When an Enemy Was a Friend

[bpti]

Ok had it been an RAF bomber, I bet the German guy would have blasted it to pieces and made sure all its crew were peppered.
They probably somehow respected the USAF for bombing during daylight and focusing on strategic targets and not whole cities.

[FUNKED1]

Brown and Stigler were at WB Con 2000.  Very cool guys.  

[Guppy35]

Originally posted by bpti
Ok had it been an RAF bomber, I bet the German guy would have blasted it to pieces and made sure all its crew were peppered.
They probably somehow respected the USAF for bombing during daylight and focusing on strategic targets and not whole cities.

You're kidding right?  If not that is a rediculous comment.  There was no pinpoint bombing from high alt in WW2. No lazer guided stuff etc.  Anytime the bombs dropped, civillians died and homes were destroyed.  There was no difference between RAF and USAAF bombs to those on the ground, or in the air.

While the stories like the one posted are few and far between, in particular from that time frame, the stories of bomber crewmen blasted in their chutes on the way down are many along with the stories of Allied airmen killed once they reached the ground.

And that isn't said as an indictment of the German airmen or civillians.  It was total war.  People's lives were being destroyed.  Allied airmen understood that the folks on the ground below them were probably not going to be real happy with someone dropping in by parachute after the bombs had landed.

What the story illustrates is that even within all the insanity of war, there will be people who can seperate themselves from the killing when compassion is called for.

And in Franz Stigler's case, you could argue he, in terms of the overall scheme of things, made a bad choice, as there is/was no knowing how many more Germans would die under the bombs of the B17 of Charles Brown in any following flights he would make.

It's one of those great contridiction stories.  The subsequent friendship of Brown an Stigler speaks loudly to the stupidity of war in that these were just two people, regardless of which country they came from and they had no personal hatred for each other.  Yet because of the decisions of their leaders they faced each other in battle.

How many other potential friends, ended up killing each other instead?

Dan/Slack

[GScholz]

Originally posted by Guppy35
You're kidding right?  If not that is a rediculous comment.  There was no pinpoint bombing from high alt in WW2. No lazer guided stuff etc.  Anytime the bombs dropped, civillians died and homes were destroyed.  There was no difference between RAF and USAAF bombs to those on the ground, or in the air.

This is of course complete rubbish. The USAAF was tasked with the (so called) precision bombing of German war industry by day. RAF Bomber Command was tasked with "de-housing the German work force" by firebombing residential areas. First Mosquitoes would illuminate the target area, followed by an initial flight of Lancasters that bombed key road junctions to hinder relief efforts and the fire brigades, then the second wave of Lancs would drop thousands of small bomblets that shattered windows and holed rooftops to create good ventilation for the fire, then the final group of Lancs would drop thousands of small phosphor fire bombs and/or napalm setting the city ablaze. This procedure was designed to create a firestorm.

The attack on Dresden was in my opinion the worst of the RAF firebombing not only due to the number of civilians killed, but mostly because it was totally wanton. The estimated death toll ranges from 25.000 to a quarter of a million civilians killed.

Allied bombers dropped an estimated 3.4 kilotons of incendiaries on the German city of Dresden. The attack on Dresden in February 1945 has always been a contentious issue because of the number of lives lost, the lateness of the war, and the cultural significance of the city. The city was a legitimate military target, and the allied air forces did attempt to precisely bomb the city's marshaling yards. In the Dresden bombing attacks of 14-15 February 1945, the American Eighth Air Force and the RAF Bomber Command together employed a total of 1,299 bomber aircraft (527 from the Eighth Air Force, 722 from the RAF Bomber Command) for a total weight, on targets, of 3906.9 tons. Of this tonnage, 1247.6 tons were expanded by the Eighth Air Force, 2659.3 tons by the RAF Bomber Command. The Americans employed 953.3 tons of high explosive bombs and 294.3 tons of incendiary bombs -- all aimed at the Dresden Marshalling Yards. The British employed 1477.7 tons of high explosive bombs and 1181.6 tons of incendiary bombs -- all aimed against the Dresden city area. Military records indicate that about half of the bombs that rained on Dresden were napalm bombs. The exact number of casualties from the Dresden bombings can never be firmly established. Most of the latest German post-war estimates are that about 25,000 persons were killed and about 30,000 were wounded, virtually all of these being casualties from the RAF incendiary attack of 13/14 February 1945. If opprobrium attaches to anyone, it should be Winston Churchill who specifically asked that east German cities be bombed to create refugees and spread havoc.

