When the discussion of suicide pilots comes up, everyone thinks of the Kamikaze units of the Japanese military in the war in the Pacific. But the Poles of the Polish Air Force also resorted to ramming, and they fought valiantly during their short war with Germany in September 1939. But it wasn't an endorsed tactic, nor did Russia endorse the occasional ramming in air combat when it was thrust into the war with Germany.

The origin of Sturm tactics can be traced back to Reichmarschall Hermann Goering's insistence that Reich defense units should start ramming bombers as a last resort. Although German Sturm units weren't tasked with ramming bombers exclusively, it was one of the many tactics employed as a last measure. With the exception of Rammkommando Elbe, no German units were specifically tasked for suicide missions, and even Rammkommando Elbe's pilots only rammed when there was a chance to get out of plane alive.

Goering's Orders: 1943

On 4 October 1943, the Eighth Air Force attacked Frankfurt-on-Main. The local party leader in Frankfurt protested very loudly about the fact that the "terror bombers" were not interecepted. This made Goering issue an order to all Reich defense units:

• there are no weather conditions unfavourable enough to prevent fighter units from taking off
• every fighter pilot who lands an undamaged machine without scoring a kill will be court martialed
• if a fighter pilot is out of ammunition, or his guns are jammed, he is to ram the enemy bomber.

After that the heated orders were put to rest and were virtually forgotten. Then Major Hans-Georg von Kornatzki persuaded certain powers to let him form an experimental unit based on the army's Sturm units who got in close to enemy units and engaged in hand-to-hand combat. He envisioned a unit designed to break up the heavily armed 4-engined bombers of the Eighth Air Force. Members pledged themselves to the unit by a handshake from Kornatzki. The rules of engagement in the unit were as follows:

• to look for a fight with 4-engined bombers, and whenever possible to avoid engagement with a fighter
• to not open fire on the bombers until at a position of 150 to 200 meters, when the four engines appeared to be in the target circle of the Revi gun sight
• to ram the bomber if weapons failed or the gunfire was ineffective.

The new Staffel became operational in January 1944 under the command of Major Kornatzki. They were based alongside the First Gruppe of Jagdgeschwader 1 (I./JG1) at Dortmund airfield.

On 11 January 1944, Oberleutnant Zehart downed a B-17 and claimed the Staffel's first victory. Unteroffizier Willi Maximowitz scored his first victory on 30 January near Hannover.

Due to the increased weight of the new fighters being used, the fighters of SturmStaffel 1 had to be escorted by Bf109s, who had better performance at altitude.

The unit became an immediate success and was soon considered an elite unit. Soon many Jagdgeschwaders began forming Sturm units of their own. The first of these was the new Fourth Gruppe of Jagdgeschwader 3 "Udet" (IV.(Sturm)/JG3) led by Hauptman Wilhelm Moritz.

Another unit, the Second Gruppe of Jagdgeschwader 4 (II.(Sturm)/JG4) was built around the original SturmStaffel 1, and command was given to none other than Major von Kornatzki.

Few pilots resorted to actually ramming a bomber unless they had the chance of escaping safely. Oblt. Werner Gerth, Staffelkapitan of the 14th Staffel of JG3 "Udet" (14.(Sturm)/JG3) was shot down at least 11 times and was finally killed when his parachute failed to open after ramming a B-17 near Halle.

The Weapon of the Sturmflieger

Due to the new mission of SturmStaffel 1, better equipped aircraft had to be used to effectively combat the heavy bombers at close ranges. The Focke Wulf 190A-series was known to be a good bomber interceptor. The only problem was that closure time for stern attacks by Fw190s was very slow, leaving the Fw190s vulnerable to both bomber gunners and escorting fighters.

SturmStaffel 1 soon adopted the baby-brother of the 'Sturmbock.' They used Fw190A-5s and A-6s and added 5 inch armor plating called Panzerplatten to critical areas of their aircraft. The unit also added 30mm glass panels to the side of the canopy and to the quarter-panels of the windscreen.

These new and heavier aircraft resulted in double the fuel consumption rate, and soon fuel drop tanks were added, further weighing down the new converted aircraft.

Armament on these early 'Sturmbocks' were the same as the normal FW190A5s and A6s.

Reich Defense

SturmStaffel 1 was among the first units to adopt Reich Defense (Reichsverteidigung) bands. These bands helped pilots distinguish each unit from the other. SturmStaffel 1 chose to adopt the black-white-black band scheme.

Sturm units would soon incorporate the new Fw190A8 and A9 versions into their units and along with the earlier modifications of Sturm aircraft, they soon also incorporated Rustsatze (Field Conversion Kits). The most numerous one used by the Sturm units was the R8 kit which equipped the Fw190A8 with armor glass and a Mk108 30mm cannon in the wing. The new 30mm cannons meant that bombers could be brought down with just a few well placed hits. But the it added still more weight, making the nimble Fw190 sluggish.

The Luftwaffe's Sturm units suffered tremendous losses from enemy escorts. SturmStaffel 1 alone suffered roughly 350% loss of pilots during its short time in the war. Yet the Sturm units were the most groups at bringing down the endless streams of 4-engined bombers that were devastating Germany by day.

The most successful 4-engined bomber killer, Walther Dahl, was in command of JG300, of which there was a Gruppen (group) and Geschwaderstab (wing staff) of Fw190A8/A9s (R-2 and R-8 variants) that were used in Sturm-style attacks quite successfully. Walther Dahl went on to score at least 36 confirmed 4-engined bombers.

For many years people believed that some of the rammings by German pilots were accidental or were a personal thing the pilot did out of desperation. Occasionally this could have been the case, but the pilots of the Sturm were tasked to ram a bomber if necessary; it was what they signed up for and it is what they agreed to do if firepower alone could not do the job.

Lost in History

It is amazing how little information has come out of Germany about the Sturm units. The book "Flying School: Combat Hell" (by Ellis M. Woodward, Copyright 1998) has many letters to the author from American servicemen that served on the 4-engined bombers.

"....,we exchanged experiences with each other, and it turned out that he was a bombardier in 445th Bombardment Group. This was the Group that was decimated by a LUFTWAFFE STORM GROUP on September 27, 1944. His entire squadron had been shot down and he was a prisoner of war for more then 8 months.

"Now 50 years later he still had never heard of the existence of the LUFTWAFFE STORM GROUPS.......the atack on the 445th BG on September 27, 1944 resulted in the loss of the greatest number of 4-engined bombers by a single Bombardment Group on a single mission in the history of the Eighth Air Force." - Ellis Woodward, 493rd BG

"the attack lasted less than two minutes, and when we looked around, only two of the twelve B-17s remained in formation. The other 10 had disappeared, as if by magic. What had hit us on that fateful day was a LUFTWAFFE STORM GROUP, but I didn't learn of the existence of the STORM GROUPS until 49 years later." - Jimmy Stewart

The story of the Sturm units is a short but yet a mysterious one. The units served with incredible bravery for the simple fact that they were defending their homes. They weren't thinking about keeping the Third Reich alive (with some exceptions, but that's another article), they were thinking of the "terror bombers" wreaking havoc on their homes and the people that lived there.

They regarded themselves as an elite group of pilots, and they were. Unfortunately, note many people know their history, let alone that they existed.