Günther Rall: Luftwaffe ace with 275 air victories and NATO general

[Kekkonen]

Quick look at mr. Rall:

* Joined the German army 1936
* Joined the Air Force 1938
* 275 aerial victories, 272 in east
* Joined Bundesluftwaffe 1956, trained in the USA to jets, F-84 and F-104
* Jagdbombergeschwader 34 commander
* NATO Defence College
* Brigadier General 1966
* Commander of German Air Force 1970-1974
* German military attache of NATO, 1974-1975

The son of a merchant, Günther Rall was born in Gaggenau on 10 March, 1918. He entered military service as an Fähnrich in the Army in 1936. The following year, he entered the War Collage at Dresden where he was influenced to transfer to the Luftwaffe. He qualified as a fighter pilot in 1938, and was sent to JG 52 which at the time was based near Stuttgart. He saw his first combat during the Battle of France, and it was during this particular campaign that he began his personal victory score when on 18 May he shot down a Curtiss Hawk 75A from GC II/5, piloted by Czech pilot Sgt.Chef Otto Hanzlicek (which saved his live with chute). Shortly afterward, his unit was transfered to Calais to take part in the Battle of Britain. Shortly after beginning operations, he was given command of 8./JG 52 on 25th July and on 1st August he was promoted to Oberleutnant. By October, though, the Staffel had been withdrawn from combat operations in order to rebuild the losses suffered. After being brought back up to strength, the unit was sent to Rumania to defend the oil refinaries and bridges over the Danube during the German occupation of that country in the spring of 1941. In late May 8./JG 52 took part in Operation Merkur, the airborne assault on Crete, providing support for the German parachute and mountain troops. By this time Germany and the Soviet Union were at war and so once the Creten operation was over 8./JG 52 was hurried back to Rumania, where Russian bombers were attacking the refinaries. In five days Rall and his men destroyed some 50 Soviet bombers and were next sent to the southern sector of the Eastern Front. Here, however, Rall suffered a severe setback - after destroying his 36th enemy aircraft he himself was shot down by an I-16 and in the resulting belly-landing in a gully he broke his back in three places. He was paralyzed for a long time on the right side and the right leg. It was not until August 1942 that he was back in action, but in the first three months after returning to oparational duty he raised his score to over 100 victories, being awarded by Hitler on November 26th the Oak Leaves. In April of 1943 he was promoted to Hauptmann and given command of III./JG 52 on 6th July. He scored his 200th victory on 29th August 1943 during his 555th mission, and on 12th September 1943, the Führer awarded him the Swords to his Knight's Cross. In October 1943 alone, he downed over 40 Soviet planes. Knight's Cross holders of JG 52 during a mission break in late 1942 in front of Rall`s Bf 109 G-2 "Black 13". From left: Uffz. Karl Gratz (138 victories, RK), Oblt. Günther Rall and Uffz. Friedrich Wachowiak (about 120 v. RK).

In the spring (19th April) of 1944 Rall took over command as the Gruppenkommadeur of II./JG 11 which was at the time on Home Defense (Reichsverteidigung) duties against the 8th Air Force. On 12th May while flying Bf 109 G-5 "Schwarz ((+", W.Nr.110 089, of Stab II./JG 11, he nearly succeeded in downing the commander of the famed 56th FG, Lt Col Hubert Zemke (17 3/4 v., POW 30/10/44), and did succeed in destroying two Thunderbolts of this unit. However, he himself was attacked by another pair of P-47s from this same unit and was shot down and forced to bail out over Frankfurt / Main, in the process having his left thumb shot off. In the operating room he suffered a severe infection that kept him hospitalized until November. His last command was JG 300 oparting out of Salzburg from 20th February 1945 until the end of the war. There he was taken prisoner by the Americans at the end of the war. He flew a total of 621 missions, and was shot down no less than 8 times, being wounded 3 times during which he shot down a total of 275 enemy aircraft, including 3 on the Western Front to become the third highest scoring fighter pilot in history.

