to catch (see Bombing of Remagen Bridge)

However, like all of Germany's secret weapons it was too little too late. The early jet engines needed a lot of fuel that wasn't available and Allied pilots figured out that the easiest time to shoot down a jet was to wait for it to take off or land, which happened on many occasions. Nevertheless, the innovations made by the Germans in the field of jet aircraft paved the way for all modern jet aircraft today. Until next time take care, and thanks for reading.

(Fcts sourced from "The Encyclopedia of Aircraft of World War II" edited by Paul Eden as well as Wikipedia on the Ar 234)

WWII Movie Review: "A Bridge Too Far"

Photo sourced from
WikiCommons.

It was the largest operation on the Western Front since the D-Day landings. It was the largest airborne assault in history up to that time. It was also the big disappointment for the Allies who thought that they could end the war before Christmas 1944. This was Operation Market Garden, and it was immortalized by the 1977 film A Bridge Too Far based on the 1974 book by Cornelius Ryan.

The film is famous as a movie because of its large number of all-star actors, including James Caan, Robert Redford, Michael Caine, John Ratzenberger, Laurence Olivier,  and Sean Connery. This was not the first World War II film to feature some of these names in one place (see The Longest Day).

However, as a historical film it outdoes itself. Based on the book of the same name by Cornelius Ryan, this movie is incredibly accurate in its portrayal of the ultimate failure of Market Garden and the people associated with it on both sides, with few obvious artistic liberties.  Filming for the most part took place on the sites where the actual events happened, most notably the Arnhem bridge.

This is not the shortest film at almost 3 hours, but for the time you commit to watching this it gives you a good taste of one of the most notorious campaigns in World War II and overall it's a great war movie. Until next time take care, and thanks for reading.

The Bridge at Remagen: First Jet Bomber Target in History

An Arado Ar 234 as seen at the National Air and Space Museum's
Steven Udvar-Hazy Center. Photo by Cody Lizotte.

In early 1945, the majority of Germans all but knew they were done for. The Luftwaffe's attempts to break the Western Allied air forces, Operation Bodenplatte, was a disaster. Soviet troops had captured almost all of occupied Poland and were closing on Berlin. Finally, the Western allies had reached the Rhine River, the natural border between France and Germany.

The Wehrmacht (German army) had failed in their mission to blow up the main bridge across the river at Remagen, so the Luftwaffe (German air force) was ordered to launch bombing strikes to destroy the bridge. Suffice it to say, the Allies were well prepared to fend off air attacks and the strikes were unsuccessful. The Americans captured both sides of the bridge by March 23, 1945.

However, this was the first instance in history when formations of only jets were used to strike a target. The escort fighters were Messerschmitt Me 262s, the world's first operational jet fighter. The bombers were Arado Ar 234s, the world's first jet bomber with a bomb payload equal to that of the B-17 Flying Fortress but with a top speed at least 150mph faster.

The raids may not have been a success, but this early mission would later serve as a blueprint for future air strikes in the jet era, with F-18s escorting A-10s for example. Until next time take care, and thanks for reading.

(Facts sourced from "Campaigns of World War II Day by day" by Chris Bishop and Chris McNab)

Luftflotte 4: Lifeline of the German 6th Army at Stalingrad

A Junkers Ju52 being offloaded at Stalingrad.
Photo sourced from www.stalingrad.net.

One of the US Air Force's proudest moments in postwar history was the Berlin Airlift, a massive undertaking in which the Soviet-besieged city of West Berlin was supplied solely by air for over a year. A similar feat was attempted during the war by the German Luftwaffe in order to supply the surrounded Sixth Army at Stalingrad.

In 1940, with the British Expeditionary Forces and the remnants of the French army fleeing to the coast near Dunkirk, Hitler ordered the advancing forces stopped. This was partly because they had outrun their supply lines, but also because Herman Goering, the head of the Luftwaffe, promised Hitler that he would demolish the enemy using nothing but air power. Needless to say, it didn't work nearly as well as Goering had hoped.

You would think Hitler would have lost faith in Goering after that, but no. In November of 1942, Goering made a promise to Hitler that using Junkers Ju 52s from Luftflotte 4 he could supply the surrounded Sixth Army with enough resources to drive back the Soviets. This worked in that it allowed the Sixth Army to hold on longer than was expected, but because of increased Soviet air superiority and the fact that the Soviets were capturing the airstrips near Stalingrad meant that the airlift was overall a disaster. The last plane left Stalingrad on January 24, 1943, and the Sixth Army surrendered ten days later.

