Sgt. Leigh Ann Hester fought her way through an enemy ambush south of Baghdad, killing three insurgents with her M-4 rifle to save fellow soldiers’ lives — and became the first woman since World War II to win the Silver Star medal for valor in combat.
The then-23-year-old from Bowling Green, Ky., won the award for skillfully leading her team of military police soldiers in a counterattack after about 50 insurgents ambushed a supply convoy they were guarding near Salman Pak.
The medal, rare for any soldier, underscores the growing role in combat of U.S. female troops in Iraq’s guerrilla war, where tens of thousands of American women have served.
To everyone bitching about Texas Roadhouse allowing that dog who was deployed twice, to eat a steak in the restaurant on Veterans Day, I’d rather sit next to him than rowdy, bratty kids all day long. I can guarantee that dog is cleaner and more quiet. He isn’t up being allowed to run around like he (and his parents) were raised in a barn!
Petmatchmaker Rescue South supports Texas Roadhouse, Veterans and all Military Working Dogs.
Beginning with the Browning Automatic Rifle (BAR), the squad automatic weapon is a vital platform that continues to evolve as it serves militaries worldwide.
The infantry Soldier’s lot is seldom a happy one. But, it is often full of quiet satisfaction at a hard job well done. Those who command the foot Soldier understand there must be a sensible organization and reliable tools with which to work. In the early 20th century, the organization of the infantry shifted heavily to use of the squad. The squad is a group from nine to as many as 14 men. A junior NCO—corporal or sergeant—commands the infantry squad. There are generally three of them in a platoon, which is commanded by a lieutenant. Since most of our data comes from experience with American infantry, that is what I have described. And while other armies might do things a little differently, there are some parallels in the types of armament employed.
In the early part of that century, the machine gun was all the rage. Various makes and models evolved almost simultaneously from heavy, crew-served guns that initially were used almost as artillery, to lighter guns a single man could carry. A full-automatic gun of that size and weight would have a powerful appeal if included in the infantry squad. In the World War I era and the following decade, virtually every army in the world was set up like this.
As if by mutual agreement, the guns used had similar features. For one thing, they almost always fired the same ammunition as that nation’s service rifle. Further, that ammo was fed into firing position from a sheet-metal box magazine. There were a few models that fed from metal strips. Some models had a semi-automatic trigger system, but all had a full-auto mode. All weighed about 20 pounds empty, while the heaviest ran to 25 pounds. Part of that weight came from a bipod, and all were meant to be fired from a buttstock in the prone position. Tactics involved in deploying the squad auto varied, but everyone prized the stable, full-auto accuracy—enough to give the gunner an ammo bearer. Over time, the squad auto became a specialized form of light machine gun.
Tactics involved in deploying the squad auto varied, but everyone prized the stable, full-auto accuracy—enough to give the gunner an ammo bearer. Over time, the squad auto became a specialized form of light machine gun.
The thousands of French and British soldiers who went to war in 1914 used a variety of automatic rifles with mixed results. When American troops entered the conflict in 1917, the French High Command insisted that the Yanks surrender their early Browning Automatic Rifles (BARs) for the notoriously unreliable French Chauchat machine gun. One of the first problems addressed when the French set about modernizing a post-World War I army was its squad auto. This time, that country’s armories came up with a fine product, and one that lasted for decades.
The gun was the Châtellerault Fusil-mitrailleur (FM) Mmlle 24/29, a 25-pound brute chambered for the French 7.5 mm cartridge. This round was developed in the 1920s, but closely resembles the 7.62 NATO, developed in the 1950s. The FM 24/29 had two triggers, one for semi- and one for full-auto mode. A series of bolt and automatic rifles used the same round. That beefy squad auto—the FM 24/29—served French infantry units through World War II, Korea and two protracted colonial wars in French Indo-china and Algeria. It was a heavy, but reliable gun that solidly anchored the French squad for decades. Some authorities have noted resemblances to the BAR.
British infantry went through a similar series of steps to develop a proper squad auto, and in the end, just bought one. The Bren gun was designed and initially manufactured in Brno, Czechoslovakia. British ordnance looked at everything available and chose this venerable warrior, building their versions at the Enfield arsenal, hence the Bren name (Brno, Enfield).Like the French 24/29, the Bren uses magazines loaded into the top of the receiver, which might seem odd to American eyes, but makes shooting prone easier. Bren gunners learned to load their magazines with great care in order to make the rimmed .303 cartridges feed properly.
