Читаем Stuka Pilot полностью

After the Mustang pilot set fire to my aircraft in the first attack he must have spotted me lying to the side of her path. Perhaps he actually saw me drop off as he flew in; at any rate he comes back at me again and again with his cannon and machine guns. Apparently he cannot see clearly through the window behind which his sights are and through which he must aim; he probably cannot believe after every fly-in that he has not hit me, for after coming in once or twice he roars over me obliquely, dipping his aircraft, at 12-15 feet and takes a look at me. I lie flat on my stomach all the time hugging the pock-marked grass; I have not budged except to turn my head slightly to one side so as to squint at him through my lowered eyelids. Every time he comes in at me from in front earth and sand from his bullets bespatter me right and left. Will he hit me the next time? To run for it is out of the question, for everything moving is instantly fired on. So it goes on for what seems to me an eternity. Now I feel sure that he has run out of ammunition, for after skimming once more obliquely over me he flies off. His colleagues have also used up their ammunition; very profitably, it must be admitted. They reassemble above the airfield and fly away.

Our airfield looks a terrible mess, especially at first sight. The first thing I do is to look for Plt./Off. Hofmeister. His aircraft is lying on the perimeter of the field; he must have been slower in landing and was caught on the way down. He is wounded; one foot has to be amputated. Fifty aircraft are burning and exploding on the airfield, luckily only a few of my serviceable planes which, well covered as they were, were not an easy target. Now I am told when visiting each unit in the forest that during the attack the ground personnel kept up an uninterrupted small arms fire, as ordered, with MP-40s, rifles, machine guns and revolvers. Four Mustangs lie near the airfield. Seeing that we had no flak this is a gratifying achievement. The Mustangs have not had their safe target practice so gratuitously after all. A few days later A.A. batteries arrive for my airfield and raids as successful as this one are not likely to be repeated.

German aircraft types often appear in our area flown by Rumanians whom we have equipped with them. They now bear the Rumanian markings and are flying on the Russian side. The Rumanian operational base is not very far from us. We therefore spend two days making low level attacks on their airfields in the area Karlsburg, Kronstadt and Hermannstadt. Malicious tongues among us suggest that we are trying to emulate the Mustangs; they would have done it before. We destroy more than 150 aircraft on the ground, some of them in the air; in any case they are mostly training and courier planes, but even so are of use for training the Rumanian air force. Success in attacks of this kind is to a very great extent dependent on the strength of the enemy defense.

The fighting in Rumania is at an end. The Soviet floods pour in over the whole country to try to force a passage into Hungary at every possible point. Tightly packed convoys are at this moment streaming through the Roter-Turm Pass in the direction of Hermannstadt.

Sorties against this invading spearhead are particularly difficult because this army is very strongly defended against air attack. On one flight over the northern end of the pass 4 cm. flak rips off the cockpit hood of my FW 190 and I find myself suddenly sitting in the open. Luckily none of the splinters wounds me.