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Originally Posted by Juha
On the JV 44 pilots
Maybe some of the "greats" were not burnt out but simply didn't adapt to new tactics needed with Me 262.
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Even when the 262 seemed to offer an new and better way to add to their scores? You'd think that would appeal to the warrior-hunter ethos that had been fostered in the Luftwaffe's glory days.
It's just that I came away from Forsyth's book noticing that some of the "greats" didn't seem to have done that much combat flying with JV 44.
Galland pulled a couple of them out the Bad Wiessee rest home to take part. Given the desperate state of Germany and the Luftwaffe in early 1945 (and the often reported shortage of experienced formation leaders), it's hard to imagine them being on extended holiday by the lakes if they were fully fit. Hohagen certainly wasn't, according to Galland.
His postwar account of JV 44 was, in my view, an attempt to do his best for his old friends' reputations. IIRC the NCO pilots barely figured in "The First and the Last."