Shoot

Memoirs of a Luftwaffe fighter pilot 1940 - 45

Walter Schuck became passionate about flying at an early age. At the age of 16 he joined the Luftwaffe, where he completed basic pilot training and fighter pilot training. He was then deployed with his unit to various locations in Germany, France, Poland, the Netherlands and Denmark. In December he was transferred to Bodö, Norway. But his meteoric career as a fighter pilot did not begin until early 1942, when his unit was transferred to Petsamo in northern Finland. There he achieved his first kill and soon became a nightmare for the Soviet air force in the Arctic Ocean. Gradually he was promoted to lieutenant.

In early March 1945 he was transferred to a new fighter squadron equipped with Me 262 jet aircraft. During his first combat flight with this machine he shot down two Allied aircraft. However, his feat on April 10, 1945, when he shot down four B-17 bombers in a single takeoff, is unsurpassed. Shortly afterwards he was hit by one escort fighter. He had to parachute and was injured. That ended the war for him after more than 500 combat years and 206 confirmed kills.

The author is not after some false romance of flying in this autobiography. He does not cite anything that in retrospect casts a more favourable light on the Third Reich, nor does he use any general phrases to belittle National Socialism. Rather, it purposely limits itself to documenting everyday military life - what life was really like in Luftwaffe units, how units were functionally linked, how air combat was conducted in the harsh conditions of the war in the Arctic Ocean and in the futile air battles on Reich territory. He describes a way of thinking that is hard for us to understand today, when he and his friends put their lives on the line daily for "nation and country", only to find that their motivation was misused and they became a betrayed generation.