важкі часи

Orthodox priests carry a giant Ukrainian flag in downtown Kyiv, Ukraine, on Dec. 4, 2013.

важкі часи (Hard Times), and it's not the Dickens novel I'm talking about. (For those who are wondering, that's Ukrainian, not Russian. I have a few readers in Ukraine, wanted to let them know that there are some in the West who care.)

The Russians under Putin are not really our friends.

The situation in Ukraine has me concerned. While I am most assuredly NOT a big fan of the European Union, I am less a fan of any entity run by a former colonel in the KGB* who went on to become director of the FSB**. Things there could go badly, but I pray this article is right.

The poster boy for the Wikipedia
article on the KGB.

This news story seems to have fallen under the radar for now. No doubt Sochi and the Olympics will make the Russian bear seem all cuddly and nice.

So the Russians have Putin, we have this guy -

I am not getting a warm fuzzy.

*KGB = The Committee for State Security (Russian: Комитет государственной безопасности (КГБ) Komitet gosudarstvennoy bezopasnosti KGB), translated in English as Committee for State Security was the main security agency for the Soviet Union from 1954 until its collapse in 1991.

** FSB = The Federal Security Service of the Russian Federation (FSB) (Russian: Федеральная служба безопасности Российской Федерации (ФСБ); Federal'naya sluzhba bezopasnosti Rossiyskoy Federatsii) is the principal security agency of the Russian Federation and the main successor agency to the USSR's Committee of State Security (KGB).

Ace of Aces

Oberst Erich "Bubi" Hartmann
Deutsches Luftwaffe
(19 April 1922 – 20 September 1993)

In the late fall of 1993, I was sitting in my office with my NATO (primarily German) colleagues perusing Luftwaffe magazine, sort of the German equivalent of the American Air Force magazine. Not to brag or anything, but said magazine is written in German and back in those days I had a pretty good handle on speaking and reading German. It's amazing how much one's language skills atrophy over the years with lack of use. Aber ich schweife ab...

As I'm reading the latest issue of Luftwaffe I notice a small article indicating that the man in the photo above had died on the 20th of September. I mentioned to my German colleagues, "Hey, did you guys see that Erich Hartmann died?"

Three Teutonic blank looks followed by a "Who?"

Of course, you have to remember that World War II is something most Germans don't like to remember. Much evil was committed in the name of Germany. Spurred on by a "Bohemian corporal" who wasn't even German!

So in hindsight, I understand. After all, at said point in time, I had only been in Germany for slightly under two years. But at the time it seemed to me that a German airman not knowing who Erich Hartmann was was rather like an American airman not knowing who Eddie Rickenbacker was.

(As time passes, I realize that there are many Americans, including those wearing Air Force blue, who have no idea who Eddie Rickenbacker was. But again, I digress.)

For you see, Erich Hartmann was the top scoring ace of all time.

352 confirmed aerial victories.

352.

Confirmed.

Much was written in the post-war years about German victory claims being inflated. Later research showed that the Germans were extremely strict regarding victory claims. Whatever faults the Germans may have, impreciseness is not one of them!

From Wikipedia:

Erich Alfred Hartmann, nicknamed "Bubi" by his comrades and "The Black Devil" by his Soviet adversaries, was a German fighter pilot during World War II and is the most successful fighter ace in the history of aerial warfare. He flew 1,404 combat missions and participated in aerial combat on 825 separate occasions. He claimed, and was credited with, shooting down 352 Allied aircraft—the destruction of each termed an "aerial victory"—while serving with the Luftwaffe. During the course of his career, Hartmann was forced to crash-land his damaged fighter 14 times due to damage received from parts of enemy aircraft he had just shot down or mechanical failure. Hartmann was never shot down or forced to land due to enemy fire.

Hartmann, a pre-war glider pilot, joined the Luftwaffe in 1940 and completed his fighter pilot training in 1942. He was posted to Jagdgeschwader 52 (JG 52) on the Eastern front and was fortunate to be placed under the supervision of some of the Luftwaffe's most experienced fighter pilots. Under their guidance, Hartmann steadily developed his tactics, which earned him the coveted Ritterkreuz mit Eichenlaub, Schwertern und Brillanten (Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves, Swords and Diamonds) on 25 August 1944 for claiming 301 aerial victories. At the time of its presentation to Hartmann, this was Germany's highest military decoration.

Hartmann scored his 352nd and last aerial victory on 8 May 1945. Along with the remainder of JG 52, he surrendered to United States Army forces and were turned over to the Red Army. In an attempt to pressure him into service with the Soviet-friendly East German Volksarmee, he was convicted of false war crimes, a conviction posthumously voided by a Russian court as a malicious prosecution. Hartmann was sentenced to 25 years of hard labour and spent 10 years in various Soviet prison camps and gulags until he was released in 1955.

In 1956, Hartmann joined the newly established West German Luftwaffe in the Bundeswehr, and became the first Geschwaderkommodore of Jagdgeschwader 71 "Richthofen". Hartmann resigned early from the Bundeswehr in 1970, largely due to his opposition to the F-104 Starfighter deployment in the Luftwaffe and the resulting clashes with his superiors over this issue. In his later years, after his military career had ended, he became a civilian flight instructor. He died of natural causes on 20 September 1993.