The toll on Luftflotte 4 was tremendous, with one-third of the entire fleet of Ju-52s on the Eastern Front destroyed. Nevertheless, one good  thing came from this airlift. About 42,000 wounded troops were evacuated and were spared the harsh prisoner of war camps that awaited the remnants of the Sixth Army. Until next time take care, and thanks for reading.

(Facts and figures sourced from "World War II" by H.P Willmott, Robin Cross, and Charles Messenger as well as Wikipedia on Hans-Georg von Seidel, the Luftwaffe head of logistics during this operation.)

Stars and Stripes Review: July 29, 1943

Scanned by Cody Lizotte.

For those of you who are unfamiliar with this, The Stars and Stripes is the daily publication for the U.S armed forces and has been published since World War I. It has been published both as a traditional newspaper and a tabloid. Today, many issues of Stars and Stripes that denote famous wartime events are highly sought, such as D-Day and "Hitler Dead". This issue, however, does not show any events of major historical importance, but is instead a unique insight into the everyday reality of World War II.

This specific issue was published in London, however as the war progressed other editions sprang up such as North Africa, Paris, and Munich, Germany. This issue's headline topic concerns the Allied policy of the Combined Bombing Initiative, where the Americans would bomb Germany during the day and the British would bomb during the night.

Also included in this issue are the first signs of strains between Germany and Italy. As peace talks begin, Italy is seen as willing to surrender to the Allies, an act that they won't commit until the Allied invasion of mainland Italy (at the time of this issue, the Germans had yet to be defeated in Sicily).

Along with various war-related stories, there's also the full-page sports section (the issue's only one sheet of folded paper, with sports being on page 3 and the other pages dealing with war issues) reporting the results from the minor leagues of baseball as well as an upset for the Phillies as the Cardinals beat them 6-2 and 5-2, leading to a replacement of the Philies' manager.

Finally, there's the comics. There are only two strips in this issue (sometimes there's at least five), and neither of them are in circulation today: Li'l Abner and a 'new' one Terry and the Pirates. These strips follow the model of serials rather than witty one-offs every day. However, for the men in the trenches it was a refreshing break from the harshness of war. Until next time take care, and thanks for reading.

Autogyros: WWII's Contribution to Helicopter Development

A Cierva C.30 circa 1951. Photo sourced from WikiCommons.

All technology has to start somewhere. Before we could get to images of Bell Hueys depositing U.S troops in Vietnam, we had to have several generations of helicopters developed, as well as find various military uses for such aircraft. Before even the spartan helicopters seen on "M*A*S*H", we had the autogyro, and it played a small but vital role in World War II and afterward.

The autogyro was first successfully flown in 1923. In concept it's similar to a helicopter in that it has a rotary wing that provides lift. Unlike a helicopter, for an autogyro to achieve lift it must have a propeller push it forward, making the rotor spin in the wind fast enough.

The autogyro was adopted by the air forces of both Germany and Britain because of its low maintenance requirements and its short takeoff requirements. The Germans used autogyros as reconnaissance tools to aid the U-Boat hunting packs off the coast of mainland Europe. The British, however, used autogyros like the Cierva C.30 to calibrate the coastal radar installations that were so crucial during the Battle of Britain in 1940.

While this was the main extent of autogyros in World War II, it was through experimentation on these aircraft that helicopter pioneers like Igor Sikorsky were able to make the breakthroughs necessary to make the first operational helicopters in the late 1940s. The rest, as they say, is history. Until next time take care, and thanks for reading.

(Facts sourced from "World War II" by H.P Willmott, Robin Cross, and Charles Messenger, as well as Wikipedia on autogyros.)

Schweinfurt: The Mission All Pilots Hated

An aerial view of Schweinfurt during the raids in 1943.
Photo sourced from wikicommons.

One of the hallmarks of World War II is the image of massive bomber formations heading into Germany to bomb factories and cities in order to cripple the German war machine and destroy morale. However, these missions were fraught with peril from anti-air flak on the ground and enemy fighters in the air. One such mission was more perilous than most, but the target was vital, if not immediately obvious as to its importance. The factories at Schweinfurt made extremely vital, immensely important...ball bearings.

