introduction to myself

[ghost]

Our squad had just been tasked to set up security for a new Forward Operating Base (FOB). The reason for building a new FOB was because there was a remote roadway between the two largest FOBs in the Area of Operations (AO) that served as an egress route used by the Taliban after placing IEDs and ambushing our Main Supply Route (MSR). Command wanted a FOB there because of the high enemy activity and to split their routes up. Our squad had the most firepower and the senior squad leader so we were chosen.


We had machinegunners, assaultmen and mortarmen attached to the squad. Myself and two of my guys with a M240 made up the bulk of the firepower, machine gunners. We stepped off with enough supplies, ammo, and clothing to last us a week. But most of us packed dip, Monsters, and cigarettes. Our ilbes were filled to the brim and gave everyone a hunch as we patrolled. We finally made it to the new FOB site and saw just an empty farm field. I set my team up down a road while our riflemen and assaultmen cleared to the site for IEDs. The site was clear and we dug one foxhole per marine in a 360. That was our living area and our defense, and a small camie netting with green gear made our Command Operations Center (COC).


Anyone we saw we were allowed to engage because the area was considered a tier 1 Taliban stronghold, and civilians were not allowed. A few days went by and nothing big but a few mortars and pop shots. Nothing close enough to legitimately engage. Usually the side of the 360 degree that took contact opened fire at the muzzle flashes. The problem was that we were not allowed to patrol farther than a certain matter of yards with less than ten marines. We had more than that but still had to man three posts so any engagement we called it up and let it go. They were testing us and we all knew it. The fourth night had just passed and we had not received contact. Some of the boots thought it was over and that they were done, but none of us knew the fight that lied ahead of us.


The next day was hot, filled with fixing up our defense, and small security patrols around the farm field. The fire team that was sent out had returned about an hour before dawn. We huddled around the COC for a debrief and some MREs. Engineers and CLB were supposed to arrive two days ago to start putting up hescos and posts but because of the Marine Corps' infinite wisdom, they had screwed up and weren't coming for another three days.


We had communications with our company PB and tried to get vics, or more ammo and crew-serves out to us, but most of our resources were out in action. What we did have was 24/7 air on station; usually an F-18 or at least a raven, "watching our backs." Our squad leader had set us up for dawn and dusk stand too with about 90% of us geared up, but the Taliban were smart and knew that already. They waited until most of us were in our holes asleep. The night that will change my life forever was about to unfold.


Then just before midnight, a large burst of pkm fire snapped over our heads. In a deep sleep, it took me a few seconds to wake up and realize what was going on. Our post facing that direction was our only crew serve out there, the M240B. My gunner instinctly called an ADDRAC and opened up. Yelling throughout the 360 erupted most of us and we threw our gear on and returned fire from our holes. As a machine gun team leader my job wasn't that easy. There was a crew serve out there being manned by one marine, and he needed an assistant-gunner. I threw my boots and flak on, grabbed my kevlar and rifle, then picked up two cans of 7.62 and darted to my guns post.


I remember seeing tracers wiz past my head and hearing the snap that seemed to cutout all other sounds. Just as I jumped in the hole with my gunner he needed a new can. All that training clicked in and without even thinking cleared the weapon, reloaded the rounds, and told my gunner to fire. As he let out a burst I heard a very large screeching sound followed by two thuds behind us. I looked back and saw two dust clouds and my squad leader yelling "RPGS! Motha f'ng RPGS!" My gunner and the pkm gunner traded rounds but all I could think about was if anyone got hit and just then I saw our pyro signal for a casualty. As much as I wanted to go and help, I couldn't.


I told my gunner to cease fire because I hadn't heard a snap in a while. The fight was behind us now and was it ever one. I looked back to assess the situation and the dark Afghanistan night was lit up from red and green tracers. It reminded of something I'd seen in a star wars movie. The Taliban had set up in a tree line a couple hundred meters out. I tried getting my squad leaders attention to move the M240 to the fight but he was too busy talking to air. Just then I realized what happened, the pkm gunner had opened on the crew serve post to distract us from the main assault. I had to get this gun over there.