[AdmRose]

Originally posted by Virage
Stigler is a hero.. but to put it in context.. imagine what would happen to a f16 pilot that escorted a shot up iraq mig to safety.

in Nazi germany.. he would of been shot.

In Bush America, he would have been shot, also.

[frank3]

Im sure pilots just wanted to shoot the enemy planes, not the pilots.
I've heard some stories about a German pilot being shot down, he bailed and while on parachute, the Allied plane (believe a mustang) came back and flew along side him. They saluted eachother like "well done"

[GScholz]

Chuck Yeager once said, "I never saw a chute I didn't shoot, cause I don't wanna have to face that bastard again."

[Guppy35]

Originally posted by GScholz
This is of course complete rubbish. The USAAF was tasked with the (so called) precision bombing of German war industry by day. RAF Bomber Command was tasked with "de-housing the German work force" by firebombing residential areas. First Mosquitoes would illuminate the target area, followed by an initial flight of Lancasters that bombed key road junctions to hinder relief efforts and the fire brigades, then the second wave of Lancs would drop thousands of small bomblets that shattered windows and holed rooftops to create good ventilation for the fire, then the final group of Lancs would drop thousands of small phosphor fire bombs and/or napalm setting the city ablaze. This procedure was designed to create a firestorm.

The attack on Dresden was in my opinion the worst of the RAF firebombing not only due to the number of civilians killed, but mostly because it was totally wanton. The estimated death toll ranges from 25.000 to a quarter of a million civilians killed.

You miss the point completely GScholz.  My point is that to anyone under the bombs or defending their home from the bombs, there was no difference between an RAF bomb and a USAAF bomb.

You are going to tell me that somehow the Germans 'respected' the USAAF bombs and didn't "respect" the RAF bombs.  No one under the bombs was counting tonnage or sat back and thought.  "Oh it's the USAAF.  That bomb that killed my kids was really meant for a factory, so thats OK."

Understand that my response was to the implication in a previous post that somehow the German pilot respected the USAAF bomber crew more so he let them go, but if it had been an RAF crew he would have blasted them.

I would assume that Stigler was a smart enough person to recognize that any bomber crew was doing their job and that they weren't the one choosing the target or type of bombing.

So no it isn't complete rubbish.  Get out from behind the statistics for a bit will ya?

Dan/Slack

[GScholz]

The USAAF bombed factories and other war production related infrastructure by day while the RAF burned down their cities by night. If you can't figure out who the Germans hated most then you Sir are beyond reasoning. You are damn straight that had that bomber been an RAF "Night Pirate" the LW (night)fighter would have shot them down. And if the RAF crew got out they would most likely have been lynched by the civilians on the ground.

[Ecke-109-]

Its always the same in this forum.
Can we stop that now?

[Angus]

Scholzie.....
The RAF shifted to civilian targets under the command of Harris (belive) when....in 1943? I have never understood why they simply didn't do it right away in 1940, after all, at the time :

a) The Germans were doing that to London with all their might
b) They could have, as German night defence technique was not that developed at the time, - they were flying unhindered to Berlin at night, say alone Hamburg or Bremen then.

This was the reckoning:

RAF Bomber command dropped around 1 million tonnes on the German Reich in WW2. The Americans added a lot to that as well.
RAF bomber command lost around 100.000 aircrew in those operations.
From the combined RAF and USAAF bombing, German casualties of dead+ wounded cross the million.
In 1940 however with the RAF hopelessly trying accurate bombing on military targets, Bomber command lost more people than the victim, Germany, AND actually German losses of life were less than losses in traffic accidents in the same period.

