Fórum Brigadeiro Nero Moura

36_Killer-Ants wrote:S!

Coréia "Democrática" do Sul.


K-A

I can confirm the data posted by KillerAnts (by the way, I remember with pleasure my meeting with Gen. Rui Moreira Lima here in Italy and the exchanges of correspondence with him...).

There never were Me 262s operating in or from Italy, the only "jets" which were reported were always the only three Ar 234s of "Kommando Sommer" (this was the official name of the unit) operating from Campoformido (Udine) and using Lonate Pozzolo (Varese) as a secondary base.

For your use, I am reporting here two large extracts from page 151-152 and page 167-168 of my former book "Air War Italy 1944-45" (written with N. Beale and G. Valentini), dealing with the whereabouts of the unit before and during the start of its operations in Italy in February and March 1945 (more details on operations are the book itself):

"...In February 1945 the first Luftwaffe jet aircraft was deployed to Italy; it was an Ar 234 of the Versuchsverband Ob. d. L. and was based at Osoppo. How it came to be there is a complicated story with several aspects still unresolved or open to dispute. We believe however that the evidence we have amassed is incontestable on these main points.

The tale could be said to have begun in late 1944 with von Pohl's calls jet fighters and reconnaissance planes, continuing through many false alarms among the Allies and culminating in a confusing postwar reference1 that:

the few German jet aircraft at Udine had done well against isolated Allied four-engined bombers returning from long-distance flights... [although] strictly a reconnaissance unit... we admitted the occasional loss of stragglers to their attacks.

Reliable information really begins on 24 January with OKL's agreement to allocate a small Ar 234 reconnaissance unit, followed by orders issued by Luftwaffenkommando West at 2100 on 1 February. Oblt. Erich Sommer's Kommando Hecht ("Detachment Pike") was disbanded and its Ar 234s were to be handed to 1.(F)/100, then at Biblis near Worms. Hecht's air and ground personnel were to be renamed Kommando Sommer and transfer to Italy. An incomplete ULTRA intercept on the 4th suggested that the unit would be going to Osoppo and this is confirmed by an entry in G.d.A. 's KTB the same day, that the movement was taking place by rail.

A Luftwaffe disposition map for 9 February has a note against Osoppo that Kdo. Sommer is being brought up but there was obviously some hold-up because the next information on the move comes a week later when both ULTRA and G.d.A. reported that Kdo. Sommer had suffered heavy material losses when its train was attacked by fighter-bombers near Worms on the 14th. What could be salvaged was being collected in the Biblis barracks. Two days later it was decided that Sommer's depleted Kommando would be reincorporated into the Versuchsverband, remaining at Biblis while its leader took the gear and personnel (but not the aircraft) of Kdo. Götz to Italy. Hptm. Horst Götz himself was posted soon after to command 1.(F)/123 on the Western Front.

On the 19th - the same day that Kdo. Götz confirmed that it had handed over to 1.(F)/123 - Sommer was asked how far the stocking-up for his new unit had progressed. Next day came the somewhat negative ULTRA intelligence that an advance detachment, headed by a "pilot of Kommando Sperling in January" had not arrived at Osoppo; no runway was available and the length of the landing area was unknown but Tornado D/F was available. However, five men, including one of Kdo. Hecht, had arrived. The landing area at Udine was 1,600 m long but it was not known if preparations for Ar 234 operations had been made.

On the 21st Kdo. Götz's ground echelon began its train journey2 from Münster-Handorf to Italy and a new plan was issued: Sommer, after handing over his aircraft, was to return to Kaltenkirchen (where the parent Versuchsverband had moved from Oranienburg) and Oblt. Muffey (Sperling 's Technical Officer) was to go to Osoppo as the officer commanding "Detachment South." In fact Muffey didn't go and Sommer stayed on the Western Front a while longer, making operational flights on the 23rd and 24th.

On the 23rd, Cap. Bellagambi of II° Gr.C. wrote in his diary, "a 'Turbin-Jäger' [jet fighter] has come to Osoppo." Subsequent questioning of Italian eyewitnesses, confirmed by reference to photographs and recollection that the aircraft took off assisted by "two canisters hung under the wings" - i.e. Walter RATO units - identifies this as an Ar 234. These witnesses were able to point to the hangar the aircraft was kept in, the concrete foundations of which still exist.