I went to COC to see what was going on. I sprinted towards the COC and jumped into the hole and there I saw him. My friend since I had got to the fleet was bleeding from the neck. A piece of shrapnel from the rpgs' had lodged in his neck. Red chem lights outlined the whole COC that was dug about 5 feet from the ground. I grabbed my squad leader and told him I was moving the M240 to the other side. He gave me a nod then continued giving grids to the pilots. I ran back to the machine gun post and grabbed my gunner, our system, and all our rounds. As we took off a riflemen hopped in the hole to replace us and yelled "get that gun in the fight!" We dashed through the whizzing tracers and Marines firing from foxholes. A rocket had whizzed no more than a foot from my head. The screaming rocket deafened me and I couldn't hear my own voice.


As we set up our gun the entire tree line was flashing. I couldn't count them all but the muzzle flashes looked like a celebrity making an appearance at the Emmys. I set my gunner to traverse along the ridge line. Our main objective was to cover our squad so they could start sending some of our own rockets downrange. Pyro and rockets lit up the night sky, almost like there was a constant sun in the air. Our assualtmen sent three smaws into the tree line and we were finally able to start seeing targets of opportunity and gain fire superiority. Two gunmen were running along the ridgeline to the south. A quick burst from my gunner cut them down. I could barely stick my head out of the hole, with rounds impacting all around us. Finally were heard jets overhead and the saying "when it rains it pours" was the best way to describe the amount of boom these planes dropped.


A signal to cease fire was sent and the squad started yelling the command. Everybody ducked down in the holes and hugged the thundering ground. A large womp took over the enemy's tree line, followed by another one. Dirt and grime swarmed our position. But I didn't care, I had to watch. An A10 let out a roar and what looked like torpedoes, impacted the ground. The shock waves rattled our position. The muzzle flashes seized and all the echoes and dust clouds from the planes took over the scene. Motivated howls and calls came from our little PB. And a relief took over my mind. I told my gunner to keep scanning just in case.


I ran to the COC and saw my buddy on a litter. His whole neck was wrapped in gauze. I tried helping but my squad leader had orders. The good thing about being in a huge farm field was it was an easy LZ. He wanted me take a fire team and clear it out, then set up a hasty defense. He gave me an LZ marker and told me to hurry because the bird was ten mikes out. I ran out and called for four bodies. I had my team and ran to the LZ. The one engineer we had, whipped out the mine detector and started sweeping. I set the team up as best I could. I heard the rotors of 53 so I knew it was close. Right as our engineer said it was clear the bird came into view. He made a quick pass to confirm the LZ then touched down as the marker blew away.


The corpsman and four Marines came running with the casualty, except there were two litters. I didn't remember seeing two casualties. I helped load them on the bird. My squad leader talked to the crew chief in there and we all ran out. The bird took off and the red cross sign on the bottom of the bird stuck out like a nightmare. I was glad the bird came so fast, seeing how I had no idea how the casualties were. We rounded everybody up and headed back to the 360. I asked Doc how they were. He took a deep breath and said they both were going to make it. Happiness filled me up and I let out a huge sigh of relief.


As we entered the 360 I noticed half the squad was still in silkies and skivies with their gear, including myself. I didn't even realize it but my knees and elbows were all cut up. My rifle, only fired a mag, but was covered in dirt and blood. I went over to my gunner and told him he did well. The Quick Reaction Force (QRF) finally showed up. They dismounted and went over to where the enemy had attacked. They brought back carcasses, busted AK's, empty rpg tubes, cell phones, and too many brass casings and links to pick up. We all stood to for another hour.


The adrenaline rush calmed down and paranoia settled in. As I got up to check my team I learned the other casualty was one of our mortar men. He was trying to set the tube up towards the ridgeline. He took two rounds to the side sappy and one in the knee cap. Some of us were ecstatic, some scared, but most of us thought we did something wrong. The main question was how so many of them had gotten so close. We always had a plane or a drone over head with the most state of the art optics. Still to this day it raises questions.


The trucks stayed with us until an hour after sunrise. Our command must have finally caught on, because our supply drop would have been able to take on the zombie apocalypse. We got another squad, ammo, crew serves, and the best of all, trucks. That night we prayed for the real heroes of that night and stood by for another attack. It never came. The FOB finally got finished and was named after one of our Marines who lost his life earlier in the deployment.

 

[ghost]

The human body is not a very effective air pump. I was consuming as much air as I was physically capable of moving. Using every single muscle in my torso straining to move air in and out of my lungs, and it wasn't enough. My diaphragm burned, just trying to get enough oxygen into my lungs. Unfortunately, at over 12,000 feet above sea level, the oxygen just wasn't there. The mucous in my airway seemed to get thicker with every labored breath and the cold air bit sharply at my mouth, throat and bronchi. My arms and legs were going numb and were starting to get cold. Weighed down with 80 pounds of ammunition and another 40 pounds of gear, taking a single step required considerable effort. The temperature wasn't so low that it caused the loss of sensation; I just was not getting enough oxygen. As I struggled to gulp as much air as possible, one of the most defining moments of my military career occurred in a complex enemy ambush on the side of a mountain in Afghanistan.

A barrage of rockets impacts erupted around us. Their eerie green fireball exhaust lighting up the snow covered mountains and trails as they passed over them. Each rocket motor pushing its fusillade faster and faster towards us, creating shock waves echoing through the valley as it punched through the air. Enemy mortars landed close by, we heard their shrapnel ricocheting against the heavy armor of our trucks. Each detonation took a small bite out of the mountain and spewed dirt, rocks and steel all around us. It was just a matter of time before they would get lucky and score a direct hit.

One of our trucks was buried to the axles in thick mud on the side of this narrow Afghan mountain road. With a steep hillside to our west and a sheer cliff with a drop of over 50 feet to our east, the enemy was perched on a ridgeline 600-800 meters away to our east. We had no way to get to them, no way to get out of the kill zone, so we were forced to shoot it out until air support could arrive on station.

About 15 minutes into the gunfight a call came over the radio that the three trucks that could engage the enemy on the high ground (2-4, 2-5 and 2-6), were running low on ammunition. That first call silenced all of the traffic on the net and went unanswered. When that radio message went out again, you could hear the strained nerves in their voices filled with anxiety. Almost everyone in our convoy had a headset on and heard that message. Some very serious decisions had to be made, and they had to be made fast.

I am normally the senior person in my truck. Our Forward Operating Base Commander decided to lead this mission and was sitting in my seat up front as he was the convoy commander for this mission. People who normally sit in the back of the trucks as passengers, we call them "windowlickers." After the second call that 2-4, 2-5 and 2-6 were almost out of ammo I simply said, "I'll go." I looked at the rest of the windowlickers with me in the back of the truck, none of them would look me in the eye; they all looked down at the floor and their boots. They were all frozen with fear of what waited outside the thick armor of the truck. I couldn't blame them, this was their first taste of real combat, and it was a full size serving. After a few seconds of realizing what I had committed to, I knew I couldn't take it back and not go. I reached for the combat lock and grabbed the cold steel handle and opened the back door, and stepped out into the cold.

I had grabbed two cans of .50 caliber machine gun ammunition on the way out the back of the truck. I chucked them to the ground before shutting the 500 pound doors closed behind me. Hearing the windowlickers combat lock it behind me with a dull metallic thud, I knew I was exposed now. I picked up the 40 pound boxes and started the journey to the trucks that needed them. Our vehicles were about 35 meters apart. 2-4, 2-5 and 2-6 were five vehicles ahead of mine. Running as fast as I could to cover the distance between the trucks I felt so slow. I attempted to catch my breath in the cover and concealment of the trucks on the west side of the road, that's when I realized how thin the air was. The smell of freshly turned earth filled my nose, but the thick aroma of cordite was burning my throat.