Victories: 275
Awards: Knight`s Cross with Swords
Units: JG 52, JG 11, JG 300

http://www.virtualpilots.fi/feature/photoreports/guntherrall2003/rall2.jpg

http://www.virtualpilots.fi/feature/photoreports/guntherrall2003/ColorGuntherRall.jpg

http://www.virtualpilots.fi/feature/photoreports/guntherrall2003/EagleStrike.jpg
Led by Colonel Hub Zemke, the 56th Fighter Group played advance guard to a
deep penetration bomber raid to central Germany. As his forty eight P-47
Thunderbolts arrived to sweep the sky around the Koblenz -Frankfurt area, the
Me109s of II./JG11 pounced from a 5000 feet height advantage. Simon Atack’s
high-impact painting shows Major Günther Rall bringing down Hub Zemke’s
wingman, the first of two victories he claimed before himself being brought down
by 56th Fighter Group P-47s later in the combat. Günther Rall returned to
combat flying, commanding JG300 until the end of hostilities by which time, with
275 air victories, he became the third highest scoring Ace in history.

http://www.luftwaffe3945.hpg.ig.com.br/ases/rall7.jpg

http://www.luftwaffe3945.hpg.ig.com.br/ases/rall8.jpg

http://www.luftwaffe3945.hpg.ig.com.br/ases/rall9.jpg

http://www.virtualpilots.fi/feature/photoreports/guntherrall2003/HPIM0078.JPG
Today (2003), still alive and kicking, standing in front of a Finnish Bf 109

http://www.virtualpilots.fi/feature/photoreports/guntherrall2003/GuntherBook.jpeg

[evanfitz]

Great thread, its a fact that most of the Luffwaffe had more years of experience than the allies airforce.

[miguelencanarias]

Just a question, tangentially related to the subject. Was there any reason why Luftwaffe painted their aircrafts with what seems to be a quite effective camo and at the same time added bright yellow stripes at the midsection and fore of the planes?

[Flagg]

That "clanging noise" is the sound of his giant brass ones as he enters the room.

I could imagine how awkward it must have been to hang out with him in the NATO Fighter Pilot Pub in the 50's & 60's....he's like the John Holmes of fighter pilots.

[el borracho]

Just a question, tangentially related to the subject. Was there any reason why Luftwaffe painted their aircrafts with what seems to be a quite effective camo and at the same time added bright yellow stripes at the midsection and fore of the planes?

Just a form of indentification during chaotic dogfights. All air forces had to come up with a balance of camoflauge to hide from the enemy and identification to avoid friendly fire. Looking down on a Luftwaffe plane frm above, the yellow would barely be visible. Also in the Luftwaffe, bands around the fuselage near the tail served as theater or squadron indentification markings. For instance in North Africa, all Luftwaffe planes had a white stripe, on the Russian front it was yellow. Many western front based groups had decorations painted according to their unit.

Later in the war, the US decided to forgo camoflauge paint and left their aircraft in it's natural bare-metal finish, with flamboyant squadron markings and nose art of course.

[Kekkonen]

Just a form of indentification during chaotic dogfights.

The yellow was an Axis' identification symbol on the eastern front, Germany's Axis' allies, like the Finnish, Romanian etc. Air Forces had it too. Note on the photos below that Rall's FW-190 as he flew on the western front in the late war wasn't painted with yellow.

http://www.jimlaurier.com/details/rallportait.jpg

http://www.barryweekleyart.com/gallery3/Image5.jpg
Rall's "Black 13"

http://www.street-gallery.co.uk/images/gallery/taylor/slp/large/swansong.jpg
During World War II Gunther Rall established himself as one of the most
remarkable of fighter pilots with 275 air victories - this print depicts Rall
leading the FW-190s of JG-300 on their last combat mission of the war
against P-51s of the United States Air Force

http://www.stenbergaa.com/stenberg/stokes-acostlyvictory.jpg
In this dramatic painting Rall is about to have a mid-air collision with a
Lagg-5 during the battle of Kursk on the Eastern Front. Rall would survive this
collision and continue to chalk-up victories until the end of the war. Rall flew
about 800 combat missions and missed nearly a year of flying when he
suffered a broken back

http://www.military-art.com/images/dhm_575_small.jpg
No Escape by David Pentland
Bf109 G2 of Major Gunther Rall pursues and downs an unidentified Soviet
aircraft over the Caucasus, Russia, early Autumn 1943. Rall went on to
become the third highest scoring ace of all time, with 275 victories in only
621 missions.

http://www.oldgloryprints.com/Long_Nose_Trouble.jpg
Long Nose Trouble
Gunther Rall, who survived the war with 275 victories, takes on a P-51
Mustang with his FW-190, while an Me-262 looks on.

http://www.riveting-images.com/John_Shaw_Aviation_Art/John_Shaw__Warrior_and_the_Wol/Shaw_Warrior_and_Wolfpack_600pxl.jpg
56th Fighter Group chasing Rall

[Kekkonen]

In the post-war period Günther Rall became (eventually) a Lieutenant General and he was also, strangely, one of the responsible for that the greatest ace of all times, Eric Hartmann, lost his career.