And then we have the legendary BAR, a gun first used in the last year of the First World War. Compared to the Bren and FM 24/29, the magazine on the bottom reloads quicker—just
tap the magazine catch in the front of the trigger guard and the magazine falls free. The “B” in BAR stands for Browning and yes, that is legendary John Moses Browning. The gun came from the same brain as several other machine guns, as well as a couple different pistols and even some shotguns you might have heard of.
American infantrymen have long since dropped the BAR and replaced it with the M14, a fine rifle that turned out to be a poor squad auto. When the M16/M4 and the 5.56 mm NATO cartridge were adopted, the situation was again confused. Just recently, the military procured yet another squad weapon from SIG Sauer to replace the venerable M249 SAW.
Once again, we’ve got a new batch of fightin’ iron.
August 24, 1940, was a Saturday. The Battle of Britain had been roaring in the skies over England for six long weeks. On this particular day a young Luftwaffe fighter pilot named Hans Joachim-Marseille found himself on his first combat sortie over the hostile island.
The author found being this close to Hans Joachim-Marseille’s Bf 109 E was an incredible experience. The plane looks factory new.
Joachim-Marseille was 21 years old, little more than a souped-up child. Of French Huguenot ancestry, the boy was the product of a difficult upbringing and a broken home. Influenza had nearly killed him when he was young. Joachim-Marseille went by Jochen to his friends.
Jochen completed fighter pilot school in Vienna in November of 1939. His instructors consistently rated him as a superlative natural pilot, but his social life threatened to put an end to his flying career before it got started. In retrospect, young Jochen was likely trying to fill some kind of void with women and alcohol. There were times he missed missions because of his excessive social pursuits the night before.
The Messerschmitt Bf 109 served the German Luftwaffe from the opening stages of World War II through the bitter end. It formally ended its military service in 1965. Photo: Bundesarchiv
Fighter aircraft at the beginning of World War II were terrifyingly dangerous machines. They were immensely powerful, but aviation technology had been advancing at a breakneck pace. Most everything about combat aircraft of this era was still essentially experimental. As a result, young men strapped into these heavily-armed planes ready to meet death.
Fighter tactics were and are learned skills. German pilots fought in pairs called Rotte. Two pairs operated as a four-plane unit called a Schwarm. The lead pilot of the Rotte was responsible for everything out front. His wingman continuously cleared the rear to avoid an airborne ambush. It was beaten into combat pilots that you should never leave your wingman. As soon as young Jochen spotted his first British fighter plane, however, he broke formation and dove in the attack.
The Bf 109 G was, in the author’s opinion, arguably the prettiest combat aircraft of the war. The Germans had undeniable moral failings, but their airplane paint schemes were epic. Photo: USAF Museum
Joachim-Marseille had drawn Bf 109 E tail number 3579 for the mission that day. The “Emil” as it was called by its crews represented the state-of-the-art in fighter aircraft at the time. Jochen firewalled the throttle, totally fixated on his target.
The enemy plane was a Supermarine Spitfire. This particular example was flown by an experienced British pilot who was none too keen on falling to German guns. What began as a diving ambush evolved into a free-wheeling aerial melee wherein both pilots fought for their very lives.
The understated elegance of World War II fighter planes cannot be denied. Photo: USAF Museum
The battle lasted a mere four minutes, but four minutes is an eternity in aerial combat. With the nimble Spit vying for position on his tail, Joachim-Marseille pulled a tight chandelle wherein he described his minimal turning radius while climbing. This was a difficult maneuver in combat.
Successful air combat is all about energy management, and a chandelle left the plane relatively slow and disadvantaged. In this case, however, Joachim-Marseille ended his turn at a greater altitude. He momentarily centered the British fighter in his REVI gunsight and squeezed the trigger.
His plane carried a pair of 20mm MG FF cannon in the wings along with a brace of rifle-caliber MG-17 machine guns in the engine cowling. He also carried a third 20mm firing through the propellor hub. The combined firepower of these five guns chewed into the hapless Spitfire. Jochen connected with the Spit’s Merlin engine, and the stricken plane rolled inverted before plunging into the English Channel.
Joachim-Marseille was then bounced by a gaggle of Spitfires bent on revenge. He dove his nimble Messerschmitt down to wavetop level and made a beeline for Calais and home. Once on the ground he was severely castigated. Though he had been successful, his lack of discipline in the air put his mates in jeopardy.