A rocket propelled grenade impacted 10 meters away up the hillside from me as I ran forward. The force of the explosion shoved me face first into the dirt. Sliding to a stop, the dirt and gravel tried to peel away the skin on my face. I tasted my own blood in my mouth. I didn't have any real damage, just felt like I got my lip bloodied in a schoolyard scuffle. Even with ear plugs in, the blast impacted my eardrums so hard all sounds were muffled. I wasn't dazed, I just remember being really mad, I got back up and pushed forward. Fire erupted from our machine gun barrels, dust around the guns jumped as each shot was fired, but I couldn't hear them. As soon as I dropped the ammo off and was about to head back to my truck, that's when I saw him.

So many thoughts processed through my mind, in such a short span of time, time seemed to slow down. He looked dirty. His beard scraggly and unkempt and looked like he hadn't had a bath in at least a month. He had bony knuckles on his hands. He was thin. Thin enough that his facial bones were easily decipherable from his black beard, his dark eyes and filthy looking hat. He didn't see me as he was focused on moving down the hill to the bigger targets, the trucks. I remember thinking, Is someone going to get this guy? I guess I am that someone, shit! I shouldered my rifle and placed the red dot of my optic on his chest. As I slowly pulled the trigger, I thought he was probably the one who tried to kill me with the RPG. I fired two shots about two seconds apart and they both hit him in the chest.

I always load my magazines with a few tracer rounds on top. My reasoning is, if I am shooting at something I want my guys to see it and shoot at it too. My two tracers zipped right through him. I saw their orange streaks bounce off the hillside behind him. His face melted from a look of surprise to terror. He stopped his slow creep down the hill and dropped his AK-47 with a hollow sounding clatter. In his last moments on earth, before he fell to the ground 50 meters away from me, he looked down at his chest. When he did, his beard folded and curled up to his mouth, almost like he was trying to eat it.

 

[Daredevil]

thanks to both of you but i am not able to see any option of starting new thread where you have stated its not about introducing myself but about indo china war.

You need 10 posts to start a new thread. This is done to control spammers.

 

[ghost]

The most extraordinary things about Stephen Harding's The Last Battle, a truly incredible tale of World War II, are that it hasn't been told before in English, and that it hasn't already been made into a blockbuster Hollywood movie. Here are the basic facts: on 5 May 1945—five days after Hitler's suicide—three Sherman tanks from the 23rd Tank Battalion of the U.S. 12th Armored Division under the command of Capt. John C. 'Jack' Lee Jr., liberated an Austrian castle called Schloss Itter in the Tyrol, a special prison that housed various French VIPs, including the ex-prime ministers Paul Reynaud and Eduard Daladier and former commanders-in-chief Generals Maxime Weygand and Paul Gamelin, amongst several others. Yet when the units of the veteran 17th Waffen-SS Panzer Grenadier Division arrived to recapture the castle and execute the prisoners, Lee's beleaguered and outnumbered men were joined by anti-Nazi German soldiers of the Wehrmacht, as well as some of the extremely feisty wives and girlfriends of the (needless-to-say hitherto bickering) French VIPs, and together they fought off some of the best crack troops of the Third Reich. Steven Spielberg, how did you miss this story?

