aircrew interned in neutral countries
Glen
Sweden or Switzerland, and their crews interned.
What kind of numbers?
How were the crews treated?
Bill Shatzer
On 6 Dec 1999, Glen wrote:
> I read somewhere about bombers damaged during raids on Germany landing in
> Sweden or Switzerland, and their crews interned.
> What kind of numbers?
166 American aircraft ended up in Switzerland ranging from a single
Stinson L-5 observation aircraft to numerous B-17 and B-24 bombers.
Forty-one crashed and were totally destroyed, 39 crash-landed in a badly
damaged condition and 86 landed in repairable condition. The undamaged or
repairable aircraft included 41 B-24s, 30 B-17s, and a single P-51 - as
well as the Stinson.
Including aircrew who bailed out over Switzerland, a bit over a twelve
hundred USAAF aircrew ultimately ended up interned in Switzerland.
Cheers and all,
GlennShiv
choose
to land and be inturned in Vladivostok, rather than risk the long flight to
China.
Also, there were several B-29's that landed in the Soviet Union due to
mechanical problems.
As I understand it, the aircrews received modest treatment, and some were
released later in the war over the Iranian border. The Soviets did make
an
almost exact copy of the B-29 bomber following WW2.
Glenn Shiveler
Andrew Clark
seem to remember reading that a number of US crews and some British crews
deliberately diverted to Switzerland and Sweden in order to get out of the
war.
Bill Shatzer <bsha...@OregonVOS.net> wrote
casita
>a number of US crews and some British crews deliberately diverted to
Switzerland and Sweden in order to get out of the war.
Bomber Command had morale problems, but never to the degree of the USAAF.
NOTE: Morale and Courage not the same thing.
ULF BERGGREN
"internering") until the end of the war.
Glen <na...@REMOVESPAMBLOCKsilcom.com> skrev i
diskussionsgruppsmeddelandet:cbD24.9$kh2....@newsfeed.avtel.net...
> I read somewhere about bombers damaged during raids on Germany landing in
> Sweden or Switzerland, and their crews interned.
> What kind of numbers?
Bill Shatzer
> Wasn't it the case that some of these aircraft had effectively deserted? I
> seem to remember reading that a number of US crews and some British crews
> deliberately diverted to Switzerland and Sweden in order to get out of the
> war.
It happened, I suppose, but I know of no instances where it was officially
determined that such a thing had occurred.
After all, there are a myriad of system failures possible which might
legitimately justify a diversion to a neutral country and, as Switzerland
or Sweden took custody of the aircraft upon landing, it is not as if
USAAF mechanics could actually check out claims as to overheating engines
or failed navigational gear or defective oxygen systems or any of the
thousand and one other things which might go wrong.
And, of course, if a crew was genuinely intent upon getting out of the war
and leaving no evidence, a bailout over Swiss territory would effectively
destroy any "evidence".
Officially at least, I don't think any of the USAAF diversions to either
Sweden or Switzerland were ever questioned or ascribed to LMF.
Cheers and all,
casita
> Officially at least, I don't think any of the USAAF diversions to either
> Sweden or Switzerland were ever questioned or ascribed to LMF.
Early return rates were an indication of morale. Press on Regardless was
the motto. Or die in the attempt.
Mr Dirk Lorek posted on 1997 / 09 / 11 that 14 heavy US bombers landed in
Switzerland in a 115 minute period. Gen Arnold sent a message to Spaatz
noting US aircraft force landing in neutral countries "without indication of
serious battle damage or mechanical failure or shortage of fuel."
Diplomatic reports confirmed the landings were intentional evasions of
further combat service."
Perhaps Mr Lorek would post the source for these scurilous allegations. Max
Hastings did however corroborate Mr Lorek in this controversy of US aircraft
force landing in neutral countries. Better interned than interred.
Campbell McGregor
on this whole subject a few years ago. As the USAAF
flew in daylight, unlike the RAF, they were in a better
position to divert to Sweden or Switzerland because they
could see the airfields. They did have an interview
with one American ex-airman who effectively admitted that
he had decided to sit out the war in Switzerland, although
he insisted that they had been genuinely forced to land
there. At one stage the USAAF became so concerned about
aircrews deserting that they instructed fighter pilots
escorting the bombers to shoot down aircraft who
appeared to be diverting without good reason. However
they concluded that, although there are grounds for
doubt in a few cases, the bulk of crews who landed in
Sweden or Switzerland did so for genuine reasons.
casita
>They did have an interview with one American ex-airman
This is a contradiction. An admission is a confession.
Then he says he was forced. It has to be one or the other.
>At one stage the USAAF became so concerned about aircrews deserting
This is also a contraction. Why would the USAAF order its fighters to shoot
down the bombers they were defending if the bombers were in genuine
distress?