Some have argued that since Hartmann's victories were all on the Eastern Front, that makes them less valid than kills scored on other fronts, against "Western" opponents. Notwithstanding that the two top scoring Allied aces were Russian (Ivan Kozhedub, 64 victories and Aleksandr Ivanovich Pokryshkin with 59 victories). The two top scoring "Western" aces were Dick Bong of the United States, 40 victories and Pat Pattle of South Africa (flying with the RAF) also with 40 victories. So the Russians were hardly "soft" or "easy" opponents. Then there's this -

On 21 May 1944, Hartmann engaged United States Army Air Forces aircraft for the first time. While flying "top cover" for another Schwarm, Hartmann attacked a flight of four P-51s over Bucharest, Romania, downing two, while the other two P-51s fell victim to his fellow pilots. On 1 June 1944, Hartmann shot down four P-51s in a single mission over the Ploieşti oil fields. Later that month, during his fifth combat with American pilots, he shot down two more P-51s before being forced to bail out, when eight other P-51s ran his Messerschmitt out of fuel. During the intense manoeuvring, Hartmann managed to line up one of the P-51s at close range, but heard only a "clank" when he fired, as he had run out of ammunition. While he was hanging in his parachute, the P-51s circled above him, and Hartmann wondered if they would take this opportunity to kill him. One of the P-51Bs flown by Lt. Robert J. Goebel of the 308th Squadron, 31st Fighter Group, broke away and headed straight for him. Goebel was making a camera pass to record the bailout and banked away from him only at the last moment, waving at Hartmann as he went by. - Wikipedia

I think that pretty much puts that argument to rest.

Hartmann was one of the best to ever fly in combat. His tally of victories marks him as perhaps the best to ever take to the air in a fighter plane.

Soviet LaGG-5 Falls to Hartmann's Karaya 1

Soviet Yak-9 Downed by Hartmann

Hartmann Post-War, Commanding JG-1 Richthofen

Note the paint scheme. The same "Black Tulip" design as used on Hartmann's Bf-109G Karaya 1

If you're ever in the McMinnville, Oregon area (about 40 miles southwest of Portland) the Evergreen Museum (which has a fine collection of aircraft, including Howard Hughes' Spruce Goose) has a Bf-109G painted in the "Black Tulip" design Hartmann favored.

Oberst Erich Hartmann, Ace of Aces

Yuck...

That was me, Monday night at around 2115 local.

Went to bed. Did not stay in bed.

Food poisoning sucks.

I'll spare you the gory details...

Snow

The view from my computer room.

There's something about the white stuff I enjoy.

You'd think the older I got, I'd start looking to maybe head south. Here's the way an old sergeant of mine put it.

"When I retire, I'm going to load up the car with everything I own, strap a snow shovel to the front grill and start driving south.

As soon as I hit a place where someone points at the shovel and asks - 'What's that?' - that's where I'm going to settle down."

That's just not me. I need the four seasons.

As long as I don't have to go out in it, I'm fine.

And it makes everything look so clean.

For a day or two.

Made in the USA

My son-in-law Big Time is a Super Hornet pilot. My daughter The WSO flies the back seat in the two-seat version of the Super Hornet.

At least back in the day we built our birds pretty tough. I have no doubt we still do.

Here's a tale from back in the day. Concerning that F/A-18D depicted above. It's over at the Smithsonian's Air & Space Magazine.

It's got Marines and fast jets. Good stuff. One might say, the right stuff.

Temos um novo membro!

The new folks are flocking to sign up here at Chant du Départ. (Okay, I know, I know, four is not a flock. Humor me.)

Our latest member, M D Roque (aka Ditos & Escritos) hails from Portugal, Lisboa to be precise. (That's Lisbon for all you Anglophones!) So we've gone all international we have.

Which is kinda cool. Where I live in Little Rhody is heavily Portuguese (though primarily from the Açores, so it's a bit different.) But still, kinda cool.

Bear in mind this information was derived from her very nice blog (here). Using the magic of Google Translate, it all becomes clear.

One sad note though, Ms Roque's latest post indicates she has very recently lost her cat, Sam.

Being a cat lover myself, I feel her pain.

Welcome aboard Ms Roque and accept out condolences for your loss.

Vamos sentir sua falta pouco Sam...

The Quasi-War

USS Constellation versus La Vengeance

The USS Constellation vs La Vengeance, or the Action of 1 February 1800, was a single-ship action fought between frigates of the French Navy and the United States Navy during the Quasi-War. The battle resulted in the American frigate USS Constellation severely damaging the French frigate La Vengeance and forcing her to flee. - Wikipedia

The Quasi-War (French: Quasi-guerre) was an undeclared war fought mostly at sea between the United States and the French Republic from 1798 to 1800. In the United States, the conflict was sometimes also referred to as the Undeclared War With France, the Pirate Wars and the Half-War.- Also Wikipedia

Very few people know that we fought a war with the French. After the French Revolution had settled down, the French government wanted the loans made to the United States during our own revolution repaid.

The U.S. government felt that those loans were owed to the French crown. A certain Louis XVI to be exact. He was no longer alive, having been executed by his no longer loyal subjects in 1793. So our view was "Sorry Pierre, we don't owe you anything." (Isn't fascinating to learn that our politicians were every bit as dishonorable back then as they are now?)

Of course, looking back at it, I feel we should have paid the French what we owed them for the help they provided us during our Revolution. Then again, we did come to the rescue (so to speak) in 1917 and again in 1944. So there is that.

But we should always remember, countries don't have friends, just interests. Lord Palmerston (1784 - 1865) who served as British Prime Minister twice said that. He was a politician. You know my feelings about politicians.

Oh well.

C'est la guerre!

As for me, I'll raise a glass for the crews of the Constellation and La Vengeance today. Men who did their duty so the politicians didn't have to. Seems to be the way it always is...