The battle for the fairytale, 13th century Castle Itter was the only time in WWII that American and German troops joined forces in combat, and it was also the only time in American history that U.S. troops defended a medieval castle against sustained attack by enemy forces. To make it even more film worthy, two of the women imprisoned at Schloss Itter—Augusta Bruchlen, who was the mistress of the labour leader Leon Jouhaux, and Madame Weygand, the wife General Maxime Weygand—were there because they chose to stand by their men. They, along with Paul Reynaud's mistress Christiane Mabire, were incredibly strong, capable, and determined women made for portrayal on the silver screen.
130508-Roberts-LastBattle-embed'The Last Battle: When U.S. and German Soldiers Joined Forces in the Waning Hours of World War II in Europe' By Stephen Harding. 256 pages. Da Capo. $25.99. ()

There are two primary heroes of this—as I must reiterate, entirely factual—story, both of them straight out of central casting. Jack Lee was the quintessential warrior: smart, aggressive, innovative—and, of course, a cigar-chewing, hard-drinking man who watched out for his troops and was willing to think way, way outside the box when the tactical situation demanded it, as it certainly did once the Waffen-SS started to assault the castle. The other was the much-decorated Wehrmacht officer Major Josef 'Sepp' Gangl, who died helping the Americans protect the VIPs. This is the first time that Gangl's story has been told in English, though he is rightly honored in present-day Austria and Germany as a hero of the anti-Nazi resistance.

Harding, is a respected military affairs expert who has written seven books and long specialized in World War II, and his writing style carries immediacy as well as authority. "Just after 4am Jack Lee was jolted awake by the sudden banging of M1 Garands," he writes of the SS's initial assault on the castle, "the sharper crack of Kar-98s, and the mechanical chatter of a .30-caliber spitting out rounds in short, controlled bursts. Knowing instinctively that the rising crescendo of outgoing fire was coming from the gatehouse, Lee rolled off the bed, grabbed his helmet and M3, and ran from the room. As he reached the arched schlosshof gate leading from the terrace to the first courtyard, an MG-42 machine gun opened up from somewhere along the parallel ridgeway east of the castle, the weapon's characteristic ripping sound clearly audible above the outgoing fire and its tracers looking like an unbroken red stream as they arced across the ravine and ricocheted off the castle's lower walls." Everything that Harding reports in this exciting but also historically accurate narrative is backed up with meticulous scholarship. This book proves that history can be new and nail-bitingly exciting all at once.

The French VIPs finally put aside their political differences and picked up weapons to join in the fight against the attacking SS troops.

Despite their personal enmities and long-held political grudges, when it came to a fight the French VIPs finally put aside their political differences and picked up weapons to join in the fight against the attacking SS troops. We get to know Reynaud, Daladier, and the rest as real people, not merely the political legends that they've morphed into over the intervening decades. Furthermore, Jean Borotra (a former tennis pro) and Francois de La Rocque, who were both members of Marshal Philippe Petain's Vichy government and long regarded by many historians as simply pro-fascist German puppets, are presented in the book as they really were: complex men who supported the Allied cause in their own ways. In de La Rocque's case, by running an effective pro-Allied resistance movement at the same time that he worked for Vichy. If they were merely pro-Fascist puppets, after all, they would not have wound up as Ehrenhäflinge—honor prisoners—of the Fuhrer.

While the book concentrates on the fight for Castle Itter, it also sets that battle in the wider strategic contexts of the Allied push into Germany and Austria in the final months of the war, and the Third Reich's increasingly desperate preparations to respond to that advance. This book is thus a fascinating microcosm of a nation and society in collapse, with some Germans making their peace with the future, while others—such as the Waffen-SS unit attacking the castle—fighting to the bitter end. (Some of the fighting actually took place after the Doenitz government's formal surrender.)

The book also takes pain to honor the lives of the "number prisoners" who worked at Castle Itter—faceless inmates from Dachau and other concentration camps whose stories have never before been told in this much detail. Whatever their political leanings or personal animosities toward each other, the French VIPs did what they could to help the so-called "number prisoners"—i.e. the ones stripped of their names—in any way they could.

One of the honored prisoners was Michel Clemenceau, the son of the Great War statesman Georges Clemenceau, who had become an outspoken critic of Marshal Petain and who was arrested by the Gestapo in May 1943. At Castle Itter he showed "unshakeable confidence" in rescue, and had clearly inherited the courage of his father, who'd been nicknamed "The Tiger." During the attack, with ammunition running dangerously low—they got down to the last magazines of their MP-40s—their tanks destroyed, and the enemy advancing from the north, west and east, this septuagenarian kept blasting away. His father would have been proud of him.