Now, this bomb debate has been ongoing for so many times, with lots of information showing up. Cutting it down to simple facts gives me this, - a matter of debate of course:
1) Actually night bombing accuracy wasn't that low in the late war, RAF Bomber command using pathfinders levelled the best accuracy in day bombing
2)The method of bombing a nation into submission using civilians as the target had been done successfully and thereby proved
3)The "firestorm" method was deliberate, and tried out, first on Hamburg (1943?) with "success". Information surfacing after the war indicates the belief of German high command at the time, that 2 more of those within a limited timeframe would indeed have forced the Reich to submit!
4)RAF BC did not go completely into terror bombing, it was more of an addition to the other jobs. Would actually like to know more about this, but I'm reading up...

Anyway, I doubt that the German people distinguished much between RAF and USAAF in that way. There was more to come than just bombing, - ground attackers roaming everywhere etc.
Something as a the opposite to the point of this thread, however close to me.
My Wifes stepfather is a german born in 1939, his father passed away in 1945. The funeral was strafed by a US fighter!

[Angus]

Oh, I'll bring you a story to this thread tomorrow,,,,a really nice one, honestly!

[-MZ-]

Originally posted by Guppy35
You are going to tell me that somehow the Germans 'respected' the USAAF bombs and didn't "respect" the RAF bombs.  

I contradict you warily, but I seem to recall a German civilian making this kind of statement about the Americans vs. British bomber pilots in Middlebrook's Battle of Hamburg.

[Guppy35]

Originally posted by GScholz
The USAAF bombed factories and other war production related infrastructure by day while the RAF burned down their cities by night. If you can't figure out who the Germans hated most then you Sir are beyond reasoning. You are damn straight that had that bomber been an RAF "Night Pirate" the LW (night)fighter would have shot them down. And if the RAF crew got out they would most likely have been lynched by the civilians on the ground.

LOL funny how if I don't agree with you, I'm beyond reasoning.

You're right, I'm wrong GScholz. I take it all back.  All these years studying the airwar, and I've learned nothing.  What a fool I was to question you

Dan/Slack

[Guppy35]

Originally posted by -MZ-
I contradict you warily, but I seem to recall a German civilian making this kind of statement about the Americans vs. British bomber pilots in Middlebrook's Battle of Hamburg.

I'm sure you could find anecdotal evidence out there of people making that kind of statement, but you can also find stories of German people helping shot down RAF bomber crews that came down at night.

Making a blanket statement that the action would have been different if it had been an RAF bomber instead of a USAAF bomber just doesn't work for me.

The German propoganda machine was quick to accuse the American bomber crews of deliberately engaging in terror bombing of residential areas and as evidence pasted photos of an American Lt. wearing his A2 jacket with "Murder Incorperated" on the back.  

Read Martin Middlebrook's excellent book on the Nuremberg Raid.  He details the experiences of numerous shot down RAF airmen from that raid.  Yes there were angry civillians, but at the same time they were also treated with much kindness despite being 'terrorfleigers".  The tone is exactly the same as the stories you read about captured American airmen.

MZ, in that B24 crew I've researched for so long you can see all kinds of different experiences by the guys from that one crew who managed to survive to bail out when they went down in early 45.  It's pretty clear that one was killed on the ground.  One was was wounded and stuck in a German hospital and died for lack of care.  One was beaten up and stoned by numerous people only to be 'saved' by a German soldier.  Another was shot at while he was coming down in his chute by German soldiers but survived.  Another broke his ankle on landing and was hustled to safety by a couple of German soldiers and the last of the survivors was taken into custody without incident, put in the care of a LW pilot who was to drive him to a different destination.  On the way the LW pilot stopped at his girlfriend's apartment, left the American in the living room and went off into the bedroom and did the deed while the American waited.

Kinda tough to make a blanket statement on the treatment of airmen based on that wouldn't you agree?

Dan/Slack