Buck telling his crew member "You son of a bitch, you are going to sit here and take it" was a real comment he made.

@patrickcannady2066

5 ай бұрын

It revealed the fighting spirit of the 8th AAF Bomber Command in a significant way: losses will not deter us, only make us more determined.

@glennrobertbantug8553

5 ай бұрын

Such a well delivered line by Austin Butler. Didn’t realize this was a real thing Buck said. Thanks for sharing

@TheIvanMilky

5 ай бұрын

Spot on, I've seen a lot of people criticise Butler for "over acting" this part but for anyone who's read the history knows this was perfect!!

@JonNo86

5 ай бұрын

The real Buck Cleven told the author of the book in an interview that he will never forget the smell of a B-17 after a mission. He said "it was a combination of burning oil, cordite, piss, and shit."

@patrickcannady2066

4 ай бұрын

@@JonNo86 must have been awful

The United States were pumping out 16 brand new B-17’s everyday at the height of their productions out of their Seattle factory. Majority of them were built by the women were back home in the factories because the men were fighting the war. (Bless those hard working women)

@jakesanchez7235

5 ай бұрын

@@darrel7589 “fighting” is under being deployed out the country. Yes you’re right most men didn’t do combat, but there’s still people who need to get all the equipment to our allies, and other places so it would require those men to be away from country. So they were “fighting the war.”

@TailspinMedia

5 ай бұрын

holy shit! 16 a day is wild.

@longago-igo

5 ай бұрын

Jonathan Demme’s Swing Shift (1984) with Goldie Hawk, Christine Lahti, Holly Hunter, Fred Ward, Ed Harris and Kurt Russell deals with women working in an aircraft plant during WWII.

@kirktravis5780

5 ай бұрын

37 percent of all aviation factory workers were women. Mostly riveters. Not knocking, they worked there butts off. Just like facts.

@ericcombs4017

5 ай бұрын

Brute Force, and yep, that's a book

My father , Albert Davis, flew this mission on the Piccadilly Lily of the 351SQ/100BG. He was a waist gunner. His diary entry from this day , AUG17, '43, is sobering and gut wrenching. he describes the battle scenes as they are being shredded by 150+ German fighters and he watched planes explode in air , or lose a wing and spiral to the ground . he counts the chutes he sees and the men who simply fall through his formation corner that don't chute out. The 100th was in the ' Purple Heart Corner' o this mission, which is why they had heavy losses ( 9 out of 21 planes that left Thorpe Abbotts ). His after mission listing of all the buddies who did not make it to N. Africa is chilling. These were guys he just had a pint with at the local pub days before.

FYI, it wasn't the largest bombing force/air armada assembled by mankind. This raid had 347 bombers from the 8th on it but in the previous year the RAF had launched a strike on Cologne with 1047 bombers. The RAF had already directed multiple bomber strikes on Germany with significantly more bombers than the 8th could deploy in 1943. It took a long time before the 8th could catch up with RAF bomber command when it came to bombers on target!

@lyndoncmp5751

4 ай бұрын

Shhhh the programme says the 8th were going to bring the war to Hitler's doorstep...... ignoring that the RAF were already doing that.

Life was dangerous even off duty. My father served 35 missions with the 8th Air Force with a bomber group as a gunner. He went on leave to London one day. While on an overcrowded passenger train, they got stuck waiting. Suddenly they heard the distinctive sound of a German V1 overhead, think an early form of cruise missile. Suddenly there was silence and the train passengers immediately started screaming. The silence meant the V1 was dropping down with a ton of high explosives that could and did destroy an entire city block. There was no way for anyone to get off the train and get far enough away to survive. The V1 landed about half a mile away, leaving the train untouched. I asked my father how he felt in those moments and he said there was nothing you could do, you just resigned yourself to whatever happened. I think that was the kind of attitude you had to adopt as part of the bomber crews at the time. On a side note, my father returned to the US well before the war ended. His bomber group continued to serve to the end of the war. I saw a collection of films gathered by the bomb group for their veterans group. Among the footage shown was how several different bomb groups were collected together to take a ship home several months after the European war ended. I was shocked to see a drawn and very grim looking Jimmy Stewart among the passengers. His first film back from the war was, "It's A Wonderful Life" where he was clearly showing the PTSD he was suffering through as a result of his bomber group service. There were no escort fighters at this time. The existing fighters didn't have the fuel to escort the bombers to the far targets they were hitting in Germany. It was only the introduction of fuel drop tanks and especially P51 fighters with drop tanks that later enabled long range escorted missions.