These ball bearings, however, really were vital in the German war effort, especially in their aircraft production and specifically in the manufacture of airplane engines. It was thought that the destruction of the Schweinfurt factory would cripple the German aircraft industry and promote Allied air superiority.

However, this raid earned a reputation in its first incarnations. In August and October of 1943, the Allies did two raids on Schweinfurt with over 200 bombers per raid. Normally, the acceptable amount of battle losses for a bomber mission is below 10 percent. On these raids, the casualty rates were as high as 30 percent. After the October raid, strategic bombing in Europe was suspended for four months to recover from the losses.

Schweinfurt would be visited again and again until the factory was destroyed, costing the Germans 25 percent of their entire ball bearing making capability. However, lack of proper intelligence and no air superiority fo rthe Allies meant that these raids were the most costly and the most infamous of the war. Until next time take care, and thanks for reading.

(Facts and figures sourced from "Campaigns of World War II Day by Day" by Chris Bishop and Chris McNab)

Wartime Innovation: The Tank Destroyer

A Hetzer on patrol in Hungary 1944.
Photo sourced from WikiCommons.

In war, there's a certain amount of innovation associated with certain situations. Technology is often developed at a much faster rate than in peacetime, and new technology is often produced as a result. One of these new technologies is the tank destroyer.

Developed later in the war, the tank destroyer is basically a tank gun mounted on an obsolete tank chassis. The Germans were one of the first to build one of these, and it was called the Hetzer. It was cheaper to produce than a tank with a comparable gun, and as the name implies it could destroy enemy tanks with losses that were easier to replace.

Unfortunately for the Germans, like many of their technological achievements in the war, it was too little too late. While the concept of the tank destroyer would be adopted by other nations and is still used to this day, in World War II it came too late to change the outcome. Until next time take care, and thanks for reading.

(Facts sourced from "Campaigns of World War II Day by Day" by Chris Bishop and Chris McNab)

Junkers Ju-87 Stuka: Death Screams From Above

A flight of Stukas October 1943. Photo sourced from WikiCommons.

One of the main reasons why Germany was so successful in its early military campaigns was its use of blitzkrieg, or lightning war. In blitzkrieg, the armored units thrust through the enemy lines and sweep in from behind, encircling the enemy forces and cutting off their supplies. One of the key supports for the following infantry was the Luftwaffe and their dive bombers, the most famous of which was the Ju-87 Stuka.

The Stuka was unique in that it had bent gull-wings and it also had a siren attached to it. When the plane dove on the enemy formations, wind would pass through the siren and the plane would be heard shrieking down on its 'prey' right before it released its bomb with pinpoint accuracy. The Stuka, in fact, was one of the best dive bombers the Luftwaffe had in its arsenal.

However, it was after the conquest of mainland Europe that the Stuka's main problems surfaced. When Germany turned its sights towards bombing Britain into submission, the Stuka was one of the main bombers used in that campaign. However, the fact that it was very slow and couldn't maneuver very well in tight turns made it easy prey for the RAF. This made the limitations of the Stuka painfully clear to the Germans.

Eventually the Stuka was phased out of the Western lines and shipped to the Eastern front, where it continued to be used in its ground support role throughout the rest of the war, raining screaming death from above. Until next time take care, and thanks for reading.

(Facts sourced from "The Encyclopedia of Aircraft f World War II" edited by Paul Eden)

Escaping is no longer a sport!

In my previous posts about the various prison escapes, I have talked at length about the methods used by the prisoners to outwit their German captors. However, one thing that may still be confusing is why so much emphasis was put on these escapes. The answer is because the prisoners showed immense courage to do what they did, but not only in the act of escaping itself.

The reason so much emphasis is put on these escapes is because of the daring of the prisoners to escape into the heart of a country whose contempt and hate for them grew with every Allied advance. This led Hitler to enact more and more severe punishments for escapees, but still within the bounds of the Geneva Convention, which laid out rules of conduct in war between POW and jailer. these bounds included the prisoner's duty to, in a nutshell, escape and confound the enemy and use an inordinate amount of resources to maintain their confinement.The other big bound was that jailers couldn't kill prisoners.

