It’s all about the fight
Event ID: 583
Categories:
18 July 1917
Source ID: 22
“The commander of a fighter wing must be in close proximity to his troops. It is unacceptable for him to reside somewhere in the rear, communicate with his pilots by telephone, and issue his orders theoretically from his desk in the rear—this is not acceptable. The commander of the fighter wing must be convinced of the abilities of his individual fighter squadron leaders, their subordinate leaders, and even every single fighter pilot in a wing through his own observations in combat. Flying in front of the enemy is not something that can be done according to a ranking list. A useful fighter pilot is only someone who attacks the enemy when he sees him, who is always ready and able to engage in combat, and who does not ask whether he himself will end up lying on the ground with broken limbs at the end of the battle. There are many gentlemen walking around in beautiful uniforms, but that does not make them decent fighter pilots.
The commander of the fighter wing must know how to separate the wheat from the chaff. He can only do this if he is constantly with the people he commands. But that’s not all. The commander of the fighter squadrons must himself be a fighter pilot, and a good one at that, in other words, a successful one. He must take to the skies himself. Why? Because he has to observe how his men fight. That is the most important thing. He has to know which men he has to deploy together in squadron flights; he has to be able to judge which ones complement each other, which ones can be used together in the air. The combat squadrons at the front that achieve something consist of comrades who know each other well, who are attuned to each other in combat and who all know that no one will let the others down when things get dicey.
Comradeship is really the main thing in a fighter squadron. I do not tolerate troublemakers, even if they may otherwise be quite useful men against the enemy. The commander of a squadron should not boss his fighter squadrons around too much. The squadron leader must have free rein in his assigned area. At important moments, the commander should assign the fighter squadrons their main combat area without, as sometimes happens, prescribing that they must ‘fly a certain route three times’. Such orders are utter nonsense. The fighter pilots should roam around the area assigned to them as they see fit, and when they see an enemy, they should attack and shoot him down. Anything else is nonsense. For us, nothing else matters but shooting down the enemy. Even the good old Mr. Slausewitz said that in war, nothing else matters but the destruction of the enemy. If someone claims that it is important to prevent the enemy from conducting observation and reconnaissance flights simply by having fighter pilots at a certain point on the front, they are mistaken. Air superiority in war can only be achieved through combat, i.e. by shooting down the enemy. Furthermore, such orders have a devastating effect on fighter pilots whose nerves are not so strong and whose will to fight is easily weakened. If a fighter pilot who is already somewhat cautious is told: ‘You are doing the same thing by flying back and forth at the front as someone who attacks and destroys the enemy,’ then this fighter pilot, who is already somewhat questionable, will be rendered completely useless. Our superior command should understand that it is not a matter of well-worded orders, but only of combat.”
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