@fredfredburger5150

5 ай бұрын

IIRC Jimmy Stewart dropped bombs on the wrong location by accident killing thousands of innocent people. The experience haunted him for the rest of his life.

@terrym3837

5 ай бұрын

My mum was in london during the war,and she saw many V1s one she remembers vividly was in Camden Town North London,,she was with her mum they were getting rations,when they heard the drone of the doodlebug instinctively they looked up when the engine stopped everyone just ran and tried to find a place to hide but has she said it was pot luck where you hid.Within seconds she heard the explosion which was no more then 150 yards away the damage was immense they could feel the force of the blast she never said what casualties there might have been,but she said the V2s were worse because you never heard them until they exploded.

@ryanhampson673

4 ай бұрын

I’m American but my grandparents on my dads side were British. I remember growing up to stories of the Blitz. My grandmother said you would go down into the bomb shelter at night and when you came up in the morning entire city blocks were just rubble. Kids would walk around holding sticks and lengths of wood holding them like rifles. Recon pictures from the air taken by the German aircraft it would look like soldiers patrolling giving the illusion there were many more soldiers on the ground than they actually had. My grandfather fought in the Royal armored core in tanks throughout North Africa, Sicily and Italy.

My late father in law was a co pilot in the 392nd Bomb Group 578th squadron. He flew B-24s, not B-17s. Was in active service from July-October 1944. He completed 12 missions and was shot down by flak on his 13th mission. He bailed out safely and was a POW until liberated by the Soviets in May 1945.

Worse thing about Curt’s death is that in real life it was much worse. From the notes we have those who saw his plane noted 6 parachutes jumping out, however due to autocannon shells heavily damaging the oxygen system in the plane, it ruptured in a major fire consuming the cockpit. All those on the plane beside saw was curt and several other consumed in a fiery gulf and curt trying to escape though one of the windows of his plane before it went down.

RIP Lt. Riddick. I really liked him. The real guy was originally from Wisconsin and then California. The target was a BF-109 messerchmitt factory. They hit it and also unknowingly hit an ME-262 Development factory. The 262 was the world's first combat jet. The other bombers were not too effective hitting the Ball bearing plant. This was the mission that started the saying that the 100th group was the hard luck group, I think.

@edm240b9

5 ай бұрын

Do you mean Barry Keoghan character? Because his last name is actually Biddick.

@TheApilas

5 ай бұрын

Schweinfurt was the ballbearing factory and Regensburg the Messerschmitt factory. The ballbearing factory was destroyed but the Germans had enough ball-bearings in storage so the destroyed factory didn't matter, already onee month later Germany's total production of ballbearing was higher than before the raid.

@jimmers123

5 ай бұрын

@@TheApilas it was eventually destroyed, this raid only slowed down production for about half a month, and they actually increase production when they repaired the factory. It took more missions later on that were even bloodier to put it out

@zachm2331

5 ай бұрын

*Biddick

@benschultz1784

5 ай бұрын

The problem was that by this point in the war, Albert Speer, the German finance and logistics minister, had ordered weapons production to be distributed out to smaller facilities. So, instead of one factory making all the parts for planes, tanks, etc., smaller cottage industries would produce a single part that would then be assembled at the dedicated plant.

Buck got that stare at the end, well done Austin Butler

From this episode and onwards it will be heavier.. in this episode they showed the first Schweinfurt and Regensburg mission where they faced over 350 enemy enemy fighters without own aircover, the 100th was chewed up badly but so where the two bomber squadrons heading for the other target, they were attacked after the enemy fighters had reloaded and refuelled.

@tim6570

5 ай бұрын

Black Thursday will be coming up soon

@stevedavis9466

5 ай бұрын

@@tim6570 yup, and it was more brutal. My father flew on the Regensburg raid on the Piccadilly Lily of the 351stSQ/100th BG. His diary entry from AUG17. '43 is heart wrenching in describing what he saw in battle and well and when he lists the names of buddies who did not make it to N. Africa. .

Most war movies focus on small-unit infantry action, but millions fought as air crews, Navy sailors, submariners, artillerymen, tank crews, scouts, special forces units, underwater frogmen, combat engineers, demolitions teams, minesweepers, flak gunners, merchant marines, signalmen, with very different experiences. Great to see a show covering this.

