Capitaine Vengeur

"Give me a magazine, and I will single-handedly kill all of you degenerate overfed Jap-ass-licker white apes!! Oh c'm' on, give me a magazine..."

Actually, the countryside may have changed much in some areas of the front. My native countryside of Champagne, southeast of the city of Reims, was at the time of WW1 a backward area regarding agriculture (the geogriphical name of this part of Champagne was and actually is still The Lousy Champagne). The soil was too thin over the chalky substratum to be used for anything else but extensive breeding (Champagne had been known as a big producer of wool since the Middle Ages). The landscape mostly consisted in bare pasture with outcrops of chalk, scrubs, many anemic woods, very few roads between scarce shabby villages far away from each other, no hamlets and exceptionally rare isolated farms. Such a poor landscape can still be observed on sat views on the hilly ranges and in the many military camps in the area (which have been settled there during the 19th Century precisely because the soil was unworthy for agriculture). The revolution of fertilizers and mass mechanized agriculture has changed everything, making this area one of the main French agricultural regions. Now the landscape is made of large, flat, fertile open fields as far as the eye can see, with very few residual woods, still largely under-populated. That's what can be seen on the present sat views, far away from what the airmen on the front of Champagne could observe.

True. Context is very important. A sign like "Free service for our Nazi friends" would look very odd at any shop... ... ... ... ... but a circumciser's !

Yep. Damn true...

Actually, Voss was expected to leave that same evening of September 23. In the caption of the photograph,his brothers later said that they found him very tired, and very impatient to leave for rest. But he was also eager to pack his 49th and 50th kills before he could leave. He finally became a legend through another way. Just another victim of the insane individual race for the highest score, like Helmut Wick and Tommy McGuire after him.

Olham, on "Fokker Dr I aces of World War One" (Osprey Editions), your photograph is said to be the last for Werner Voss, taken in the morning of 23 September 1917, just after Werner's 48th kill and the arrival of his elder brothers Otto and Max at Marcke airfield, to bring Werner on scheduled long leave, and just before Werner's last mission. By the way, Til Schweiger to play Werner Voss was one of the many bad choices of "The Red Baron"...

Well, the Great Leader may have chosen to paint the MiGs, trains, and all of the most glorious People's machines in a bright Socialist red. But being the red-green color blind degenerate Kim he may be, he pointed out the wrong paint scheme. Who'd care to say him he is wrong?

There were still some few examples of such chivalric stories during WW2: the brotherhood of pilots above the rest. One of the best known of such stories concerns of course the legendary British ace Douglas Bader, the man who flew with two prosthetic legs. Shot down over Northern France in 1941, he could eject with one leg less, and was captured. He was respectfully visited by the most prominent German aces from JG2 and JG26, including General Galland, who took contact with the British to negotiate a safe passage for a RAF bomber to drop a new leg for Bader on an airfield, an unprecedented operation approved by Göring himself. Less chivalric, the RAF took advantage of the safe passage to launch a strike nearby! Quite recently, I stumbled on several shocking pics of Vichy French pilots hitting it on with German Nazi airmen. I thought it at first a disgusting example of Vichy collaboration, but it was rather a private affair between pilots. During the Phoney War, two French pilots from GC III/6 had shot down a Do 17, and in the finest traditions of WW1, had brought back the German officer to their mess to offer him a last fine dinner before he was sent to a POW camp (for a few months only, actually). Late May 1941, the GC III/6 sent to Syria transited through German-occupied Athens, and was unexpectedly welcomed there by this German officer, whose bomber unit was quartered nearby, who had heard of the arrival of his former hosts, and who was eager to return the favour. The French pilots were honoured guests for a couple of days, guided by welcoming German airmen in the city of Athens (the Parthenon as well as the night clubs), and taking with them the memory of how drunken and noisy a German night party can be! Just one week later, the GC III/6 had to face RAF and RAAF in Syria, with cruel losses on both sides.

I suspect that the aerial operations France led this year over Libya, largely focusing on the land- and carrier-based Rafales, were in a large part intended to promote outlets for this multirole fighter, thus assessable in the long term over a hostile place. It seems it worked in India. It had been confirmed this year that a major foreign market was required for the production to carry on. I just hope that this nice bird will never have to tangle with Pakistani or Chinese fighters.

Beautiful, hilly, healthy, developped, yet underpopulated countryside... ... ... ... ... Where is the trap?!

La Marseillaise, reggae version by Serge Gainsbourg, 1979. Quite shocking and controversial at that time. Who'd care today?

"OFF Phase 4: so realistic that you could suffer from frostbites, inhale combustion gas, and feel tempted to shoot yourself in the head if your virtual plane catches fire!"