However, as the war went on Hitler could not afford to tie up more and more resources to round up escaping prisoners. After the Great Escape, where 76 prisoners escaped, an example had to be made. After they chose 50 of those captured to be summarily executed, posters popped up in all of the German POW camps warning the prisoners that if they were caught escaping again they would be killed.

 Even so, many prisoners dared to resist their German captors, although significantly less than in previous years. The prisoners of Stalag Luft III worked on yet another tunnel after the Great Escape, and the prisoners of Colditz built the Colditz Cock glider. These men knew the risks if they were to be caught and they still did these things. This was the kind of courage that legends were made of. Until next time take care, and thanks for reading.

(Sourced from "The Great Escape" by Paul Brickhill and "Colditz: The Untold Story of World War II's Great Escapes" by Henry Chancellor)

Icy Lifeline: The Arctic Convoys

Frost built up on the HMS Sheffield while escorting a convoy.
Photo sourced from WikiCommons.

One of the many success stories of World War II is the capacity of the United States to keep Britain fed throughout the war by making ships faster than the Germans could sink them. There was another convoy route, however, that does not get much attention but was equally as vital to the war effort. These were the Arctic convoys.

The Arctic convoys were put into place in the summer of 1941, days after the German invasion of the Soviet Union. They were so named because they were forced to travel north of the Arctic Circle to deliver supplies to Murmansk, one of the USSR's northernmost ports.

However, these convoys had to brave more than just the cold. With the German conquest of Norway and Finland allied with the Germans, the route that the convoys had to take was fraught with enemy planes and ships.

One particularly notable convoy was PQ17 (PQ referring to travelling to Murmansk; QP meant departing Murmansk). It left at a time when the majority of the German fleet and a number of German planes were stationed in Norway, and intelligence leaked that the Tirpitz, the sister ship of the Bismarck, had sailed for the convoy. The Tirpitz, it turned out, wouldn't sail until the next day but the convoy was ordered to scatter and 23 of the 34 ships were sunk by U-Boats.

Nevertheless, these convoys were never deterred, and the Soviets were able to be supplied throughout the war. Until next time take care, and thanks for reading.

(Facts and figures sourced from "Campaigns of WWII Day by Day" by Chris Bishop and Chris McNab).

Seemingly Valuable Hostages: The 'Prominente' Prisoners

As the war in Europe went on the Germans accumulated more and more prisoners of war. The demographics of these prisoners reflect the stages of the war. Fr example, in 1943 before the landings at Normandy but during increased activity by the U.S Army Air Force there would have been increased numbers of American pilot prisoners.

However, throughout the war there were several prisoners that the Germans viewed as high value simply because they were related to key members of enemy governments. These were the 'Prominente', and they were held at the most secure prison camp in Germany: Colditz Castle.

The Prominente were usually servicemen who were captured in the line of battle, but some were civilians. Giles Romilly, for example, was a war correspondent who was captured in the Norway campaign and was the nephew-in-law of Winston Churchill. Other Prominente were usually distant cousins or nephew of high-ranking generals in the armies of Britain, France, the Netherlands, and Poland.

These people were kept 'safe' and isolated from other prisoners in Colditz, and when the end of the war approached the Prominente feared that they had been saved only to be used as bargaining chips or worse, human shields. Eventually they were moved from camp to camp in the closing days of the war and by the end the officer in charge of the prisoners (who was regular army instead of SS and was afraid of SS reprisals if he surrendered) allowed the prisoners to go towards American lines, and he got a reduced sentence during the Nuremburg Trails for saving them.

In the end, the Prominente were little use to the Germans. Their potential value as hostages was overestimated ( a popular incident involves Hitler capturing one of Stalin's sons and asking to exchange him for a high ranking German officer and Stalin turned him down) and the end result was negligible. Until next time take care, and thanks for reading.

(Facts sourced from "Colditz: The Untold Story of WWII's Great Escapes" by Henry Chancellor)

Airliner Turned 'Liner-Killer: The Fw 200 Condor

An Fw 200 in flight. Photo sourced from WikiCommons.

In a previous article concerning the Germans' practice of making civilian planes with the explicit purpose of converting them to warplanes later, I talked about the Junkers Ju 52, which had a number of uses throughout the war. There's another notable aircraft to come out of this process, the Focke-Wolfe 200 Condor, which Winston Churchill dubbed "the scourge of the Battle of the Atlantic".