@charlesderosas5577

4 ай бұрын

I get HBO said this was too expensive to fund but I think Netflix would've been a perfect market unless it's still too pricey.

Shows like this help put life in perspective. Here I am too tired to get up early and go for a 30 minute walk each day, and these boys literally sacrificed their lives for our freedom. Inspiring to say the least, and a kick in the ass to strive harder.

I've seen about all the B17 footage available, commercial and documentary. So far, this is an amazing show. I'm still warming up to the back story, but the flying and combat footage is pretty compelling given that there's only 5-6 B17s still in operation around the globe

@geekstradamus1548

5 ай бұрын

Amazingly, they didn’t fly even one for this show. They couldn’t risk losing one, let alone the danger to the crew. For the scenes in the ground, Spielberg had three built from scratch. Two are standard size, perfect recreations, and one of those has enough engine power to roll under its own power. The third has a slightly larger body so that the best camera equipment could fit along with the actors and cameraman.

If this was a Hollywood production, Babyface would’ve been saved from the turret last second like I expected but I’m glad they kept it gritty

@Schizm1

4 ай бұрын

It is a hollywood production...

The Schweinfurt-Regensburg (Aug 1943) was the infamous raid in this episode, it was as bad as it got for the 8th Airforce and 100th Bombardment Group. The 8th Airforce sent over nearly 400 bombers and lost about 60 with another around 20 wrecked (about 20% of the force) and a total of more than 600 aircrew killed, missing (mostly POWs) or wounded in action. The 100th suffered the worst losing 9 aircraft of the 21 flown out on the mission. This raid absolutely demonstrated that unescorted daylight raids deep into Germany were simply unfeasibly deadly. However, the RAF night raids were also extremely bloody and dangerous (if not as disastrous as Schweinfurt). For comparison the terrible Nuremberg Raid, 30/31 March 1944 was likely the RAF's worst. British Bomber Command sent nearly 800 aircraft on a night raid to Nuremberg. They lost just under 100 aircraft shot down, around 10 more wrecked - over 11% of the force sent. Total aircrew missing at over 700. Also, take a moment and consider the truly extraordinary risk the local Resistance groups took in aiding aircrew evaders (in this episode from Flanders - Belgium, but all across occupied Europe). It looks like the series will include some focus on this and the incredibly dangerous occupied Europe escape trails - that history is ridiculously under-recorded.

@peterireland4344

5 ай бұрын

.......then they went back and did it again 2 months later, with similar results.

@newsieboys1171

5 ай бұрын

The Luftwaffe vastly improved its night defenses by 1944. It got to a point where the RAF started to take as many losses as the unescorted daylight USAAF raids. Which decreased thanks to the introduction of the P-51D and a major change in tactics with the 8th under Jimmy Doolittle. Fighters were to sweep ahead of the bombers attacking air bases & flak emplacement.

This series is amazing

Yeah....so historically this was the turning point, and not a good one. Hopefully it will still show missions in the air for the most part and touch on the ground stuff and it looks like that's what is going to happen. For the friendly fighters, at the time of this mission in 43, they couldn't stay with the bombers very long and the Luftwaffe's strategy was to wait until their escort was gone, then strike. But now you see the point of view from the air, so think of it this way, before Band of Brothers could happen, the guys in the sky were paving the way for them. Before the invasion of Normandy, the 8th had been fighting in enemy territory for 2 years. Buckle up, it's not gonna get better. But you will see surprises, if this show sticks to the historical facts.

My grandpa was B-17 pilot and was shot down over France. He fought foot for awhile then back to it.

Just FYI: the 100th left N. Africa on AUG24 and did a raid on Boudeaux , FR on the way back to Thorpe Abbotts. My father's diary records them getting some R/R in N. Africa. Going swimming and hanging out for a few days.

Hey! I just discovered your channel a couple of days ago, I've been binging on your reactions. Honestly, this is the greatest reaction channel I've ever watched, (I've watched a lot). I love how you spend TONS of time after the show analyzing and discussing. I miss going to the movies with friends and going and getting something to eat and drink afterwards and discussing. You guys do it brilliantly. So much insight, different perspectives, it's like rediscovering movies all over again. I cannot give you enough praise. THANK YOU!!!! 💜💜💜

It wasnt the largest air armada assembled at all. especially not at that point. the RAF had done multiple 1000 bomber raids at that point and the USA had already done a 500 plane one

@matthewgreenfield360

5 ай бұрын

That "largest air armada in mankind" comment in the briefing amused me too. The RAF's first thousand bomber raid (Cologne) featured 292 Lancasters, Halifaxes and Stirlings (all four-engined heavy bombers). The medium bombers (mainly Wellingtons) which comprised the rest of this force could actually carry an identical bomb load (4,500lb total) to B-17s when operating against long-rang targets. And this happened in May 1942, over a year before the events in this episode took place!

