I Flew for the Fuhrer (Cassell Military Paperbacks)

Rating:
Summary: Fascinating insight
Review: When Lieutenant Heinz Knoke spotted the British Spitfire, it was flying in circles, taking pictures of the docks below. Knoke maneuvered his Messerschmitt Me-109G above the plane just as it stopped circling and headed back for England. Opening his throttle, he dived on the Spitfire, firing at its tail. Despite the British pilot's twisting maneuvers, Knoke's fire ripped into the Spitfire's fuselage. Then another Messerschmitt flew in to finish the job. As Knoke watched the Spitfire plummet to earth, he shouted, "Bail out! Bail out!" Then, as the plane began to break apart, Knoke saw a body detach itself from the Spitfire, and parachute bloom. It was March 5, 1943, and Heinz Knoke had just bagged his first enemy plane. There would be other enemy planes: B-24 Liberators, B-17 Flying Fortresses, P-47 Thunderbolts and P-51 Mustangs. All Knoke's victories and an eyewitness account of the eventual destruction of the Luftwaffe are revealed in I Flew for the Führer, Knoke's World War II diary, a fast reading tale of the air war over Europe. Originally published in 1957, Knoke's story has been reprinted by Greenhill Books. It is easy to see why. Knoke's book is raw, seat-of-your-pants storytelling. The day-by-day war journal is free of the imagery and adjectives that weigh down some military histories. There is no apology for the war or any profound theme; the book is just a combat pilot's simple daily record. And Knoke saw plenty of combat. Earning his wings after the Battle of Britain, Knoke went on numerous routine patrols all over France, but saw very little action. It was not until he was stationed at Jever, in northwest Germany, that the action stepped up. Shortly after he downed the Spitfire, American bombers began crossing over into Germany. To break up the formations, Knoke and his comrades came up with the idea of attacking the bombers using bombs with delay fuses. The operation worked for a while, but the Americans eventually began to learn how to dodge the falling bombs. Slowly, as Knoke racked up enemy kills (his tally rose to 33), the number of bombers flying over from Great Britain grews. Soon, they were escorted by P-47 Thunderbolts, keeping the Messerschmitts away from the formations. Knoke found himself bailing out or crash landing more and more often. In one action, Knoke came under fire from a Thunderbolt and popped his canopy to bail out. But the Thunderbolt kept firing at him. Knoke crouched down in his cockpit, despite the flames all around him. When his engine quit, the Thunderbolt overshot his plane, so Knoke opened fire on the enemy fighter before crash landing his plane. The American, his plane shot-up, ended up parachuting down near Knoke, where they shared a cigarette. But that kind of chivalry became rare as pilots on both sides began firing on parachuting pilots. Eventually Knoke found himself forced to fly wounded, taking off with one, sometimes two other pilots to engage hundreds of bombers escorted by hundreds of fighters. Despite his injuries, Knoke continued to fly his plane until incapacitated by a land mine while driving to his airbase. I Flew for the Führer is an excellent microcosm of Germany during World War II. Knoke started off eager for war, believing the war propaganda churned out by the Nazi press. He became a professional who enjoyed the excitement of the war. Eventually, he saw many of his friends killed but held on to the hope that Hitler's wonder weapons would turn the tide of the war. As the Allies closed in on Germany, he clung to the hope that Germany could make peace with the West, then turn and defeat the Red Army. He ended the war a cripple, cursing the Führer he once glorified. I Flew for the Führer is not only World War II in Europe at its best, it is combat aviation at its best. Both historians and aviation buffs will find something of interest in these pages.