Lords of the Sky: Fighter Pilots and Air Combat, From the Red Baron to the F-16 (47 page)

Which was why he was here right now. The lightly armed paratroopers were running out of food, medical supplies, and, above all, ammunition. So these B-24s
had
to get through. As the radio erupted with chatter, he shoved his goggles up and squinted up at the deep blue sky. That was where the threat would be—the new German jet. From higher up and incredibly, unbelievably fast.

Sunlight flashed off metal to his left as the P-51s closest to the bombers ramped over and dove at the Focke-Wulfs. The 190 was an awesome aircraft, tough, fast, and heavily armed with four 20 mm cannons plus two 12.7 mm machine guns. In the right hands it was a match for his Mustang below 20,000 feet. And one just never knew these days. It was either a novice who could barely fire his guns or one of the
experten
, aces with years of combat experience. His job this September morning was covering the high ground against any Messerschmitts that showed up. Again, you just never knew.

Glancing down, Olds reached around the stick and touched a toggle switch on the console. It was up, where it should be, in the
GUNS
CAMERA
&
SIGHT
position that armed his weapons and filmed whatever he shot. The glowing yellow dot on the combining glass could be activated with the camera for training, and it all looked the same. He wouldn’t be the first pilot to squeeze the trigger and have nothing happen because the damn switch was in the wrong position.

Methodically scanning the sky, he then glanced at the line of fighters floating loosely nearly four miles above the earth. Most retained their silver paint on the top surfaces except for a dark strip along the cowling to the cockpit. Some had the rudders painted olive drab, and a few were solid green. The rudder bars and spinners were either red or yellow depending on the squadron, and most of the 18-inch alternating black and white invasion stripes had been removed by now. It didn’t matter; they were beautiful planes. It always amazed him how motionless flying seemed to be unless you were passing a cloud or looking down at the ground.

Or in a dogfight.

Up ahead a deadly spiderweb of tracers began streaking over, into, and below the bomber formation. Darting black specks merged like a swarm of gnats and began twisting together. A bright flash popped from the mess and a fighter dropped away, burning and trailing black smoke. Then another . . . and another. His headset was alive with voices: excited yelling from the new guys and much calmer, terse directives from the veterans, who sometimes didn’t say anything at all.

Suddenly the Mustang to his left sparkled brilliantly, and he flinched, surprised, as it staggered, pieces breaking loose and fluttering away. As he opened his mouth to call out, a mottled, torpedo-shaped plane flashed past overhead, heading for the bombers.

The jet!

Actually, there were two of them. He shoved the throttle forward and dumped his nose to follow, keying the mike at the same time.

“Roundtree Lead . . . Greenhouse Yellow One’s got bandits . . . your seven o’clock level . . . inbound fast . . . jets!”

Like a thoroughbred out of the gate, the Mustang surged ahead as the Packard Merlin engine spun up. Jettisoning his own wing tanks, Olds looked left to see his wingmen do the same as the big 12-foot prop bit hard into the thin air.

“Gre—Yellow Two is hit! Hit . . . I’m . . .”

The pilot clicked his mike and shot a glance at the map on his kneeboard for an approximate position. Close to Maastricht . . . it was the best he could do. In a matter of seconds the P-51 accelerated past 400 knots, and he stared through the clear bubble canopy at the mess before him. The bombers had all turned north toward Arnhem, and he could see a few Mustangs in the vicinity. The rest were all below him, wrapped up with the Germans. Black smoke trails hung in the air, most curving straight down, but others streamed away east and west as wounded fighters tried to make it back home.

One of the B-24s was spinning in, and another looked like it had lost most of its right wing. The jets had slashed through the bomber formation then disappeared. Below to his right a dark, compact fighter turned wildly with three . . . no, four Mustangs. The yellow cowling on the Focke-Wulf was plain to see as the skillful pilot pirouetted away from the other planes. Kicking the rudder, Olds skidded his Mustang sideways and was about to jump in from above when he caught movement off to the east.

The jet again. This time he could only see one.

“Greenhouse Yellow One . . . tally bandit . . . three o’clock level . . . ah, three miles . . .”