The Rest of the Story
Hans Joachim-Marseille’s patterns of misconduct eventually landed him a posting to North Africa where his Bohemian proclivities might be better muted. While there, he found his stride, ultimately shooting down 158 Allied planes. All but seven of these were scored against the British Desert Air Force. No other Luftwaffe pilot claimed as many Western aircraft downed. All of his combat flying was in Bf 109s.
This plane was flown by famed Luftwaffe ace Hans Joachim-Marseille on his first combat sortie.
During the course of three sorties in a single day in September of 1942, Joachim-Marseille managed to down seventeen enemy aircraft. He was eventually awarded the Knight’s Cross with Oak Leaves, Swords, and Diamonds. Joachim-Marseille was arguably the first of the Experten, the cream of the Luftwaffe fighter arm that was to be the scourge of the skies over Europe and North Africa. Thanks in no small part to Joseph Goebbels’ propaganda machine, he became known as Der Stern von Afrika or “The Star of Africa” as a result.
On September 30, 1942, Joachim-Marseille was flying a brand-new Bf 109 G-2 on a Stuka escort mission. His flight encountered no enemy aircraft, but Jochen’s engine began smoking on the return flight. His wingmen guided him back to friendly lines so that he could bail out of the stricken plane.
Although damaged in combat at least three times and abandoned for half a century in a Russian swamp, Hans Joachim-Marseille’s Bf 109 looks simply spectacular today.
Jochen rolled his Messerschmitt inverted per protocol and jettisoned his canopy. However, the smoke apparently disoriented him such that he let the plane enter a steep dive. He eventually cleared the aircraft at around 400 mph and struck the vertical stabilizer on exit. The blow either killed him outright or rendered him unconscious and unable to activate his parachute. Hans Joachim-Marseille was 22 at the time of his death.
The Plane
The German Bf 109 Messerschmitt was the most-produced combat aircraft in history. Nearly 34,000 of them were built between 1937 and 1945. The last Bf 109 variants were not retired from combat duty with the Spanish Air Force until 1965.
The G-model Bf 109 shown here was known as the “Hunchback” because of the bulbous covers for the twin 13mm guns mounted in the engine cowling. Photo: Bundesarchiv
The Bf 109 incorporated a variety of radically advanced features. The inverted-V Daimler-Benz engine was fuel injected, which rendered the plane immune to negative-G flight conditions. By contrast, the Merlins on opposing Spitfires were carbureted and would therefore lose power in the negative-G flight state. The Messerschmitt also had leading edge slats in the wings that deployed automatically due to gravity and enhanced the nimble plane’s turning radius.
The landing gear mounted to the fuselage. This kept the wings thin and slippery. It also made the wings easier to remove for servicing at the expense of an unusually narrow ground track. An inordinate number of Bf 109s were lost to ground handling accidents as a result.
The narrow-track landing gear on the Bf 109 was one of the plane’s enduring weaknesses. A staggering number of planes were ground looped and lost to taxiing accidents.
The Bf 109 advanced through a wide variety of upgrades that increased performance and enhanced armament. Despite its relatively advanced age, the late-war Bf 109K still had a rate of climb superior to that of the American P-51D as well as the British Spitfire Mk XIV and the Hawker Tempest. A total of 25 Czech-built Bf 109s served with the fledgling Israeli Air Force during their War of Independence in 1948.
Hans Joachim-Marseille’s Particular Ride
The Bf 109E Werknummer 3579 that Joachim-Marseille flew on his first combat mission was later damaged in combat with Jochen in the pilot’s seat and bellied in at Calais-Marck. After subsequent recovery and rebuild in Antwerp, the plane was issued to JG77 operating out of Alakutii, Russia. The plane was once more damaged in combat and rebuilt again, this time in Norway, before being returned to the Russian Front.
The Messerschmitt Bf 109 was a sleek and deadly war machine. The author is shown here with a Messerschmitt Bf 109 G.
In August of 1942 with LT Kurt Hammel at the controls, 3579 was forced down near the FLOT (Forward Line of Troops) where it was abandoned. The wreckage was recovered in the Summer of 1992 by the Russian Aircraft Recovery Group and moved to Moscow. It was then purchased by an American company and rebuilt into flying condition. In 2014 the plane was sold and moved to its current location at Biggin Hill Aerodrome outside London.
This priceless aircraft with its extraordinary connection to one of the Luftwaffe’s greatest fighter pilots is awe-inspiring up close. The plane looks like it just rolled out of the factory and is frankly a thing of extraordinary beauty. Special thanks to www.flyaspitfire.com for the priceless opportunity to study it up close.
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