Like the Ju 52, the Fw 200 was originally built as a civilian plane and was operated by Lufthansa. Once war broke out, however, the Condor was quickly converted to serve the Luftwaffe. It was originally used to help the Kreigsmarine (the German navy) in their attempts to disrupt shipping in and around Britain after the invasion of France. It was reportedly quite successful in this role, what with its large and heavy-hitting arsenal. In February 1941 five Condors attacked a convoy and sank five ships in total.

However, by the middle of the war, with the advent of improved fighter planes and the entry of the United States into the conflict, the Condors became less and less effective. The Germans told Condor pilots to avoid conflict at all costs in order to preserve the planes. This didn't work, and it resulted in a Condor being the first German plane to be sot down by a U.S pilot in the war.

The Condor took on other roles during the war, such as reconnaissance and transport. But with Germany collapsing, the Condor was eventually phased out of the Luftwaffe's arsenal. Until next time take care, and thanks for reading.

(Facts and figures sourced from Wikipedia on the Fw 200 and "Campaigns of WWII Day by Day" by Chris Bishop and Chris McNab).

WWII Book Review: "Freedom's Forge"

Photo from Barnes and Noble's website.

This book is a unique historical piece about the "arsenal of freedom", the process from which the United States recovered from the Great Depression by putting the burden of armament on the private sector.

Its basic premise is to show the immense challenges America had to face in order to arm not only us but our allies. It constantly shows the incredible gap between the amount of war materiel that was needed and what the manufacturers thought they could make, and how they would eventually blow those numbers out of the water.

The Wonderful Tools for Escaping from a POW Camp

A compass hidden inside a walnut.
Photo sourced from  pegasusarchive.org.

One of the stories that is not looked upon as often as compared to the life and death struggles of combat during World War II is the life and death struggle of prisoners of war. In Germany, there were large numbers of Polish, French, Belgian, Dutch, British, Russian, Greek, Czech, and later American prisoners all over the place. These men were duty bound to escape, and they had some of the most ingenious tools to do it.

In previous posts on The Great Escape from Stalag Luft III and Colditz Castle, I talked about the two most famous and glorified accounts of POW life in Germany. However, one aspect that hasn't been touched on were the escape aids. These were tools vital to escape, such as saw blades, money, compasses, and identity papers, hidden in such a way that the Germans couldn't find them, at least in theory.

A record containing German money.
Photo sourced from theescapeline.blogspot.com

These tools were the products of MI9, a branch of the British Directorate of Military Intelligence, and the man who made them, Christopher Hutton, was a master of disguising contraband as harmless items. There were maps hidden as handkerchiefs, magnetic clips on pens so that they could be balanced on the tip to make a compass, spare uniforms that were specially designed to easily convert to civilian clothes, money hidden inside records, and even compasses hidden inside walnuts!

These were hidden in Red Cross care packages, and over the course of the war the Germans found most, but not all of these clever inventions, which only inspired MI9 to be even more clever, a war of wits if you will. These are the kinds of things usually seen in spy novels, but in reality, and it still makes a good story. Until next time take care, and thanks for reading.

(Facts from Wikipedia on MI9 and "Colditz: The Untold Story of WWII's Great Escapes" by Henry Chancellor).

Paris: A City Spared Devastation

German soldiers enter Paris.
Photo sourced from WikiCommons.

In today's society one of the most famous places in Europe is Paris for a number of reasons. We can soak in the history stretching back centuries, from the Louvre to the Eiffel Tower. However, it could have ended up differently had events in World War II taken a different path.

By the middle of June 1940 the Germans had the Allies on the ropes. The British Expeditionary Force had evacuated from Dunkirk, the best French army units had already been encircled, and the government had abandoned Paris. The city was squarely in Germany's sights.

Earlier in the war, Warsaw, the capital of Poland, and Rotterdam, a major city in the Netherlands, had both been severely bombed by the German Luftwaffe. The remaining city officials in Paris did not want to have their city share Warsaw's fate, and so on June 10 they declared Paris an open city, allowing the Germans to march in unopposed, an opportunity which the German propaganda artists (as well as Hitler, as described by his chief architect Albert Speer) took full advantage of.