Several threads in CA have discussed about Spielberg's latest movie, "War Horse". World War One has been the turning point when cavalry became once and for all an obsolete service, relieved by modern weapons issued by the industrial warfare - aviation first of all. Symbolizing this turning point, many of the most illustrious pilots or air commanders were former cavalry officers, like Göring and von Richthofen ("the Rittmeister") at the Germans, or Nungesser and de Rose at the French. The planes themselves seemed to have been designed for experienced horsemen, light enough to be flown "by the ass", with rudder pedals in place of stirrups. Yet, a British cavalry charge on a German camp can be seen on the movie's trailer; historically accurate or not, I don't know. But I'd like to evoke here a perhaps obscure but actual feat, the last time when ageing cavalry could get back at the insolent newcome aviation. On September 9, 1914, at the height of the First Battle of the Marne, a French cavalry squadron from 16e Dragons, 40 lancers led by Lieutenant Gaston de Gironde, was stuck behind the enemy lines near Soissons. At dusk, they learnt from a countryman that a German airfield had been settled in the vicinity of Vivières, hosting eight Aviatiks and their support services. At that time of the war, air forces were quite scarce, and eight German planes less could have weighed much in the current battle, letting some Allied maneuvers unspotted. So Lt Gironde took place on the edge of the field, and waited for the darkest night to launch a surprise attack. Once the sentries neutralized, the French horsemen charged across the field with spears, pistols and carbines. Vehicles set aflame soon lit up the battlefield. Out of the 40 dragoons, 13 were killed (including Gironde who died of wounds) and 8 were wounded; several horsemen were captured afterwards, or had to use civilian clothes to break through to their lines. Most of the French casualties, including Gironde, were owed to one single German MG settled on a car, which swept across the open airfield. But all of the eight Aviatiks and several vehicles were set aflame, and the German squadron leader is even said to have been killed in the encounter (nonetheless, I couldn't find the unit's name, or if it actually used Aviatiks). "To hell with you! I want to die on a saddle, at a gallop!" (Lt Gironde just before his last charge)

c днём рождения!

Forty... Man! Forty... Just like ten years ago, I have tried to draw up my end of decade statement, taking place in front of a mirror and asking to myself: “So, what have you done with your own life, mm?”. And just like like ten years ago, I finally ended up replying to myself: “Oh, shut the f**k up, you pompous jester!”

The habit of naming fighter planes after girlfriends/ fiancées/ wives seems to have been common at many German aces in the WW2 Luftwaffe, as for Erich Hartmann's "Usch" or "Ursel" (on a red heart with arrow), Gerhard Barkhorn's "Christl", or Josef Priller's "Jutta" (on an ace of hearts card). Glad that an assumed "macho man" like Charles Nungesser didn't conform to the same tradition, or his Nieuport would have been covered in dozens of names of deceived fiancées, passing groupies, and various common whores!

Stop it! Stop it! Discussion policy of the Pub: We want no pee-troll !!

About Sc-Fi, it just sounds like Joe haldeman's "The forever War", when the new technology of stasis fields neutralizes all of kinetic or energy weapons, and forces the 30th Century belligerents to resort to hand-to-hand brawling with medieval blades. Haldeman also uses this quote from Einstein. About the charge at Balaklava, I have enjoyed a tour in Crimea just last summer, visiting the port (a beautiful site!) and travelling along the battlefield, a large flat valley now covered in vineyard. I have heard there that since 1945, when Churchil visited the battlefield as a former hussar while negotiating at Yalta, the British government tries to buy the place, as a commemorative site.

"The first guy who painted a roundel on a plane was a bastard." ( A Tempest pilot, quoted by P. Clostermann in his book "The big show" )

During the Franco-Prussian War, the famous "von Bredow's Death Ride" was one of the very few succesful charges, as the Prussian horsemen could approach unseen very close to the French lines due to smoke and terrain. They saved the day for Germany at Mars-la-Tour: the charge costed half of the Prussian brigade, but neutralized the deadly French artillery and thus saved many more German lives. Most of the French charges on the contrary, the Cuirassiers at Froeschwiller or the Cavalerie d'Afrique at Sedan, only ended up in glorious and vain mass common graves of men and horses. The three repeated suicide charges of the Division Margueritte at Sedan could snatch a respectful "Ach! Die tapfere Leute!" ("Ah! The brave people!") from the King of Prussia, but they couldn't save the French army from complete destruction. During WW1 on the Western Front, the Allied were not the only ones to give in to the charm of insane charges. At Haelen on August 12, 1914, three Belgian regiments of Guides and Lanciers (with some supports of cyclist light infantry, well-placed light artillery, and a reinforcing infantry regiment) chose to fight dismounted to receive the charges of six regiments of German heavy cavalry, supported by powerful artillery and up to ten infantry regiments advancing behind local human shields. At dusk, it is claimed that some 3000 Germans and hundreds of horses, dead or wounded, were laying on the ground (almost the number of fighting Belgians, but most possibly exaggerated), to Belgian casualties three times lesser. The Dragoner-Regiment Nr. 17, including the finest nobility of Mecklemburg, was fatally bled. Nonetheless, the weak Belgian forces were forced to withdraw again the following day.

Funny + Original + Instructive = I love !!!

This Osprey book cover is said to portray Richthofen's last dogfight on April 20, 1918. Full red triplane with Balkenkreuz. The serial number was 425/17.

Surely, IRIAF, USAF, and all of air forces in the World including Vatican's Seraphs, may now use the same Chinese-built cheap junk spare parts!

SFP2, full hard mode: Be aware your gee-suit could become a pee-suit !!

Combatace: "Even air heroes may pee. Sometimes."