@jameswg13

5 ай бұрын

@@matthewgreenfield360 exactly that

Amazing series so far. Ive been waiting for this for years! My mothers Uncle was a Ball Turret Gunner (under the belly of the bomber) in the 381st bomb group 532nd Squad. My mothers uncle went in on a bombing raid March 24th 1944 into Germany and became a POW that day due to having 2 of the 4 engines were knocked out and some of the nose damaged. This damage kept them from keeping up with the rest of the Bombers heading back over to England. So while my mothers uncles B17 pulled out of formation the pilots kept control of the Bombers and limped it across Germany then through France ( which was still being held by the Germans ) but could no longer fly anymore due to the damage sustained. They nursed the bomber as far they could hoping they can get across the channel and back to England ( which some B17’s that were heavily damaged did make it across) but to no avail on this day . So they had to crash land in the French countryside , the French resistance got their before the German Patrols and quickly rounded up whom they could , 4 of the 10 man crew escaped with them and hid for months , the other 5 were captured eventually including my mothers uncle. He spent the rest of the war in Stalag Luft 1 POW CAMP. You also need to realize that the German Fighters had 20 or 30 MM rounds being shot at those bombers , where as we were only shooting back at them with 50 caliber rounds , if the bombers got hit with those 20 mill rounds it would go through like a hot knife through butter. God bless these young men who fought and died for this country

Of the different bombers used in WWII the B-25 Mitchell was probably one of the toughest. There was one that completed 300 missions, belly-landed 6 times and all the holes made by flak were patched up and painted with bright yellow zinc primer, all 400 of them by the end of its service. It was so warped out of shape toward the end that in order to fly straight the pilots had to trim its ailerons & rudders so out of whack that it looked like it was flying sideways.

@BryanPAllen

5 ай бұрын

Very interesting. I’ll have to research the name of that one.

My Father was drafted in 1942, after boot camp he was assigned to the 106 infantry division. While that may seem trivial, look up what happened to that division during the Battle of the Bulge. 2 of it's 3 regiments were destroyed by the initial onslaught. My Dad was in one of those regiments. He wasn't there when that battle took place because, he was going to the university of Michigan when he was drafted, and due to the high losses sustained by the 8th air force, he was sent to train as a bombardier. When his training was almost over, he was reassigned to the 87th infantry division as part of Patton's 3rd army' as a replacement for the losses on D-Day as he also was trained as a machine gunner. He made it through the war, but he told me that if he fly in the 8th air force, he probably would have been KIA .

In reality, Lt. Curtis Biddick (played by Barry Keoghan) and three others sadly died when an oxygen fire broke out on the ship because of nose damage done to the plane. This trapped them on the plane as it started to go down.

I volunteered at a WW2 Aviation Museum handling documents and artifacts from throughout the war. The United States invested the most in Pilot and Crew recovery. Each plane has inflatable life rafts, emergency food rations and a radio distress beacon that was hand cranked. Also the amount of convoys, Destroyers, Patrol Boats, PbY Sea planes, war Weary aircraft (aircraft that are serviceable but not fit for combat). The likely hood of being picked up is really high. Also you may notice that there are no American escorting fighters in these scenes. It was a combination of factors Americans really failed at effective fighter escorts in the early part of bombing. Ranging from lack of range, the fighter relay system has not been created and the number one reason was we had this belief that these bombers can fly high and fast and are so well armed that they didn't need fighter protection. This was a mistake the British and French had in 1940. So when we came in we said your doing it wrong and we tried doing unescorted missions and suffered heavily for it.

Great Episode. The airman stuck in ball turret got me. The only service with higher causality ratio were U-Boats.

@brianwilson9206

5 ай бұрын

Actually the British bombers were 2nd behind the U-boat force.

@iluvyummywaffles

5 ай бұрын

@@brianwilson9206 I was referring to all the Allied Air Bombers. They all paid a hefty price.