In February 1959, the German government announced that "after evaluating nearly two dozen of the world's top fighter aircraft," it had chosen the "Super Starfighter" (which Lockheed had named the F-104G, "G" standing in this case for "Germany").

Only one voice in Germany was raised against this decision: Erich Hartmann, the Luftwaffe's top ace of the Second World War, said after flying the F-104 that it was too unforgiving for young German fighter pilots, and that the Luftwaffe should consider an interim type such as the F-100 before bringing such an advanced aircraft into the inventory. His dissent - in the face of support for the airplane from fellow aces now high in the new Luftwaffe command like Johannes Steinhoff, Gunther Rall, and Walter Krupinski - eventually cost him his career. In light of the subsequent operational history of the F-104G in the Luftwaffe, Hartmann was right.

By 1961, Germany, Canada, the Netherlands, Belgium, Italy and Japan had come aboard the "Super Starfighter" program as partners in its construction. The airplane would also serve with the air forces of Norway, Denmark, Greece, Turkey and Taiwan.

The prescience of Hartmann's dissent can be seen in the fact that over the time of the Starfighter's service in these air forces, each one averaged 30-35% losses by accidents of their total fleet (though the Norwegians lost exactly two of theirs, and to accidents having nothing to do with the airplane itself), the highest accident rate of any operational combat aircraft in the West since the Second World War. The losses in aircraft and pilots in West Germany became a national scandal in the 1970s; in the Luftwaffe, there was a joke that an optimist was "a Starfighter pilot who gave up smoking because he was afraid of dying of lung cancer." As the late Tony Levier once said to me, "The Starfighter was an airplane that never forgave the slightest mistake, ever." As Bill Gunston put it: "an experienced pilot would love the 104G and be unlikely to run into trouble, whereas the young Germans who made up the bulk of the Luftwaffe and Kriegsmarine Starfighter squadrons were far from experienced." Better training at Luke AFB in the 1970s and a general shaking-out of bugs led to a reduction in the accident rate in the later 1970s and 1980s, but the Starfighter was definitely the most difficult of post-war jets to operate.

http://www.airforcemuseumsoellingen.de/G%C3%BCnter%20Rall%202_Ebene%201.jpg
Rall in a F-104 Starfighter. February 24 1960 Oberstleutnant Rall made
the 1st solo flight of a German pilot in a Starfighter.

[stonecutter]

That "clanging noise" is the sound of his giant brass ones as he enters the room.

I could imagine how awkward it must have been to hang out with him in the NATO Fighter Pilot Pub in the 50's & 60's....he's like the John Holmes of fighter pilots.


Awkward? Probably not -- after all it says most of his victories were in the east, not against countries that later became part of NATO. NATO pilots were probably all bunched up around him, listening to tales of how he shot down all those Soviet planes!

[Flagg]

Awkward? Probably not -- after all it says most of his victories were in the east, not against countries that later became part of NATO. NATO pilots were probably all bunched up around him, listening to tales of how he shot down all those Soviet planes!

I was thinking "funny awkward", rather than "shooting down your best friend back in the war awkward".

Unless your last name is Hartmann, and if the rounds of beer are bought by the lowest scoring ace in the room, hanging out at the pub with Gen. Rall ould be a bit expensive and awkward..20 victorie for an Allied fighter pilot would be an exemplary war......for Gen. Rall that would be an exemplary month ;)

[Kilgor]

the finnish 109 he is standing next to has the "tropical/african" air filter , or looks like it.

[Zapp Brannigan]

Today (2003), still alive and kicking, standing in front of a Finnish Bf 109
AFAIK, Rall is still alive as of December 2005.

He is one of only a handful of Schwerterträger still living, along with Waldemar von Gazen genannt von Gaza, Hajo Herrmann, Ernst Wilhelm Reinert, Erich Rudorffer and Erich Topp.

[Ericsson]

Rall was just an awesome aviator

[Bryson C]

the finnish 109 he is standing next to has the "tropical/african" air filter , or looks like it.

Yes you are right that is a Bf 109 G-6/Trop.