Even when the Allies landed on Normandy and began pushing inland,, the Germans did not want to have bombs drop on Paris, so they moved their forces out of the city in 1944, leaving the city virtually unscathed throughout the war. These decisions have left us with a beautiful city to go to and enjoy for all its worth. Until next time take care, and thanks for reading.

(Facts and figures sourced from "World War II" by H.P Willmott, Robin Cross, and Charles Messenger.)

WWII Survivor: The Brandenburg Gate

The Brandenburg Gate after the German surrender.
Image sourced from the Library of Congress
via www.militaryphotos.net.

From about 1941, Berlin had been a target for Allied bombings. Over the course of the war, the city was pounded relentlessly, and frankly many historic structures were lucky to survive the onslaught. In a previous post, I discussed the Berlin Victory Column as a WWII survivor. Another such survivor is the Brandenburg Gate.

The Brandenburg Gate was one of the original customs gates into Berlin, built in the 1730s in order to manage the flow of traffic into the city as it expanded after the Thirty Years War. In a famous painting, Napoleon is depicted proceeding through the Gate into Berlin during his conquest of Prussia. It was after this that the Quadriga, the horse-chariot statue on top, was moved to Paris and later returned after Napoleon's downfall.

During the World War II, like most of Berlin, the Gate took some hits around it from bombs and later Soviet artillery as Berlin was encircled in April of 1945. After the war, the damage was repaired in one of the few joint efforts by the West Berlin and East Berlin governments. Since the Gate was between the zones of occupation, the Quadriga was outfitted with a pole which flew the flag of East Germany. This, of course, was removed after the Wall fell.

The Brandenburg Gate in 2011. Photo by Cody Lizotte.

The rich history of the Brandenburg Gate is more vast and layered than can be provided in a small package. However, the fact remains that the Gate was one of the few structures that survived and today is one of the most visited sights in Berlin. Until next time, take care and thanks for reading.

(Facts and figures sourced from Wikipedia on the Brandenburg Gate and "World War II" by H.P Willmott, Robin Cross, and Charles Messenger)

The German 88: Not Your Grandfather's Karbine

As I indicated in my last post, Germany in the interwar period did not strictly abide by the rules set by the Versailles Treaty stipulating what weapons Germany could and could not have. Another one of those provisions that Germany bent was that they were not allowed to develop anti-aircraft artillery. In the process of breaking that rule Germany made one of the most versatile and well-known pieces of artillery in history.

A German 88 with its crew in France 1944.
Photo sourced from WikiCommons.

The 88mm 'flak' gun, or more commonly known by the Allied forces as the 'German 88', was originally designed to be a purpose built anti-aircraft gun (anti-aircraft guns of World War I were merely regular artillery pieces modified to point straight up). In this capacity, the 88 performed well all through the war.

However, its most infamous role was as an antitank gun.This was achieved because the 88 was unique from other 'flak' guns by its ability to be aimed below the horizontal plane. The first well-documented use of the 88 in combat was during the Spanish Civil War, but it was in North Africa where its infamy became solidified. Outside the ranges of normal Allied tank guns and surrounded by empty desert, the Allied tanks had nowhere to hide.

It was this stellar success in the use of the 88 that newer German tanks became equipped with the 88 as their primary weapon. It was this gun that spurred new developments in tank design by both sides that are still in use today. Until next time take care, and thanks for reading.

(Facts and figures sourced from "The World War II Desk Reference", edited by Michael E. Haskew, as well as Wikipedia on the 88mm).

Lufthansa Turned Luftwaffe: Germany's Duplicitous Aircraft Development

In the Treaty of Versailles, signed in 1919, it stipulated that Germany could not have any military aircraft. This was one of many provisions intended to punish Germany after the First World War, and to limit Germany's capability of being a threat to the rest of Europe. After Hitler was elected chancellor, the anger felt by Germany over the unfairness of the treaty translated into many subtle pursuits into rebuilding Germany's army while walking the line but not violating the treaty.

One of those pursuits was the development of a modern air force. Of course, because the treaty said that Germany couldn't have an air force this process could not be done in the open or overtly. So, this task was handed to the various aircraft manufacturers in Germany (Heinkel, Messerschmitt, Junkers, etc.) in order to design new and better planes for civilian use.

