Just finished watching a Documentry on the sonderkommando Elbe on the History Channel. This was amazing. Not only the German pilots who flew and survived but also those American pilots who nursed their severely damaged bombers home. I thought I had seen an earlier posting on this group but could not find it.

Sonderkommando Elbe - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Sonderkommando Elbe was the name of a World War Two Luftwaffe task force assigned to bring down Allied bombers by ramming German aircraft into the bombers. The Elbe is a river that runs through Germany to the North Sea. The term "Sonderkommando" itself in German means "special unit" and was also used to designate work units of Nazi death camp prisoners forced to aid the killing process during The Holocaust, in the case of the Elbe pilots, however, this is not a euphamistic term. While the Luftwaffe had a ready supply of airplanes at this point in the war, well-trained pilots and fuel were two components in short supply. Despite the grim prospects of survival of such a mission, the unit was not a true "suicide unit" in that the pilots were expected to attempt to bail out just before colliding with the Allied aircraft.

The aircraft of choice for this mission was a Bf 109 stripped of armor and armament. To accomplish this mission, pilots would typically aim for one of three sensitive areas on the bombers. The easiest part of an Allied bomber to damage was the empennage, or tail assembly, with its delicate control surfaces on the elevator and rudder. Another potential target were the engine nacelles, which connected to the highly explosive fuel system. The final target was also the most gruesome--the cockpit.

Adding to the last ditch nature of this task force, the only mission was flown on 7 April 1945 by a sortie of 120 Bf 109s. While 15 Allied bombers were attacked in this manner, only eight were destroyed.. A 100th Bomb Group B-17 was attacked by a SonderKommando Elbe Me-109 but only damaged; the German Pilot was not killed.

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American by birth, TEXAN by the grace of GOD!

but the Bf 109's were armed, the centerline cannon was removed but the cowling mg's were retained so once firing the pilot could use it as an aiming point on the tail especailly of the B-17's, though B-24's were also attacked. operated by Schulen pilots JG 300 offered a supply as well as JG 53 and two other single engine units. JG 7 was to be the high cover against the US P-51 escorts but did not follow this and attacked the US heavies with success.

if you note the keynote German speaker was friend Fritz M. He and I had a lengthy discussion whether or not they would even participate in the History Channel dogfight episode, and I suggested they (meaning former German pilots) not do so because of the track record of the H.S. to get the story simply correct. Well Fritz and the others did give their stories but they were so foreshortened which sad did not fully explain tactics nor outcome of each of the members during the attack, in fact Fritz on two spots in the doc was cut off short I noted, including another one of the German pilots. a month after this was shown from this past fall we chatted again for some time and he was quite upset in the way he was personally handled and the way the doc was applied without their full knowledge of what was to be the true design of the "Kamikaze episode".

Me too! great special! just insane though, and the fact that the German pilots were able to avoid getting killed as well. The most insane part was when the Luftwaffe plane rammed the rear section and the guy inside the bomber said he saw the plane cartwheel around and saw the swastika on the tail!

I did not catch if that rear gunner survived. My wife kept distracting me during the show. but I did catch how he hit the bomber, with a damaged plane and wasn't he injured as well. Totally amazing. I just don't know what the Germans were thinking that 30 planes against 1300 bombers could affect/turn the bombing campaign. We can hate National Socialism but you gotta give some credit to those fighter pilots and to the bomber pilots who brought in some of the heavily damaged planes. That is some flying

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American by birth, TEXAN by the grace of GOD!

the LW attack was to comprise over 500 a/c originally. But delay after delay happened, a total waste of human life and for what ??

not all the sonderkommando elbe pilots died, actually a lot survived. And if your referring to a waste of human life are you talking about the Allies who died or the Germans who died? The Germans believed they were defending their homeland just like their Japanese counterparts.

it was a total waste of human effort from the LW side, as always in 1945. sorry but you are wrong in this case the average German pilot of the time knew full well what the result was going to be before they even took off from the airfield on the April date, I have that in writing from several veterans that took part on this goof mission, in fact for years my German friend has proposed a web-site for the Kommando operation including antoher one as well that he has much information about .......

it was for the Fatherland.

For the fatherland? Thats a pretty poor excuse. It's one thing for the Russians Mass Wave Attacks (for the Motherland!) that cost them countless lives but forced the Germans into retreat.

Flying a few planes into a few other planes 'for the fatherland' doesn't accomplish anything other then death and waste of materials.