@jimandaud

5 ай бұрын

the service with the highest casualty rate was the merchant marine with over 50 percent casualties. And still they served.

@brianperry

5 ай бұрын

@@jimandaud Yes your correct, The percentage of those killed serving in the merchant navy was higher,,, whats more in most cases they couldn't fight back...In the mid sixties l attended a Sea training school in Liverpool, where there are many memorials to Seaman who lost their lives at Sea...

@TheIvanMilky

5 ай бұрын

There is an absolutely horrifying story in one of the books about a ball turret gunner which was described by a reporter who stayed with them as one of the only stories from the war he never had any interest in reporting or writing about. A damaged plane was trying to land but couldn't because the landing gear was jammed and so was the hatch of ball turret (very similar to the show) so this reporter had to listen to a 3 way conversation between ground command, the pilot and the ball turret gunner making the decision to do a belly landing and kill him in a horrific way to save the lives of the rest of the crew. Probably one of the most disturbing war stories I've ever read, God bless all of them.

Since B-17s were assigned to the busiest parts of Germany, they only had a 25% to 33% chance of surviving the 25 missions needed to complete their tour. The ages of the crewmen were on the average, 24 years and below.

@stevedavis9466

5 ай бұрын

My father completed 25 missions with the 100th during this time period ( JUN - OCT. '43) . He turned 19 on SEPT20. Completed his 25 missions on OCT4. They were all very young men .

29:00 so there definitely will be episodes with fighters (you can see the Tuskegee airmen in the intro), but at the time this episode takes place, fighters just didn’t have the fuel to escort the B 17’s deep into enemy territory. It’s later into the war with the invention of drop tanks that fighter escorts become a thing, so we’ll probably see them in a couple episodes. Another thing y’all should know is that all the missions they fly in the show were real missions flown by the 100th as well as all the characters. These aren’t fictional characters like in Saving Private Ryan, these were real people and this is what actually happened to them in real life

The losses incurred in the Regensburg and Schweinfurt raids made the USAAF seriously reconsider their daylight bombing doctrine. The Ball Turret Gunners... I remember hearing an anecdote from the late Andy Rooney about a Fortress coming back from a mission with heavy damage and had to make a wheels up landing. There were mechanical issues with the Ball Turret and the crew couldn't get the gunner out of there. And on the approach to the airfield, the individual crew members had to say goodbye to their friend and comrade stuck in the turret... awful thing.

@unropednope4644

5 ай бұрын

Not really true fortunately. As far as it can be determined from the available evidence, no ball turret gunners were crushed during emergency landings and the concept can be generally regarded as a myth. This myth arose from a famous Amazing Stories episode, a poem called "Death of the Ball Turret Gunner' and a story actor Andy Rooney wrote about in his book called "My War". He wrote that he personally witnessed these events at Bassingnourne, England with thr mission he described being mission #84 which was made up of 4 squadrons. Researchers have obviously checked the casualty reports of the mission and although multiple individuals from the group died as a result of the raid, only a single individual was confirmed at the time as being killed: Technical Sergeant Donald F. Robertson, who was the radio operator on B-17F, 41-24639. Every other man in each of the squadrons were listed as missing in action or wounded. Its also worth mentioning that in his book, Rooney suggests he eschews a facts based approach in favor of good storytelling. warbirdinformationexchange.org/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=73627

@andreraymond6860

5 ай бұрын

Steven Spielberg shot a sixty minute episode of the television series Amazing Stories based on that incident. He gives it a 'happy ending', but the real life story ended quite tragically. Donald Miller tells the story briefly in his book 'Masters Of The Air'.

@catherinelw9365

5 ай бұрын

I read about that. I had to stop. It was so horrible. And the crew that had to clean his remains from the plane… 😭

@cs3473

5 ай бұрын

@@andreraymond6860 I remember watching that episode when it came out. In the story, the Ball Turret Gunner was an aspiring cartoonist who went into a trance and drew the plane with big cartoon wheels which appeared on the plane as it landed. It wasn't until they extract the gunner from the turret after landing and wake him up that the plane loses the wheel and crashes.

The show remains incredibly well-based on the memoir of Crosby, as well as the Masters of the Air book. They have really done a tremendous job here.

