AAR: A bottle of port, please!
The bishcuits had invaded our home island some hours earlier by capturing a port and an adjacent airfield. Even worse, they had crippled our task group, and when the CV came back to the port for repairs, the damn pointyheads captured it!
Seeing this might turn the tide against the valiant rooks, the finns - always ready and able - decided to take back the port. A strike package of four pilots was assembled from the elite squadrons Lentolaivue 34 and Jagdgeschwader 53 "Pik As". LLv34's Executive Officer Camo and their newest recruit DB603 were chosen for the escort duty in their 109 G-2's. JG53's finnish top guns Janjan and Kaitsu took the heavy duties and climbed into their Ju88 and Ju52, which was disguised as a C47 to fool the enemy.
Camo and DB603 took off with their fully laden G-2's from a field just 20 miles southeast of the port. They headed towards the enemy field to sweep the area clear of any threats. Janjan took off from an elevated field some 50 miles south of the port in his Ju88. Kaitsu was still sobering up in the officer's club at the same forward field the fighters just left behind.
Camo reports:Just as DB603 and I crossed the coastline into enemy airspace, we noticed a dot on our low one oclock. It turned out to be a spit on the way to our base. Since it didn't pose any threat to our operation, we let him go. Soon it disappeared into the horizon. We arrived at the enemy field and set up a cap pattern to keep any enemies low. And just as ordered, we noticed two enemies taking off. The first climbed eagerly towards us, we identified it as a spit. We made some passes at him and I managed to lure him into a zoom climb safely behind me. Just as he stalled, DB603 was positioned behind him and gave him a warm 20mm wakeup. The pilot bailed out as the wounded bird plummeted to earth. Scratch one!
The other enemy seemed to be looking for something at low altitude some miles off the shoreline. I flew towards him and noticed it was a green P47. He appeared to be totally unaware of my presence so I set up a steady dive from his high 6 oclock position. I opened fire at 300m and watched the cannon shells walking from the tail to the cockpit area. As I zoomed by, I noticed the landing gear was out and most of the control surfaces were blown away. The P47 caught fire and blew up in a huge ball of flames. The pilot never had a chance to bail out.
By now Kaitsu had woken up and managed to take off as well and was closing on the port with the Fallschirmjägern in the back of his plane. Janjan was passing the enemy airfield from a safe distance and prepared to bomb the port.
More enemies were now taking off from the field. One Mustang approached from the south but was quickly bracketed by us and sent down trailing smoke. Kill #2 for DB603! Two more enemies were noticed trying to reach the port in the north. I saw a P38 climbing towards the port and engaged. My drop tank was almost empty so I dropped it at this point. Another P38 had somehow managed to sneak past us and almost got to Janjan as he was making his second pass on the target, but fortunately he managed to shoot it down. My P38 was quite slippery and managed to evade my guns admirably. He didn't manage to shoot at me either, although he pinged me once during vertical scissors. After a furious knife fight the P38 managed to get behind me. DB603 was nearby and dove for help. After too many seconds of evading bullets left and right, the P38 plummeted down in a ball of flames. Thanks DB!!
By now Janjan had done his job, although taking some hits of the 88mm AAA, and the port was a smoking pile of rubble. It was time to drag the enemies away and let Kaitsu sneak his troops in. He had landed some moments earlier in a foresty area some miles to the west and was reportedly sleeping his hangover off under a tree. A local farmer also later complained of some paratroopers stealing his sheep.
Three more enemies approached from the south, a mustang and obviously a captured Focke Wulf. The third kept a bit further away and we didn't get an id on him. I engaged the mustang and managed to put a few cannon rounds into him. The P51 refused to engage and hurried to catch Janjan's Ju88, who was peddling south as fast as he could. The 190 was chasing him as well. DB603 followed the trio at full speed, but I was a bit slower and decided to engage the third enemy so that it wouldn't find Kaitsu.
I flew back North towards the port to meet the enemy fighter. At his point, Kaitsu reported he was on the final to land at the port. Moments later he announced the Jägern had found the map room after all. So they went to the back of their JU52 and dug up a crate of Flakpanzer oil and proceeded to empty the bottles, celebrating their great victory!
I raced towards the enemy fighter. As we passed eachother by mere centimeters in the headon, I noticed the plane was a russian Yak - yummy - my favourite! I started my turn early and watched him spend his rounds into thin air. I got into the offensive fast and furiously not to give him any mercy. I managed to get into good position and scored some hits. Unfortunately, a P38 out of nowhere joined the game and I was forced to go on the defensive. DB603 raced in to help me and chased the Yak away, who ran towards the nearby base. DB went off to chase the P38, as I picked another dot north of the enemy base. The enemy tried to get to the port, maybe to attack it. I started the pursuit and saw it was a P38 again. There must have been a P38 squadron based on that field!
A furious fight ensued. However, the P38 had a strange tactic: instead of dragging me to his own ack, he dragged me to *my* own ack, since we had already captured the port! Nevertheless the fight was one of the most enjoyable I've had in a long time. Vertical scissors, knife fighting on the deck, stall turns and whizzing tracers. Finally I caught him in a stall and managed to damage him enough to force a spin. He crashed in a ball of flames. Only seconds later DB603 announced he just scored his 4th victory of the sortie and thus setting his new record. Well done!!
By now our tanks were nearly empty and we landed on the port. As we shut down our engines, we saw the cavalry arriving - a few of our fighters chased the approaching enemies away. As we got ready to unhook the radios, Janjan reported having landed safely at the home field, missing an engine and some other parts. He had managed to shoot the P51 down that chased him. Not bad!!
We climbed out of our cockpits and walked up to Kaitsu's Ju52. He had saved a few bottles of FPO for us.
Some letters and numbers:
Pilots:[/b]
JG53 Pik As
Janjan: Ju88, took off A37, landed A33.
Kaitsu: C47, took off A33, landed P32
LLv34
Camo: 109 G-2, took off A33, landed P32
DB603: 109 G-2, took off A33, landed P32
Kills and accomplishments:Camo: 2 fightersP47
P38
DB603: 4 fightersSpit
P51
P38 (off Camo's tail)
P38
Janjan: 2 fighters P38 (above P32)
P51 (on rtb)
Kaitsu: 1 capturePort 32
Total:
8 kills
captured port
no casualties[/i]
Well done gentlemen, always a pleasure flying with you!
Camo
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Camouflage
XO, Lentolaivue 34
www.muodos.fi/LLv34 Brewster into AH!"The really good pilots use their superior judgement to keep them out of situations
where they might be required to demonstrate their superior skill."
