In 1940 its armament consisted of two fixed machine guns in the wings and one flexible machine gun in the rear cockpit, but it was entirely unprotected by machine-gun defensive fire power from underneath. The Stuka is an all-metal, low-wing monoplane of cantilever construction, with a top speed of 242 miles an hour - 130 miles slower, that is, than its destined nemesis, the British Spitfire fighter. It refutes the puerile assumption in some American circles that Germany is somehow ‘a natural air-power nation’ with a divine mandate to rule the world in this airpower age. It is a fact, nonetheless, that unwarranted reliance on this and similar types of aircraft was one of the principal contributing causes of Germany’s defeat in the Battle of Britain.Īs the basic ingredient in Hitler’s Luftwaffe, indeed, the Stuka stands as a symbol of the essential lopsidedness of that service in Germany. It was hard for them to realize that the very airplane which made the largest contribution to the Nazi conquest of Europe proved worthless in the attempt to invade the British Isles. Even some military experts were too dazzled by the achievements of the Stuka in its appropriate place to recognize its shortcomings when removed from that place. ![]() Moreover, the Stuka revealed itself to the world, first in Poland and then in Western Europe, as the most conspicuous element in the fearsome blitzkrieg, in a setting of demoralized armies, terrorized refugee populations, and swift collapse of nations.Īll this tended to surround this plane with an aura of invincibility, of power far beyond the limited functions for which it had been specifically designed. With characteristic thoroughness, the Germans equipped the plane with weirdly wailing sirens to heighten its capacity to inspire fear. It suggests ominously the image of an eagle pouncing on its prey. Its swooping, plunging flight has a melodramatic quality that terrifies and sows panic. ![]() THE Junkers 87, better known as the Stuka dive-bomber, has registered on the popular imagination more deeply than any other airplane thus far exhibited in combat.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |