Von Richthofen: The Legend Evaluated

by Richard Townsend Bickers

  The advances in aircraft performance meant that combat height increased. The greatest altitude at which a fighter pilot fired his guns in World War Two was 44,000 ft. This unique event occurred on 12 September 1942 when Pilot Officer Prince Emanuel Galitzine, flying a Spitfire IX of the High Altitude Flight, which was stationed at Northolt, intercepted a Junkers Ju 86P high-altitude reconnaissance type. He was at 38,000 ft when the ground controller guiding him towards the target informed him that the ‘Bandit’ was at 42,000 ft. Galitzine’s combat report records that he could see its black trails. Both aircraft climbed to 43,000 ft. He got above it, dived, opened fire and hit its starboard wing, after which one gun jammed.

  The Junkers made evasive turns, Galitzine attacked again, but its slipstream obscured his windscreen. This happened twice and finally the target disappeared in a large patch of mist. It got back to Germany and the two pilots met after the war.

  In Korea, dog fighting at 40,000 ft was commonplace. At such altitude the ability to discern other aircraft deteriorated greatly. Recognition also became increasingly difficult, for the look of the various types of jet fighter did not differ from one another as much as piston-engine types used to.

  The division of victories between fighter pilots remained much the same as in the two world wars: approximately five per cent of them shot down about forty per cent of their side’s total bag.

  Mike Spick points out that ‘Part of situational awareness consists of knowing the strengths and limitations of the air-craft/weapons systems employed’. With the passage of time, therefore, the demands on fighter pilots had steadily increased and the first appearance of every new enemy fighter type entailed study and experience. Since the Korean War, electronic equipment in the cockpit has eased the fighter pilot’s span of attention as dramatically as the installation of airborne radar in two-man night fighters did during the winter of 1940-41.

  Finally, two inventions that would have astonished Richthofen marked the end of an era of fighter operations and the beginning of a new one. The first was the helicopter and its effectiveness for ground strafing; the other was the homing rocket, first fired by the F-86H towards the end of the conflict.

  CHAPTER 20 - CONCLUSIONS

  What were Manfred von Richthofen’s strengths and weaknesses; what good and bad qualities did he possess as a person, a pilot and a leader; what influence did he have over fighter tactics and the use of fighter aircraft; how does he compare in ability with other famous fighter leaders; why is his name so well-known when other eminent fighter commanders have been forgotten?

  More has probably been written about him than any other military pilot and he has been the subject of frequent research since the end of the Great War. He wrote a brief autobiography in 1917 and many of his letters home reveal feelings that he would not have expressed elsewhere. His fame exceeds any of his contemporaries’ and successors’ for two main reasons; not only because of publicity in his lifetime or because he shot down more enemy aircraft than any other pilot of any nationality during his war, but also because no other flying man has ever had so arresting a sobriquet as The Red Baron or led a formation with so striking a one as The Flying Circus.

  It is remarkable that his reputation is as great in the English-speaking world as it is in Germany; except, it seems, among today’s youth. People may not know the details of his career or even that he was the supreme ace of the Great War, but they have heard of The Red Baron and know that his name was von Richthofen. Ask them to name an outstanding British or French pilot of the same war and few would be able to. Refer to the Second World War and Johnnie Johnson, Sailor Malan, Ginger Lacey, Hartmann, Marseille or Galland would evoke the same negative response. Douglas Bader is probably the one universally well-known pilot of the 1939-1945 war because he flew with two artificial legs, was the subject of more publicity than any other RAF pilot during the war and after it until his death in 1982; and is still sometimes mentioned in the press, often in connection with the Douglas Bader Foundation, which helps limbless people in many ways.

  The first characteristic misapplied to Manfred that must be disabused is fearlessness. Raymond Collishaw’s words on that subject have already been quoted. Manfred, like all airmen, sailors or soldiers who have been in action and not run away, all firemen and firewomen, doctors, nurses or ambulance crews, doing their duty in an air raid; lifeboat crews and rescue teams in mining disasters and earthquakes were not fearless; they were, and are, brave.