Flipping the P-51 over, he sliced to the right as his two surviving wingmen rolled and maneuvered to stay with him. The Me 262 was about three miles away, sliding across the horizon like a cruising shark. As he watched, the thing cranked up on one wing and turned in toward the bombers.

“Yellow Three, tally one . . .”

The Liberators were heading due north. Racing in from the southeast was the jet, and the three Mustangs were right in the middle. With a combined closing velocity of 1,400 feet per second, there was less than ten seconds until firing range—no time for anything fancy.

Ten . . . nine. . .

And the German never hesitated.

Aiming straight at him, Robin Olds stared through the glass reflector of his gunsight. He’d already set the dial at 35 feet to account for the Focke-Wulf’s wingspan and didn’t bother to change it. The jet was a little bigger, but it wouldn’t matter. His throttle was all the way forward, and Olds pushed it hard enough to feel the safety wire break. It moved another two inches, and five seconds of emergency power boosted the Merlin up to maximum power. This was only used in combat, since it could, and did, burn up engines.

Six . . . five. . .

He also twisted the throttle grip counterclockwise till the range indicator read 2,400 feet. The yellow aiming pipper stayed as it was, but the circle formed by the six surrounding diamonds shrank as the range setting was increased. The K-14 gyroscopic gunsight was a marvel that compensated for bullet drop
and
calculated the lead required for deflection shots. All the pilot had to do was put the pipper on the target, twist the grip until the diamonds matched the wingspan, and open fire.

Three . . . two . . .

Left hand rock steady on the throttle and his right hand on the stick, the pilot instinctively nudged the controls to keep the pipper on the deadly-looking fighter.
What a strange plane—no props
.

One . . .

Robin kept the pipper on the pointed nose and hammered down, the Mustang instantly vibrating against the recoil of six .50-caliber machine guns. Older P-51s had dangerous jamming problems because the guns were mounted sideways so they’d fit inside the wings. Not so with this Mustang; all six guns were electrically boosted to fire 1,200 rounds per minute per gun. The tracers streaked out, and even as Olds let up, the German’s nose sparkled as he fired in return.

Olds quit firing, his two-second burst having sent more than 120 rounds at the other plane. Pushing over savagely, he kicked the left rudder and twitched the stick, skidding the P-51 down and right as the German’s shells went exactly where he’d just been.

The 262 zipped past, and the Mustang pilot corkscrewed his fighter around, nose low, and pulled. Taking a deep breath against the g’s, he felt the air bladders on his new Berger G suit inflate and for once was grateful to be wearing the damn thing. Both wingmen cross-turned above him, then sliced back to bring their noses to bear.

With the stick back in his lap, Olds brought the nose around in the direction of the bombers to cut off the jet, but he wasn’t there! Blinking against the glare, he swallowed.
Not there.
Then he saw the smoke. A thin, dark gray trail that curved around to the south. Reversing the turn, he followed the smoke with his eyes and saw the jet. Two miles away already and arcing toward the ground, now heading southeast, back toward Germany.

“Ya got ’em, Yellow One . . .”

Well . . . a piece of him, anyway.

His number three man sounded relieved. Fighting something that different was disconcerting, especially after being told the Mustang was the best fighter in the world. And the men flying the jets were no novices; the Messerschmitts were too valuable for that.

Olds shook his head and watched a second longer before banking smoothly around to the north. Pulling the throttle back, he set a cruise speed of about 350 knots and glanced over the gauges: oil pressure, rpm, and especially coolant. All good. Exhaling, he checked his fuel and then the rounds counter to see how many shells were left. Everything was fine.

For a brief moment Robin Olds felt everything: heart thudding against his chest, the deep throb of the big Merlin engine, and his quick breathing slowly returning to normal. Cool air from the vents was drying the sweat on his neck, and the pilot sighed, shaking his head. He would’ve loved to send the German down in flames and watch that beautiful jet break apart under his guns. To fight and not kill was frustrating.

But if the Mustangs hadn’t been there, then the Messerschmitt would’ve shredded those bombers and everything they carried would be lost. Squirming against the harness, he took a deep breath and shrugged. It was enough this time. And besides, Robin thought as he smiled under the mask, there would be other Germans on another day.