It seems that during the war there was a morale problem. After the war, it
was swept under the carpet.
Gerry Doyle
war.
Apparently security was quite lax, and the internees had quite a bit of
freedom, they could ramble out to the local villages for instance, go
dancing etc., until one of them escaped and made his way home. Because the
security was then considerably tightened up and these privileges withdrawn,
the remaining prisoners protested to their own governments and the escapee
was actually returned.
Sounds a bit unlikely, but I've heard it a few times now...
G
Gerry Doyle
Campbell McGregor <cm...@linkcafe.co.uk> wrote in message
news:3864136e...@news.curie.dialix.com.au...
As the USAAF
> flew in daylight, unlike the RAF, they were in a better position to divert to Sweden
>or Switzerland because they could see the airfields.
But wasn't this just as dangerous? Didn't the Swiss tend to open fire on
overflying belligerents?
G
1026Scout
I'm no expert, but from what i've read it goes like this:
If a plane flew into Swiss airspace, and was met by Swiss planes (ie,
Me-109s), they would react according to the encroacher. If, for ex.,
it was a B-17 crippled (engines shot out, etc), they would take
positions fore and aft - the fore plane guided the bomber to the Swiss
airfield it was to land on, the aft plant ensured it didn't break
formation! If there was no fire from the plane, it was not engaged.
If there was fire, it was attacked. If it tried to leave Swiss
airspace, it would be shot down (probably warning shots were fired).
Swedes I know nothing about. Swiss had lots of experience with
encroachers.
--
Tom Adkins
"In the year 2000 I'm going to change my name to "none of the above"
and run for office."
Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/
Before you buy.
Bill Cherepy
<alac...@NO-FECKINSPAM-ireland.com> wrote:
>There is an old story about interned Allied airmen in Ireland during the
>war.
I saw a movie recently with this same plot, but I can't remember the
title. I was an English (I think) movie and I can't remember any of
the actors either.
Bill Cherepy
Grayson, GA
jche...@mindspring.com
Campbell McGregor
on this subject while I am at it.
casita wrote:
> From: Campbell McGregor
> >They did have an interview with one American ex-airman
>
> This is a contradiction. An admission is a confession.
> Then he says he was forced. It has to be one or the other.
>
He did claim that they had been forced to land in Switzerland
through genuine difficulties, although once there he had sat
the war out.
>
> >At one stage the USAAF became so concerned about aircrews deserting
>
> This is also a contraction. Why would the USAAF order its fighters to shoot
> down the bombers they were defending if the bombers were in genuine
> distress?
>
They were ordered to shoot down bombers which did not appear
to be in genuine distress.
The issue of interned airmen in Ireland would merit an entire discussion
in itself. The true story behind Gerry Doyle's story is that conditions
were lax, British airmen were allowed to go outside the camp during
the day providing they signed parole papers to return to the camp
by the evening. One American internee left the camp, came back a
few minutes later on the pretext that he had forgot his gloves, then
got the bus to Belfast, arguing that he had fulfilled his promise to
return to the camp. The British thought this was cheating and
handed him back, possibly on the grounds that if they did not do so
then this would jeapordise the position of the remaining internees.
However Allied internees were released in 1943.
At one stage early in the war the Swiss did shoot down German
aircraft taking a short cut to get to France, but I am not aware
that they ever shot down American bombers diverting to
Switzerland. It could have been to their advantage not to do
so, the Swedes at least held on to aircraft which landed, the
Swedish air force had acquired a lot of aircraft this way by
Dawiyya Ifranj
<alac...@NO-FECKINSPAM-ireland.com> wrote:
>As the USAAF
>> flew in daylight, unlike the RAF, they were in a better position to divert to Sweden
>>or Switzerland because they could see the airfields.
>
>But wasn't this just as dangerous? Didn't the Swiss tend to open fire on
>overflying belligerents?
Yes. At least one RAF aircraft (a Mosquito returning from operations
over Germany) was forced down in Swiss territory by fighter attack.
However, this was less of a threat than facing a return leg over
German occupied France or over the North Sea with a damaged aircraft.
Gavin Bailey
--
Fochinell
"Ancient Scots warcry" painted on the side of a Spitfire Mk XIV in 1944
- presumably without Air Ministry approval.
Rob Davis
>But wasn't this just as dangerous? Didn't the Swiss tend to open fire on
>overflying belligerents?
Swiss flak was notoriously accurate - but usually deliberately set to
explode at the wrong altitude.
=====================
Rob Davis MSc MIAP
Telford Shropshire UK
Silent Otto
>From: Campbell McGregor
>>They did have an interview with one American ex-airman
>
>This is a contradiction. An admission is a confession.