The story has an ending that Hollywood would love too: just as the SS had settled into position to fire a panzerfaust at the front gate, "the sound of automatic weapons and tank guns behind them in the village signaled a radical change in the tactical situation." Advancing American units and Austrian resistance fighters had arrived to relieve the castle. In keeping with the immense cool that he had shown throughout the siege, Lee feigned irritation as he went up to one of the rescuing tank commanders, looked him in the eye and said simply: "What kept you?" Part Where Eagles Dare, part Guns of Navarone, this story is as exciting as it is far-fetched, but unlike in those iconic war movies, every word of The Last Battle is true.

 

[Armand2REP]

Now it is the time of night
That the graves, all gaping wide,
Every one lets forth his sprite
In the church-way paths to glide

I think French army already copyright the walking dead

 

[ghost]

Once in a while, you hear an old war story that restores your faith in humanity. Usually it involves a moment of quiet in the midst of chaos; some singing or the sharing of a few condiments. But how many of them take place in mid air?

This is the remarkable story of a crippled American bomber spared by a German fighter pilot. After the two planes' pilots had a mid-air moment of understanding, it didn't seem likely that they'd ever see one another again. Only they did, and became closer than brothers.

Here's how it all went down.

It was a few days before Christmas in 1943, and the Allied bombing campaign in Germany was going at full tilt. Second Lieutenant Charlie Brown was a freshly minted bomber pilot, and he and his crew were about to embark upon their first mission — to hit an aircraft factory in northern Germany.

Brown's B-17F Flying Fortress, dubbed Ye Olde Pub, was typical of American heavy bombers of the time. Along with an 8,000-pound bomb capacity, the four-engine plane was armed with 11 machine guns and strategically placed armor plating. B-17s cruised at about 27,000 feet, but weren't pressurized. At that altitude, the air is thin and cold — 60 degrees below zero. Pilots and crew relied upon an onboard oxygen system and really warm flight suits with heated shoes.

As Ye Old Pub approached Bremen, Germany, German anti-aircraft batteries opened up on the formation. Unfortunately for the pilots and crew of Ye Olde Pub, one of the anti-aircraft rounds exploded right in front of their plane, destroying the number two engine and damaging number four. Missing one engine and with another throttled back due to damage, Ye Olde Pub could no longer keep up with the formation.

Why A German Pilot Escorted An American Bomber To Safety During World War II

B-17s were known for being able to soak up a lot of bullets and anti-aircraft flak and still make it home, but that came at a cost. The armor plating protecting crew and vital areas of the plane was heavy and affected cruise speed. Although armed with a number of heavy machine gun turrets, there were still areas of the aircraft that were vulnerable to attack by enemy fighter planes. The U.S. Army Air Corps addressed this problem by placing many planes in staggered formation that allowed bombs to be dropped while multiple planes could cover the defensive gaps of other planes in the formation with overlapping fields of fire.

The drawback to this arrangement was that individual planes couldn't take evasive maneuvers (they'd risk damage from friendly bombs or machine gun fire), and stragglers were completely open to attack by enemy aircraft. Think about a small group of quick, agile cowboys chasing a herd of buffalo. They're both dangerous to one another, but if one lumbering buffalo leaves the safety of the group, there's not much hope for it.

Things went from bad to worse for Brown and his crew. Falling behind the formation, Ye Olde Pub weathered merciless attacks from 15 German fighters. The bomber's machine guns got one of them, but the damage they sustained was immense. The tail gunner was killed and four were injured, including Brown, who caught a bullet fragment in his right shoulder. The only defensive guns left in service were the top turret and the nose gun, and the bomber's hydraulics and oxygen systems had also been knocked out. The plane went into a spiral, plummeting earthward.