Bellagambi may have had the wrong date: Kdo. Götz reported to G.d.A. that its first Ar 234 had arrived in Osoppo on the 24th, although the day's disposition map still marks the unit "in transit." An OKL status report of the 26th has one Ar 234 of Kdo. Götz in Osoppo and two more ready to start from Oranienburg as soon as the weather and air situation permitted.

MATAF summed up for the month:-

...photo reconnaissance revealed what may possibly have been a jet... at Udine, and a ground report has mentioned Osoppo as the site of preparations to receive special aircraft from Germany. It is considered unlikely that even a small detachment of jet-propelled reconnaissance aircraft will become operational during March."

March 1945

"...Luftwaffe jet aircraft became fully operational in Italy during March. On the 1st the Komm.Gen. strength return showed one Ar 234 of (as the British translated it) "Special Staff Götz" on hand, although unserviceable, and 382 cbm of J2 available for it. We take it that this was still the same Arado that had flown into Osoppo on 24 February and all our evidence leads us to guess that it must have departed during the early part of March. We have not been able to establish the exact date but the 4 cbm drop in stocks of jet fuel between the 1st and the 11th would have fuelled an Arado with a little to spare.

We are on much firmer ground regarding the arrival of a permanent jet reconnaissance presence in the theatre. Erich Sommer's recollects receiving fresh orders to establish a Kommando in Italy on 28 February. Equipment to replace that lost in the train-strafing had arrived from Kdo. Sperling, in the charge of Oblt. Mänhard. During a visit to Oranienburg on 10 March, Sommer had taken the precaution of equipping his aircraft with a Magirusbombe centreline pack, containing two MG 151/20 cannon, acquired from the stocks of the Versuchsverband 's experimental Ar 234 nightfighter flight. Next day he reported to Gen. Barsewisch at Würzburg and had his plane's gunsight calibrated on the 12th. By this time Oblt. Loah had left for Italy in charge of the new Kommando's ground personnel and his intended posting as Staffelkapitän of 1.(F)/33 never took effect, indeed Sommer only learned of it some 44 years later!

Sommer flew from Biblis via Lechfeld to Campoformido on 14 March and found his other two pilots there, they having come down from Oranienburg by way of Riem, which was both the base of the Ar 234 unit 1.(F)/100 and out-station of Luftwaffe Italien. Probably these two Arados were the ones referred to in the G.d.A.'s 26 February note as being in readiness at Oranienburg. The pilots and aircraft of new detachment were:

Oberleutnant Erich Sommer W.Nr.140344 T9+EH

Leutnant Günther Gniesmer W.Nr.140142 T9+DH

Stabsfeldwebel Walter Arnold T9+FH

The Kommando's arrival had been well prepared for - carefully camouflaged dispersal areas and blast shelters had been constructed at Campoformido and Lonate; alternate landing grounds were apparently made ready at at Bergamo, Ghedi and Villafranca, although it is doubtful that these were ever used and Sommer himself says that there was J2 only at home base, Lonate and Osoppo. Specially trained ground crews were on hand to tend the jets. Berlin noted that the Kommando was present and at full strength on the 17th.

Close attention was also paid to security procedures: the unit's sorties were regulated by the Jafü organisation and if their base was threatened while they were aloft the Arados would be diverted to land elsewhere. Once on the ground (at Lonate, if not Campoformido), in addition to the usual camouflage netting, the nacelles were fitted with dummy wooden propellers in an attempt to delude Allied reconnaissance. Furthermore, Sommer ordered that wherever one of his planes landed, Flying Control should erase both times and aircraft markings from its logbook. This distrust extended extended to the loyalties of the civilian population adjoining the dispersal areas and to the security of the telephone system (e.g. an Ar 234 take off was to notified simply as "986").

The first few days were also spent establishing liaison with Jafü staff and radio interception units in the Tagliamento Valley. There was much scavenging and/or improvising of all manner of necessary supplies; Kommando Sommer had no photo-processing facilities of its own and was dependent on NAGr.11's, for example. Personnel were quartered in Ceresetto (UD), about 3 miles north of the airfield, although a document of 20 March refers to "Kommando Gîtz... Torreano, NW Udine."

Hope this is of some help.

All the best,

Ferdinando D'Amico