The moment I saw the map at the briefing scene and heard ‘Regensburg’ my heart sank…

The crew that downed in the med could likely be picked up by the Royal Navy. The other air crews would have marked the grid reference where it went down and would report it back to HQ. The allies had a pretty good grip on the Med by then, Sicily was mostly under allied control so the Germans would likely not have the resources to go after rescue ships.

About the fort that ditched in the water, whenever possible there were sea rescue assets. Might be surface vessels, submarines, possibly “flying boat” sea planes sent out to rescue downed crews. I suppose sometimes it worked, sometimes not.

@Vipre-

5 ай бұрын

Hopefully the rafts weren't shredded.

The first Schweinfurt and Regensberg raid was a bloody engagement for the 100th. It was a disaster.

@terrym3837

5 ай бұрын

The two Schweinfurt raids cost 120 bombers even the top brass knew this level of attrition couldnt continue

Love your reactions. My next-door neighbor for the first 30+ years of my life was a B-17 pilot during WW2. He was shot down on his 33rd mission when the tail of his plane was shot off by a Folke Wolf 190, killing 7 of the 10-man crew. He was a POW in Germany for the last year of the war, after which his 6' 3" frame weighed only 87 pounds when the camp was liberated by the Russians.

Regensburg / Schweinfurt was the mission that more than any gave the "Bloody 100th" it's nickname. 1/3 of the Eight Air Force went down that day. They came back a month later. The Germans replace the ball bearings from a plant in Sweden.

The 100th’s high casualty rate mirrored that of its parent division, the Eighth Air Force, which suffered more fatalities-26,000-than the entire Marine Corps over the course of World War II.

2:48 not true. The Germans sent larger forces to bomb England in the summer and fall of 1940 during the Battle of Britain. Also: the British Royal Air Force’s Bomber Command sent about 1000 bombers to hit the German city of Cologne on the night of May 30/31 1942. A little dramatic license here for sure. It was the USAAF’s biggest effort to date. The 8th sent bigger raids later on in early 1944.

The term for a landing with no functioning engines is called a: "Dead Stick Landing."

Just so y'all know, it seems that this series is depicting actual historical bombing raids. This attack on the ball bearing factory at Stuttgart was real. The reason why their landing zone was in Africa is because Stuttgart is in Southwestern Germany, just 100 miles north of Zurich, Switzerland, and it was just as easy to continue flying south instead of turning around and flying over occupied France back to Britain. By going to Algeria, they would be flying over Neutral Switzerland, liberated Italy, and then the Mediterranean, all away from German Air Defenses.

@stevedavis9466

5 ай бұрын

this was the AUG17 raid on Regensburg.

the B-17 was actually already outdated by the time the first Japanese bomb fell on Pearl Harbor, and its initial wartime introduction produced results so dismal that the British, who were the first to test it in combat, decided against the Boeing bomber and instead opted for the new Consolidated airplane that had been designed to replace it as their four-engine bomber import.

I'm still not over this episode. I'm so devastated about Biddick I'm actually seething with rage.

The Schweinfurt-Regensburg mission is a famous operation that took place in August 1943. There is a lot written about this raid and the casualties were very high.

@rossgage9730

5 ай бұрын

Infamous would be a better description.

@terrym3837

5 ай бұрын

And the did the raid again in October and lost exactly 60 bombers as they did on the first raid

What’s insane is that it wasn’t even the worse raid they went on. PTSD was seen as cowardice so they kept it inside until they lost it. Some pilots reported flying blind because the stress got to the at the IP and then regained vision on the return leg

What stayed with me is the choice _Babyface_ had when he dropped onto Belgium. Turn himself in and become a POW (flyers, esp. officers, generally get treated better), or try to make it home with help from the Resistance. I keep wondering, _what would I choose?_ If caught, I'd be shot as a spy (primarily because I'd be in civilian clothes). But the thing is, it likely wouldn't be just me that gets caught. So, by decidng to escape, I'd be asking others to put their lives on the line too. 😳 Btw, there.are a handful of TY videos of WW2 veterans (airmen) that are discussing their experiences and the show. One, John _"Lucky"_ Luckadoo, was a member of the _Bloody Hundredth._ He has a few.

As a teenager my dad was stationed in Germany 🇩🇪. Regensburg was a cool place to visit. I remember reading the history of the ahead of the visit. It’s wild that the medevil part wasn’t of Regensburg wasn’t damaged sorta….too bad from the raid.