A Junkers Ju52 with Lufthansa markings.
Photo obtained through WikiCommons.

The most prominent example of this is the Junkers Ju52. It was originally designed to be used by Lufthansa, the German flag-bearing airline to this day, as a civilian airliner. However, the designers at Junkers made this plane so that it could be easily converted to be a bomber. Indeed, during the Spanish Civil War it was one of the first planes given to Franco's forces. The Ju52, however, was not a very effective bomber and ended up serving in the Luftwaffe in its original role: as a troop transport.

Many of Germany's new planes built in the 1920s and '30s would end up serving in the Luftwaffe in one way or another. This was just one of many areas where Germany defied the treaty in order to rearm itself. Until next time take care, and thanks for reading.

(Facts and figures courtesy of "The World War II Desk Reference" edited by Michael E. Haskew, with specifics about the Ju52 found on Wikipedia.)

The Largest Tank Battle in History

Operation Citadel as a whole. The Battle of Prokharovka
was fought in the bulge seen in the lower third
 of the picture seen in red. Photo obtained through WikiCommons.

It was July 12, 1943. By this point, it was the beginning of the end for Germany's ambitions. The German Army had reached its farthest advance into the Soviet Union and was slowly being pushed back. At one spot, the Soviets had pushed a bulge into the German lines, which is usually bad military tactics. Hitler decided to strike back, hoping to defeat enough of the enemy to turn the tide. In this offensive, code name Operation Citadel, was the largest engagement by tanks the world had ever seen or will see.

It was known as the Battle of Prokhorovka. The Soviets had marshaled around 850 tanks and the Germans had about 450 tanks. Both sides fought at almost point-blank range, and in an amazing feat of armored combat tactics the Germans suffered relatively minor losses while the Soviets lost almost half of their tank forces. In the microcosm it was a major victory.

Unfortunately for Germany, in the grand scheme of things it did little good. Morale was at a rock bottom low, the Soviets could afford such losses and continue to go strong, and the Germans knew that the long slog  back to Germany would cost them many more casualties. Nevertheless, this is a battle for the record books and if you could have been there it would have been a sight to behold. Until next time take care, and thanks for reading.

(Facts and figures sourced from: "World War II" by H.P Willmott, Robin Cross, and Charles Messenger; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Prokhorovka)

Argentina: More Than an Innocent Bystander

In a very real sense, World War II was the first truly global war. If a country wasn't actively fighting they supported one that was. Argentina was no exception. Like Spain, Argentina became a war zone  of espionage on both sides.

Argentina had a sizable German and Italian population at the beginning of the war, and their Nazi Party was particularly active. However, the Argentine maintained neutrality throughout most of the war. This ended when the FBI accused Argentina and Chile of acting as intelligence hot spots for the Axis powers, and provided evidence to support their claims. This led to 38 arrests in Argentina and the end of the espionage wars. When the Axis powers were nearing total collapse, Argentina finally declared war, a month and a half before Germany surrendered.

Nevertheless, because of the heavy German presence in Argentina it became a refuge for many top Nazi leaders after the war, including Adolf Eichmann, head of the Gestapo Department of Jewish Affairs.He was later found by Israeli agents and tried and hanged in 1962. Until next time take care, and thanks for reading.

(Facts and figures courtesy of "The World War II Desk Reference", edited by Michael E. Haskew)

BMW and Rolls-Royce: Enemies Now Allies

While the title of this post may seem confusing, in fact it highlights a point of bitter contention between Britain and Germany that continues to this day. During World War II the British fighters, as well as the P-51 Mustang, were powered by Rolls-Royce engines. The Germans, on the other hand, powered their aircraft by, among others, BMW engines.

Both BMW and Rolls-Royce made cars before the war and during the war their production lines were outfitted to make war materiel. After the war, Rolls-Royce went back to making cars but the BMW plants were almost all leveled over the course of the war. It wasn't until the mid 1950s that BMW even started  to make cars again. However, in Britain after the war up to the present day almost all of the British car companies either went out of business or were bought up by other companies. Among these companies bought, Rolls-Royce is now owned by BMW, whose engines power the new Rolls-Royces, a point of contention between two countries decades after the war's end. Until next time take care, and thanks for reading.