  Perhaps the one literally fearless pilot in the Second World War was Flight Lieutenant Richard Playne Stevens DSO, DFC of 151 and 253 Squadrons. A professional pilot before the war, with 400 hours’ night flying between London and Paris carrying a cargo of newspapers, he was thirty-two years old when war was declared. This was the maximum age for eligibility as an RAF pilot. He joined immediately and by the end of 1940 was engaged solely on night sorties in a Hurricane. After his wife and children were killed in one of the first raids on Manchester, he showed what the word ‘fearless’ really means. Consumed by hatred for the Germans, he flew with total disregard for his life. He shot down enemy bombers from such close range that once, when one exploded, his own aeroplane was spattered with the flesh and blood of the men he had just killed. He refused to allow this defilement to be washed off. He had scored his first victory on 15 January 1941 and enjoyed his fourteenth and last on 3 July the same year. His total exceeded that of any pilot and observer who had the advantage of flying in radar-equipped night fighters at that time. On 12 December, as everyone expected must happen eventually, he failed to return from a sortie. Perhaps it is only when, in the words of many coroners’ verdicts, ‘the balance of his mind was disturbed’, that any fighter pilot has ever literally shown fearlessness as distinct from courage.

  Manfred was energetic, a characteristic he shared with many RFC contemporaries who were addicted to games. In the Second World War this was not so evident and the time came when RAF aircrew were subjected to two hours’ compulsory exercise every week. He wrote to his mother ‘At last I have found an outlet for my energies. On the days free from trench duty, I go hunting’. When he was able to expend his energy on flying he no longer felt restless and his shooting forays on leave were for relaxation: which, for him, seemed essentially to entail slaughter.

  Pilots are trained to be painstaking and thorough, which with him was intrinsic. Remember his description of his first flight: ‘The night before, I had gone to bed earlier than usual to be fresh for the great moment next morning’. Whatever he undertook he did with enthusiasm and the determination to master it — a born winner. One has only to recall his equestrian exploits for proof of this and of his sheer guts. Before the great event at Breslau: on the day before his mare was put on the train, ‘I could not resist taking her over the hurdles in our training area once more. In so doing we slipped … I cracked my collarbone’. It did not prevent his competing and doing well. Next year, in the Kaiser Prize Race: ‘I galloped over the heather and then suddenly landed on my head. The horse had stepped into a rabbit hole and in the fall I had broken my collarbone. I remounted and rode another seventy kilometres with the injury’.

  In contrast, he showed caution in battle — until his last, when, certain of an eighty-first kill with an obvious tyro as victim, he was abandoned by those who ought to have protected him from an astern attack.

  Such affection as he had for animals arose from admiration for their handsome looks and their usefulness to him; they served him. His dog was a companion; his horses enabled him to distinguish himself in competition. One does not need to be a professional psychologist to divine why so small a man chose such a huge pet.

  He was cruel. He made unreasonable demands of the horses he rode, he thrashed his dog, he exulted in killing game, big and small, and in sending his victims in the air to their death when he could often have let them live, knowing their stricken aircraft were about to crash behind the German lines. His savagery became more pronounced after his head wound. His cruelty w
as inherent and was not owed to the war.

  He was an overtly loving son and brother and warm in his friendships with his comrades.

  He was the typical country gentleman of any Western European nationality, keen on field sports. Judging from his character, he would have taken ardently to game fishing and revelled in the fight to dominate marlin, tuna and shark. He would have enjoyed it honestly, not in the Hemingway fashion of bogus masculinity and an unquenchable urge to brag about it. Manfred thrived where, as Douglas Bader expressed it, ‘the hot lead was flying’, not hot air in the bar of the Paris Ritz.