There always were.

FROM ITS BEGINNING
, the Second World War appeared to be an unquestionable Axis success. Fortunately, Hitler’s military decisions combined with the geography of the Soviet Union, the Pacific Ocean, and the English Channel to give the Allies a few desperately needed advantages. For the most part, these opportunities were seized and used with considerable fighting skill until overwhelming American war production took effect. The pivotal year was 1942, with the Japanese blunted in the Pacific and Hitler’s Reich halted in Russia. Operation Torch brought Allied landings into North Africa that would threaten Europe’s belly and eventually shatter the Axis.
^*
Despite the Allied debacle at Kasserine Pass, May 1943 saw the remnants of the Afrikakorps with their backs to the sea and surrendering at Cap Bon, Tunisia. This came just five weeks after the German Sixth Army, surrounded and starving, capitulated at Stalingrad.

Italy’s king Victor Emmanuel III dismissed Mussolini in July and eventually imprisoned his former prime minister at the Campo Imperatore ski resort in Gran Sasso. A daring raid by German paratroopers freed the dictator, and he promptly declared his own Italian Social Republic in northern Italy. Americans then crossed from Sicily, landing at Anzio and slugging their way up the Italian peninsula. They’d gotten off to a rough start during Torch, largely due to incompetent leadership, but learned very quickly.
^*

As many had foreseen, the entry of the United States into the war spelled doom for the Axis. Even without being bled white by four years of war, there was just no way to compete with the Americans. Once blooded, they rose to the occasion, as did their supporting economy, and it was an impossible combination to beat. In four years of war, shipbuilding had increased elevenfold, munitions fifteenfold; aluminum manufacturing had quadrupled, and aircraft production was twelve times greater than it had been in 1940. The USAAF had begun the war with 354,161 men and 4,477 combat aircraft. By 1944 personnel exceeded 2.3 million and the USAAF could field some 35,000 combat aircraft. A standing Wehrmacht joke went, “When we see a silver plane, it’s American. A black plane, it’s British. When we see no plane, it’s German.”

The Allied bombing campaign was largely a result of the 1943 Casablanca conference where the British and Americans mapped out the Third Reich’s destruction. Though the goal was identical, both sides were diametrically opposed on strategy. The RAF was committed to area bombing—basically the mass leveling of cities and industrial centers regardless of civilian casualties. Their firestorm method was calculated to destroy vast amounts of acreage (2,000 acres in Berlin alone) and sap German willpower. The first objective was arguably successful, but the second was not. In any event, Hamburg, Darmstadt, and a dozen other cities burned brightly under RAF bombs and eventually suffered 1.4 million civilian casualties. Of course, it also destroyed the submarine pens at Peenemunde and most of the industrial capability in the Ruhr Valley.

The Americans were convinced that only the annihilation of key military and economic chokepoints would force the Germans to their knees. To this end, they espoused the doctrine of daylight precision bombing, which would, in theory, focus immense tonnage in concentrated strikes to utterly wipe out a target. The idea had some merit in that the B-17 was the U.S. Eighth Air Force’s primary heavy bomber. Extremely tough and well armed with ten guns, it also possessed the Norden sight, which made bombing deliveries within 135 yards from 15,000 possible. The actual CEP (circular error probable) was much higher—more than 50 percent of bombs were at least 2,000 yards off target. However, in terms of sheer volume, the damage was done.

Also, American production continued ramping up; bombers were pouring off the assembly line and there was no real shortage of planes. The concept was really put to the test on August 17, 1943, in a grand raid to destroy the German ball bearing manufacturing centers at Schweinfurt and Regensburg.

It was a disaster for the Americans. German fighter pilots obviously hadn’t read the treatise on bomber theory and were unaware that the bomber would always get through—especially tight, heavily armed formations. Weather, timing, and complex plans aside, some 350 bombers of the 1st and 4th Bombardment Wings launched that morning, but only 290 returned. Sixty heavies and more than 550 men were lost that day, with more than eighty other bombers irreparably damaged—all for no appreciable strategic results. Ball bearing production did temporarily decrease by 30 percent, but losses were quickly made up by affiliated factories.