The Start of Ian Fleming: Operation Golden Eye

Ian Fleming is best known for being the writer of the James Bond novels, but before that he was an intelligence officer with the British Naval Intelligence Service. His career was made by two operations during the war, one of which was Operation Golden Eye.

Golden Eye was a plan to conduct sabotage operations against Spain should they forge an alliance with Germany or worse, be taken over by them. Because Spain had become fascist in the Spanish Civil War of 1936, Britain feared that they would sympathize with Germany and possibly cooperate with them to invade Gibraltar, the British port city and the Allies' gateway into the Mediterranean Sea. However, due to the fact that Spain never allowed German units into Spain ( in fact, like Switzerland, Spain kept its neutrality and became a hotbed of spy activity on both sides) the plans were scrapped.

Nevertheless, Operation Golden Eye had a lasting effect on Ian Fleming, the operation planner. He would later name his Jamaican home Goldeneye (later also the name of the 16th Bond movie), and thanks to his wartime career as a spy and peacetime career as a journalist he began to create the most famous novel character in history: James Bond. Until next time take care, and thanks for reading.

The People's Car: VW

Ferdinand Porsche

Many people can easily identify the Volkswagen Beetle, with its semicircular shape and cute-looking headlights. In fact, it passed the Ford Model T as the longest continually produced car in the world, having been made in its original format from 1938 to 2003. However, many people may not know the history behind the development of this icon.

This car was originally conceived by Dr. Ferdinand Porsche (yes, that Porsche) in 1932. In its first incarnation, it looked similar to the Beetle in that it was arranged in the same general layout with a semicircle body with a rear engine. However, these prototypes didn't cut it and were all eventually destroyed in an air raid during the war. In 1933, the year that Adolf Hitler took power in Germany, Hitler commissioned Porsche to make a "People's Car", literally a Volks wagen in German, for the general population. It was ordered to seat two adults and three children and go up to 100 km/hr (about 60 mph). It would be available on a savings plan with regular installments over about a year for the same price as a motorcycle at the time.

Porsche was only able to make a few cars for civilians before the war started. During the war, the Nazi elite could get them but for the most part the Germans used the Beetle as their version of the US Jeep, usually with the same chassis (underbody frame) but with a different body. Thankfully, Dr. Porsche survived the war and after the Allied disassembly of the German production facilites was over with he could proceed in making the car which would become the one we all know and love, as well as some of the most iconic German sports cars in history. Until next time take care, and thanks for reading.

Denmark: How to Capture a Country Before Lunch

It is a matter of months after Germany has successfully invaded Poland. Britain and France have declared war on Germany and the Second World War has begun. However, aside from some minor ( and half-hearted) border skirmishes on the French-German border, nothing has happened on the ground in Europe.

This silence, on April 9, 1940, was about to be broken. The Germans, remembering the First World War, wanted to prevent the British from effectively blockading Germany from its shipments of war-vital iron ore. To do this, the Germans needed to take Norway and in order to do that they needed to secure Denmark.

In the early morning hours of April 9, the Germans deployed a relatively small ground force in conjunction with paratroopers, the first such operation in history. By 9:00 AM, the Germans had secured the major airfields as well as Copenhagen the capital. While there was some sporadic resistance by the Danes, they knew they couldn't win and by noon Denmark had surrendered. However, because the Danes did not roll over and give up without a fight, and because the Germans viewed the Danes as fellow Aryans, they were treated better than most occupied nations during the war. Nevertheless, it is most certainly one of the shortest wars in history. Until next time take care, and thanks for reading.

A New Direction

To my previous readers,

As I have stated in my personal description, I am a journalism student at Colorado State University. As per my education, one of my classes requires me to keep a blog. Therefore, I am adapting the format of my posts to conform with the new reality of modern journalism: my posts will be shorter and more frequent.

Nevertheless, I will continue to offer interesting tidbits on various and little-known aspects of World War II in Europe. This includes personality profiles on famous generals, different facets of famous battles, technological advances, as well as reviews of World War II movies both old and new and Stars and Stripes Review.

To my new readers, mainly those in my class, I hope that you find this material as fascinating as myself. Look at it this way: I'm providing you with unique icebreakers and conversation starters for the weekend! Also, feel free to read my previous articles. They're long but they're packed with information.

Until next time take care, and thanks for reading.

Cody Lizotte