  He derived enormous pleasure from the decorations he received, but this was not purely from vanity, it was a professional soldier’s way of assessing his own worth. He accumulated a staggering array of these. For centuries, Germany had been a geographical area, not a specific country. The name embraced numerous small states, each ruled by a king, prince or duke. In 1871 the German Empire was founded and the King of Prussia became emperor. The rulers of some of the states continued to bestow their own decorations. Manfred’s Iron Cross, Second Class and First Class, and Pour le Mérite, known as the Knight’s Cross of the Iron Cross, were followed by nine more German awards: the Order of the House of Hohenzollern, Order of the Royal House of Oldenberg, Saxony Military Order of St Henry, Griffon Cross, Hessen Order of Phillips, Saxe-Coburg-Gotha Duke Karl Edward Medal, Lippe Schaumberg Cross, Bremen Hanseatic Cross and Lübeck Hanseatic Cross. Austria-Hungary gave him the Order of the Holy Crown, Imperial Order of the Iron Crown and Military Service Cross. From Bulgaria he received the Order of Military Valour; and from Turkey, the Star of Gallipoli, Imtjaz Medal and Liakat Medal.

  It gave him pride, pleasure and satisfaction to do useful work. Of his life as an observer: ‘This was a wonderful time. Life in the air service was much like cavalry life. Every morning and afternoon I flew on reconnaissance, gathering valuable information’. A year later, ‘I love my new occupation as a pilot. I do not think anything else can attract me in this war’.

  Like Ball, he did not spare his parents’ feelings. In October 1916: ‘During the last four weeks we have lost five aeroplanes out of ten.’

  On another occasion he informed his mother, ‘One of my wings broke at a height of 300 metres and it was a miracle that I reached the ground without a mishap. On the same day my old squadron lost three aeroplanes. It is possible that they met with the same accidents.’

  In other words, don’t be surprised if it happens to me again. His combat reports were not written in the third person, like Ball’s. They were crisp and, in their own way, detached. One dated 20 December 1916 is typical.

  Time 1.45 p.m. over Noreuil. Vickers two-seater [it was not, it was an FE2b]. Engine, Beardmore No. 791. Occupants, pilot Lieutenant L. G. D’Arcy [who was, in fact, the observer; the pilot was Sub-Lieutenant R.C. Whiteside, RNAS, the aircraft belonged to 18 Squadron RFC], observer unknown, no identification disc. About 1.45 p.m. with four aircraft I attacked an enemy squadron at 3,000 metres over Noreuil. The English had not yet been attacked and were in loose formation. I therefore had a chance to attack the last machine. I was leading and no other German aeroplanes were to be seen. After the first attack the enemy’s engine began to smoke and the observer had been wounded. The machine spiralled down in wide turns. I followed and fired at close range. It was later found that I had killed the pilots. The aeroplane crashed to the ground between Quéant and Lagnicourt.

  He had no taste for patrolling on his own; it was part of his nature and his training to be a leader of men and there was also the matter of prudence, of having at least one companion so that they could protect each other.

  It has to be conceded that Boelcke was the originator of fighter tactics that remained valid until after the Korean War. Immelmann deserves credit for his collaboration in evolving the system of the basic pair, but it was Boelcke alone who developed this into the elemental finger-four and must also be acknowledged as the finest squadron leader of the war. In this, Manfred was equal to him in situational awareness and tactical sense, but whereas Boelcke often allowed the other pilots with him to shoot down the enemy while he guarded them, Manfred took first pick while the others protected him. Manfred has to be rated the outstanding fighter Geschwader leader because there were no German fighter Wings in Boelcke’s time and nobody who succeeded Manfred during the seven months between his death and the end of the war showed any superiority. He has a further claim to this for laying down the first rules for flying in squadron, or greater, formations; but in Vs of five, not finger-fours.