What happened next is according to the memory of Brown, who told interviewers years later that his mind was a bit hazy at the time; his shoulder was bleeding and he needed oxygen.

I either spiraled or spun and came out of the spin just above the ground. My only conscience memory was of dodging trees but I had nightmares for years and years about dodging buildings and then trees. I think the Germans thought that we had spun in and crashed.

Ye Olde Pub was spared further harassment by enemy fighters. Somehow, he and the co-pilot managed to get the plane flying level again at about 1,000 feet of elevation.

On the way out to the sea, Ye Olde Pub passed a German airfield. Lt. Franz Stigler, a Luftwaffe fighter pilot just in from shooting down two B-17s, saw Ye Olde Pub limp by. Naturally, he scrambled to give chase. But what he saw arrested any aggression he may have had. As he told interviewers in 1991, he was aghast at the amount of damage the bomber had sustained. Its nose cone was missing, it had several gaping holes in the fuselage. He could see crew members giving first aid to the wounded, and most of the plane's guns hung limp, unmanned as they were.

I saw his gunner lying in the back profusely bleeding"¦.. so, I couldn't shoot. I tried to get him to land in Germany and he didn't react at all. So, I figured, well, turn him to Sweden, because his airplane was so shot up; I never saw anything flying so shot up.

Stigler kept his distance, always staying out of the line of fire of the two guns still in service, but managed to fly within 20 feet of the bullet riddled B-17. He tried to contact Brown with hand signals. His message was simple: Land your plane in Germany and surrender or fly to Sweden. That heap will never make it back to England.

A bewildered Brown stared back through his side window, not believing what he was seeing. He had already counted himself as a casualty numerous times. But this strange German pilot kept gesturing at him. There was no way he was going to land the plane, but the pilot stayed with him, keeping other attackers off until they reached the North Sea. When it was clear that Brown wasn't staying in Germany, Stigler saluted, peeled off, and flew out of Ye Olde Pub's nightmarish day.

When Franz tried to get me to surrender, my mind just wouldn't accept that. It wasn't chivalry, it wasn't bravery, it was probably stupidity. My mind just didn't function in a clear manner. So his choice then was to kill us or try to get us to go to Sweden, since we wouldn't land.

The bomber made it back to England, scarcely able to keep 250 feet between itself and the ground by the time it landed in a smoking pile of exhausted men and shredded aluminum. Years later, Brown would say that if Stigler had been able to talk to him, offering the land in Germany or fly to Sweden ultimatum, he probably would have gone to Sweden. But Ye Olde Pub did make it, and Brown got a much needed stiff drink handed to him when he got off the plane.

Why A German Pilot Escorted An American Bomber To Safety During World War II

The incredulous debriefing officer, wowed by Brown's story, went off to tell the brass what had happened. He recommended Brown's crew for citation, but the glory was short-lived. Brass quickly decided that word getting out about a chivalrous German fighter pilot could endanger the lives of other crews if it caused them to let their guard down. All details of Ye Olde Pub's first mission were classified Secret.

Stigler was never able to speak of his actions that day, as it would have meant certain court martial. He flew many more missions, though, becoming one of the world's first fighter jet pilots. By the war's end, he was one of only about 1,300 surviving Luftwaffe pilots. Some 28,000 had served.

After the war, Charlie Brown returned home to West Virginia and went to college, returning to the Air Force in 1949 and serving until 1965. Later, as a State Department Foreign Service Officer, he made numerous trips to Laos and Vietnam. But in 1972, he hung up his government service hat and moved to Miami to become an inventor.

Stigler finished the war amidst ruin. Anti-Third Reich post-war authorities in Germany were unimpressed with his exemplary service record, and the economy was wrecked. He subsisted on food stamps and work as a bricklayer's helper for a while, but moved to Canada in 1953. There, he enjoyed success as a businessman.