>Then he says he was forced. It has to be one or the other.
I didn't see the interview so i cant comment on that.
> >At one stage the USAAF became so concerned about aircrews deserting
>
>This is also a contraction. Why would the USAAF order its fighters to shoot
>down the bombers they were defending if the bombers were in genuine
>distress?
No its not. There could be lots of things wrong with a bomber that
wouldn't be obvious to an escorting fighter. Overheating engines,
bad superchargers, fuel loss, electrical failure, the list goes on and
on.
But your right when you say their was a morale problem and that the
powers that be were concerned about it. They did kick around the idea
of ordering escorts to shoot down bombers that didn't show evidence of
serious damage. But when they talked it over with the fighter boys
that was the end of it. The fighter pilots weren't eager to play
judge jury and executioner to someone who may or may not have a
serious problem. Apparently they decided that an order to that effect
would have more serious repercussions than losing a few bombers each
month even if some of the diversions were questionable.
>It seems that during the war there was a morale problem. After the war, it
>was swept under the carpet.
I've never heard of any force involved in combat that publicly admits
it has a morale problem, so that doesn't make the 8th unique in any
sense. Did BC publicly announce its moral problems? At any rate, its
no secret to anyone who has studied the bombing offensive to any
degree.
In addition, the USAAF still had a lot to learn about how to combat
morale problems. You sarcastically mentioned in another post that
they sent the flyers to atlantic city to unwind and that it wasn't
particularly effective. That's true. Its also true that they learned
other techniques that were more effective such as:
1. Rotating crew members between different bomber crews to help
minimize the sense of personal loss crews felt when a member was
injured or killed.
2. Speedy replacement of causalities.
3. Making sure that their were no "empty beds" in barracks, even if
it meant moving survivors to different quarters.
4. Making sure that dining areas were always full. (Galland talks
about how demoralizing it was to be surrounded by the empty chairs
where his men used to sit when he was trying to eat his dinner.)
5. Increased use of psychiatry and recognizing that a normal man can
only take so much rather than the swashbuckling attitude the flyers
and their leaders had at the outset.
Their are others, but i think i've made my point.
A guy named Crosby wrote a book a few years ago about the 100 th bomb
group that went into morale quite a lot. The early members of the
bomb group were a bunch of cowboys with their white scarves and 1000
hour hats. They wouldn't listen to direction, flew lousy formations
and pretty well played the role of the macho flyer. Their commander
was the same way. And because they were so hard headed, and refused
to take formation flying seriously, they were easy targets for the
luftwaffe and took murderous losses. As the missions piled up the
more renegade elements of the bomb group, and a lot of other guys
flying with them, were lost. That had a big negative impact on the
morale rest of the group because, for all their faults, these men were
respected and admired by the men who flew with them. It was during
this period that they became known as the bloody 100th.
Their commander was offered an opportunity to take the group off of
operations in order to rest the men after the huge losses they had
taken and integrate and train replacement crews. True to form he
raved "The hundredth never goes off of opps." However a short time
later when all of his planes failed to return from a raid on munster
he suffered a complete collapse, physically and emotionally, and was
relieved. (Some of the planes did survive the mission but were forced
to land at other bases due to combat damage. He didn't know that and
had stood outside waiting for his planes to return. None showed up.
The poor man was shattered. He cried and cried.)
Crosby said that the new commander was a lot more serious than his
predecessor. He took them off of opps for a while, trained, trained,
and trained some more. He pounded into the men the need to fly tight
formations. And when they went back on opps, losses declined and,
with the other measures i listed above now in place, morale began to
improve. Crosby, whom i should mention was a navigator with the
group, keenly regretted the loss of the swashbucklers, but he had to
admit that with out them the 100th was a more professional and
therefore more effective unit. But it sure wasn't as much fun in the
officers club.
As a side note you posted:
>Mr Dirk Lorek posted on 1997 / 09 / 11 that 14 heavy US bombers landed in
>Switzerland in a 115 minute period
I don't know about that specifically, but at certain stages of the war
its certainly conceivable that the Luftwaffe could have damaged 14
planes from a single deep penetration raid badly enough that they
would seek refuge in Switzerland. I'd be curious to see details also.
But you can infer that it was a deep raid to have them so close to
Switzerland, and we all know what happened to deep penetration raids
with out fighter escort.
>
>
>
Robert J. Kolker
Bill Cherepy wrote:
> On 26 Dec 1999 18:14:01 GMT, "Gerry Doyle"
> <alac...@NO-FECKINSPAM-ireland.com> wrote:
>
> >There is an old story about interned Allied airmen in Ireland during the
> >war.
The Bryll Cream Boys.
Gabriel Byrne starred in it.
Bob Kolker