  He was also the best shot. As an inspiration to other fighter pilots he surpassed Boelcke because he was unique as the top scorer of the whole war. As for the value of his eighty victories, forty-eight were over two-seater reconnaissance or bomber types, for which he has often been derided because they were usually easier victims than single-seaters. In his favour is the fact that their reports, photographs, artillery direction or bombing were collectively more important to the conduct of the ground war than forty-eight fighters. With regard to the skill and courage involved in shooting them down, thirteen were various marks of BE2 and easy meat. The eight Sopwith Camel single-seat fighters he took out reflect much more credit on his competence and bravery.

  In comparison with his contemporary British and French fighter pilots, he lacked the dash of Ball, McCudden and Collishaw and he was no better a leader than they or Mannock, nor did he have Mannock’s sharp brain and planning ability. If Ball had not been so regardless of caution that he virtually threw his life away; if McCudden had not made an uncharacteristic fatal error of judgment; if Mannock and Collishaw had appeared on the scene earlier, any one of them could have exceeded Manfred’s total. If Fonck had been a trifle less calculating, Nungesser and Navarre less wild, and Guynemer had not gone so long without a rest that he was not fit to fly at all when he was killed, all of them were capable of surpassing him.

  There is one highly significant difference between the conditions in which the fighter pilots of the two world wars fought. In the first war, the RFC was not issued with parachutes. The office-bound generals who took the decisions did not deign to explain their reason; which was the disgraceful one that pilots might be tempted to abandon a fight prematurely. The same ukase applied to the Luftstreitkräfte until it was rescinded in early 1918. Manfred was wearing one when he was killed. One wonders how many British or Germans who died would have survived to fight again if, knowing their aircraft must be lost, they were able to save themselves; and how many more victories they would have scored?

  After the war the RAF continued flying wartime types, still without parachutes, for seven years. The United States Army Air Corps was already equipped with parachutes, so two RAF officers were sent to America to learn all about them. It was not until 1925 that the Parachute Test Unit was formed to visit squadrons and demonstrate how to bale out. The seats in wartime aeroplanes were modified, and those in new types suitably designed, to take a parachute pack. The first RAF pilot to use a ’chute was Pilot Officer Eric Pentland, when his Avro 504K got into an inverted spin in 1926. Many of the high-scoring pilots in World War 2 had to bale out; some, more than once; among them Lacey and Mölders.

  The only loners in the second war were the night fighter and intruder crews. Day fighters flew at least in pairs, except in the early days over the desert, when there were so few of them. The only other singleton sorties were not for seeking combat but on weather reconnaissance, convoy patrol or high-altitude photographic reconnaissance.

  In comparison with the greatest exponents of air fighting and of leading fighter formations in the Second World War or the Korean War, it has to be assumed that if Manfred had been of their generation, he would have been equally successful.

  It is impossible to be didactic about who was ‘the best’ fighter pilot or fighter leader in either world war. All the most individually successful were on a par and so were the most prominent Wing leaders. Opportunity was the great decisive factor
; if Johnnie Johnson and Pat Pattle had changed places, their scores would most likely have been reversed; if Douglas Bader and Sailor Malan had swapped places, their Wings would have been equally well led; the same can be said about any of the best German, French or British squadron or Wing leaders changing places. Obviously, some had keener eyesight than others or superior situational awareness, were better shots or better flyers, better at their relationships with the pilots whom they led. The only distinctions one can accede are to those who were the first to introduce some innovation. Even so, if Boelcke had not worked out that operating in pairs or fours was best, someone else would have — very likely, Manfred; if Mölders had not revived this system, another fighter leader would have; probably Malan, Tuck, Bader or Galland.

  Manfred von Richthofen was just one of the most determined and dedicated of his generation, one of the most inspirational and gifted leaders and one of the very best shots. He is remembered because he was the top scorer in the Great War and for the gaudy livery that made first his squadron and then his whole Wing conspicuous.

  BIBLIOGRAPHY

  Arndt, A. Die Fliegertruppe im Weltkrieg, Reichsarchiv.

  Bickers, R.L.T. Ginger Lacey, Fighter Pilot, Hale, 1962.