The idea for the project was first conceived in 1943 by a small group of idealists including a well know female aviator. At first rebuffed by the Luftwaffe high command and then by Field Marshall Milch, head of the German Air Ministry, it was finally approved by the German Academy of Aeronautics who decided that the idea was operationally sound.
The group then tried to obtain official support for the project and a meeting with Hitler was arranged in February 1944. After a 3 hour interview Hitler did not approve of the project, stating that the philosophy of suicide was not in keeping with the character of the German people (ironic since he ended up topping himself!). He did, however, give his permission for the group to continue with the development and planning of the project.
Having been offically sanctioned by Hitler, the project was assigned by the Chief of General Staff of the German Air Force to the commander of a Luftwaffe bomber wing that was engaged in special operations and clandestine activities. Unfortunatly for the group, this commander was more intrested in the credit that he could receive from the volunteers self-sacrifice, than the actual effectiveness of the plan itself.
Orignally, the Messerchmitt 328 was selected as the weapon to be used by the volunteers, but production was so slow that the group looked around for another weapon that would be easy to produce and available on short order. They settled on the V1 "buzz bomb", rebuilt to carry a pilot and within three weeks 4 four types of this piloted missile were ready for testing.
However, it was here that things began to go wrong for the group. The Luftwaffe wing commander who had been placed in charge of the project had little intrest in it. He appointed a staff of Luftwaffe officers to handle the planing and operational positions. These officers had little idea of the orginal intentions of the volunteers, to destroy a Allied invasion fleet, and instead thought they could be used to destroy Soviet ammunition trains on the Eastern front, something that did not go down well with the volunteers! Instead of flight training they found themselves engaged in physical education and pistol shooting programs.
In despair, the female aviator was called upon to use her influence to save the failing project. She arranged a meeting with Himmler, who liked the suicide idea (no suprise!) but thought that membership of the corps should consist of criminals and the incurably diseased. He offered to take over the project but only if one of his officers could assume leadership of it. Feeling that the plan would not recieve any better treatment under Himmler, the group turned his offer down.
It was at this point that the Allied invasion of Normandy began, with the group unprepared to meet the threat. Several days into the invasion, Herman Goering remember that there were a group of Luftwaffe pilots who had volunteered for a suicide mission and contacted the commander of the bomber wing that the volunteers had been placed under. The commander declared that the group were ready for action, even though no piloted "buzz bombs" were available and that only a few of the men had any preflight training.
The commander and his technical assistants set to work on plans to use a Focke Wulf 190, carrying a 4000lb bomb to be used as the suicide weapon. Since no-one in the German Air Force had ever flown this plane with such a heavy bomb load, and it was more than likely that it would crash before it got airborne, the regular test pilots declined the honor of testing it. Undaunted the commander decreed that his suicide pilots would conduct the tests themselves, regardless of the fact that none of them had ever flown a FW 190.
Fortunatly for these men, Hitler heard about the commanders plans and ordered the project abandoned. The commander was removed from his post and his succesor tried to salvage the orginal ideas of the project. But it was too little, too late. The Allies were established in force on the continent and the hour to strike had passed, so the group was disbanded.
Ive been studying WW2 for many years, but thats the first time i ever came across that story. It makes me wonder what the implications would have been if the plan had been taken seriously by the German High Command and implemented on D-day. Could such actions had prevented the invasion?
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