Many years went by without either man ever thinking much about what had happened on that day in 1943. But in 1986, then retired Colonel Charlie Brown was asked to speak at a big combat pilot reunion event called Gathering of the Eagles. Someone asked him if he had any memorable missions during World War II. Brown thought a minute, then dredged up the story of Stigler's salute which had been buried somewhere in the dirty corners of his mind for decades. Jaws dropped. Brown knew he would have to try to find the man who had spared his life.

After four years of searching vainly for U.S. and West German Air Force records that might shed some light on who the pilot was, Brown hadn't come up with much. So he wrote a letter in a combat pilot association newsletter. A few months later, Brown received a letter from Canada. It was from Stigler. "I was the one," it said. When they spoke on the phone, Stigler described his plane, the salute; everything Brown needed to hear to know it wasn't a hoax.

From 1990 to 2008, Charlie Brown and Franz Stigler became like brothers. Introduced by the bond of that first powerful meeting, their friendship was cemented over the years. The two men remained close throughout the rest of their lives, dying within several months of each other in 2008.

There are so many parts of that beautiful story that could have turned out differently. In any event, Stigler probably wouldn't have shot Brown's crippled plane. He was a veteran pilot with an iron sense of right and wrong; a man who would never kick another while he's down.

But what if Stigler had been executed for his disloyalty? What if Brown had landed in Germany or hadn't made it across the North Sea? What if Stigler had stayed in Germany and never learned how to speak English? Yes, things could have been different, but that chance encounter in 1943 was destined to become a chance encounter again in 1990. But more importantly, it's proof to the rest of us that something great done now can change your life much, much later.

 

[badra100]

Hello everyone i am new to this website my name is badra malik and i am from Islamabad doing my BS.c in computer science from VU university.Nice to meeting you all.

 

[kseeker]

Hello everyone i am new to this website my name is badra malik and i am from Islamabad doing my BS.c in computer science from VU university.Nice to meeting you all.

:welcome: to DFI !

 

[bose]

Hello everyone i am new to this website my name is badra malik and i am from Islamabad doing my BS.c in computer science from VU university.Nice to meeting you all.

Welcome to DFI !! and have a nice time here...

 

[badra100]

Most welcome all dearest friends here.
Hope you like it this informative place.
Keep sharing

 

[maomao]

Hello everyone i am new to this website my name is badra malik and i am from Islamabad doing my BS.c in computer science from VU university.Nice to meeting you all.

Welcome Badra! Enjoy your stay!

Does your first name signifies battle of Al-badar or Bhadra Kali?

 

[Waffen SS]

@Singh can we have a sticky thread for new member's introduction?

 

[angeldude13]

Welcome to DFI

 

[Soul83]

hi im new member too, im thirty year old male born in serbia grew up in austria im of roma gypsy ethnicity, a ethnicity which has their origins in the indian subcontinent i was referred to the site by a indian friend she will join soon too. i apologise but i cant open new threads, i dont know if my account was properly activated

 

[Menhit]

^welcome to the forum bro, I ultimately joined this forum after lurking here for a while What I liked about this forum is its peaceful environment and absence of hateful posters.

 

[LurkerBaba]

hi im new member too, im thirty year old male born in serbia grew up in austria im of roma gypsy ethnicity, a ethnicity which has their origins in the indian subcontinent i was referred to the site by a indian friend she will join soon too. i apologise but i cant open new threads, i dont know if my account was properly activated

You need to make 10 posts before opening a thread

 

[Soul83]

ok thank you

 

[jaheen100]

Hello everyone i am new to this website my name is jaheen ali and i am from Islamabad doing my BSc in computer science from VU university.
Nice to meeting you all.

 

[northernarunachalpradesh]

Hello everyone i am new to this website my name is jaheen ali and i am from Islamabad doing my BSc in computer science from VU university.
Nice to meeting you all.

Welcome ali bhai.

 

[Soul83]

i have now 11 posts but still cant open threads, do i need to wait to be activated