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Pof S you obviously do not know what was going through LW minds during 1945........... simply put nobody gave a bloody F*** about the Fatherland anymore, it was a point of survival the best way you could, understandably orders were orders no matter how foolish they were but if you were of any intelligence the writing had been cast right after the Bodenplatte disaster - 1-1-45

how about on the Doolittle Raid when the Americans crashed their planes into Japanese buildings and killed themselves? oh but thats ok.

what are you talking about ? My comments concern the year of 1945 and the hopelessness the LW Kommandeurs and younger pilots felt day after day going up in the air facing enormous odds knowing full well they could be taken out at the slightest whim by the might of the US AF escort fighter protection, even getting through the heavy bomber formation was bad enough but then trying to zoom away and then being latched on by 3-7 P-51's, possibly even more .............. good luck. I can only imagine my cousins thoughts during his flight through the 491st bg B-24's and finally shot down by 355th fg Mustangs and killed ......

Read what I said! its ok for the Americans to do it but not the Germans! please rise above your narrow perpespective of history.

did you say narrow perspective of history , ah I see you're the experten then on WW 2 history ..........as you change the subject lines continuously with every thread you make. Incidently the thread is about the last days of the war and German 109's attacking US 8th AF bomber formations not Doolittle raiders attacking the Japanese

thanks for proving my point about your German bias. It is a valid comparison my friend.

Whoa, whoa, whoa there big boy. If you are going to try to slide this bogus claim in here on us, then I'm going to need crash location, air crew and tail number from you for you to begin to prove this whopper.

I'll be waiting, and trust me, I will bring this back up.

Nevermind, I'm not going to give you the opportunity to not offer support to your statement.

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Best Regards,
JW

Just to clear up any misconceptions on the fate of the B-25 crews that bombed Japan in April of 1942

AAF serial #
Nickname
Sqdn
Target
Pilot
Disposition

40-2344
none
34th BS
Tokyo
Lt. Col. James H. Doolittle
crashed Chuchow, China

40-2292
none
37th BS
Tokyo
Lt. Travis Hoover
crashed Ningpo, China

40-2270
Whiskey Pete
95th BS
Tokyo
Lt. Robert M. Gray
crashed Chuchow, China

40-2282
none
95th BS
Tokyo
Lt. Everett W. Holstom
crashed Shangjao, China

40-2283
none
95th BS
Tokyo
Capt. David M. Jones
crashed Chuchow, China

40-2298
Green Hornet
95th BS
Tokyo
Lt. Dean E. Hallmark
crashed Nanchang, China

40-2261
The Ruptured Duck
95th BS
Tokyo
Lt. Ted W. Lawson
ditched Shangchow, China

40-2242
none
95th BS
Tokyo
Capt. Edward J. York
interned Vladivostok, Russia

40-2303
Whirling Dervish
34th BS
Tokyo
Lt. Harold F. Watson
crashed Nanchang, China

40-2250
none
89th RS
Tokyo
Lt. Richard O. Joyce
crashed Chuchow, China

40-2249
Hari Kari-er
89th RS
Yokohama
Capt. C. Ross Greening
crashed Chuchow, China

40-2278
Fickle Finger
37th BS
Yokohama
Lt. William M. Bower
crashed Chuchow, China

40-2247
none
37th BS
Yokosuka
Lt. Edgar E. McElroy
crashed Nanchang, China

40-2297
none
89th RS
Nagoya
Maj. John A. Hilger
crashed Shangjao, China

40-2267
none
89th RS
Kobe
Lt. Donald G. Smith
ditched Shangchow, China

40-2268
(The) Bat Out of Hell
34th BS
Nagoya
Lt. William G. Farrow
crashed Ningpo, China

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Best Regards,
JW

Great info Jeff but not needed. We all knew the fate of the Doolittle raiders and recognized whitewash from misguided individuals. Don't know where this came from

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American by birth, TEXAN by the grace of GOD!

because the previous poster was living in an illusion, and that was my whole point why bring in the Pacific theater and the events surrounding those times with the ETO, the poster somehow got off onto another road, but too late for him, he was shot down by the Penquin

Yes, once I saw him going on that tangent, I tried not to get caught in the riptide. Might have gone down with him. Good postings Erich.

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American by birth, TEXAN by the grace of GOD!

What a crazy thing to say about the Doolittle raid..definitely did not even check the net about that one...

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