It’s not that the B-17 couldn’t maneuver it’s that they were forced to stay in formation to provide overlapping machine gun coverage for each other. In the show when they’ve emphasized the pilot having difficulty controlling or landing the aircraft it’s been either due to battle damage, the dead stick (unpowered) landing in this episode or in extreme winds as in the first episode. Normally when not shot full of holes, on fire or fuel starved the B-17 is a joy to fly.

I felt sorry for Babyface, the ball turret gunner on one of the B17. He was too young to die; he was probably 17 or 18 of age. I cried when the plane exploded. Quinn should've stayed back to help him. If I were in Quinn's position, I would stay back to help him even if it costs my life. RIP Babyface.

When the bombardier questioned the dumping of the Norden Bombsight. It was because it was top secret and the 3rd most expensive thing the US spent money on. Behind the Manhattan Project 2nd and the B-29.

One of the deadliest days in the Air War was October 14, 1943. On one mission the Army Air Corp lost 60 bombers. That's 600 men lost on just those bombers add to that the men lost on the surviving bombers. Thankfully the upgraded P-51 would soon be used and lower the number of losses.

Just stumbled across your youtube channel and really enjoyed your reaction to this phenomenal series. Subscribed!

I even remember as a kid reading about the Regensberg and Schweinfurt missions, how deadly they were. Honestly, I'd rather be a grunt on the front line than anyone in one of these Forts.

Frieden, Freiheit, Glückseligkeit, Freude und Wohlstand für alle Menschen

So, to be clear, the Schweinfurt-Regensburg mission was kind of a failure. The aircraft factory in Regensburg was severely damaged, but ball bearing factories in Schweinfurt weren't that badly damaged. Production was slowed, but not for very long. The real thing was the enormous cost of this raid, 60 bombers were lost with many more very badly damaged. 500+ men were killed, captured, wounded, or MIA. Idealy, after this type of mission you would want to launch follow up raids to keep pounding those factories and prevent repairs. But the allies lost so many men and bombers that they couldn't launch a follow up raid for a couple of months. 1943 was not a good year to be on an American bomber.

The three most expensive projects for the U.S. during the war where The Boeing B-29 Bomber, The Bomb and The Norden Bombsight. Two worked pretty good, but the bombsight was a bit of a lemon. It was not designed to be used at those altitudes and the weather and temperature really affected its effectiveness.

B17s are just crazy build. Sometimes half the plane was shot off and it still landed back at the airfield.

This was a real mission and the other divisions did go up and also got shredded 😢

@anngo4140

5 ай бұрын

Yeah because the clever plan had a flaw in that they needed day light for the first group to land in north Africa, so they couldn't wait for the fog to clear.

@parice

5 ай бұрын

@@anngo4140 should have waited a day

The guy who could not get his comrade out of the ball turret must have felt guilty for the rest of his life, thats if the man survived the war that is , very brave men , every one of them, must have been terrifying on every mission flown , It takes a special kind of courage

@fredfredburger5150

5 ай бұрын

IIRC tail gunners took the most casualties, but ball turret gunners weren't far behind.

ep 3 killed me,cant wait to watch the other episodes!!

As bad as this was, in terms of mortality rates, the German submarine forces "Ubootwaffe" had a 75% death rate for the war. 30,000 killed of the 40,000 that went to sea. War is truly horrific.

In the Daylight bombing months, the Army Air Corps lost more crewmen than all the Marines in the entire Pacific War.

Going deep means more fighters. There was another bomber that landed deep in N African desert with a dead radio. They found them 10 years later ;-(

@jameswg13

5 ай бұрын

I think you are getting confused with a b24 liberator that was bombing Napkes and lost on return. Lady be good. Also the radio didn't die the crew bailed from the plane etc then died while trying to walk back. If they had stuck with their plane their radio worked , supplies etc

You must know history. Especially the biggest conflict there ever was that ending in nuclear blast. Thank goodness my father (7th air force) made it back

Curt was my favorite. Was so upset he died. Though I have some hope. ❤️ great reactions guys. Love this show

The B17 G had thirteen 0.50 machine guns. Due to the bombers inability to maneuver when attacked by fighters because it needed to be flown straight and level during their final bomb run, individual aircraft struggled to fend off a direct attack from enemy aircraft or anti-aircraft artillery (triple A or flack)

Such a good show, plot just gets better as it goes on.

5:40 Colonel LeMay is Curtis LeMay who went on to become an early commandeer of SAC - Strategic Air Command. He later became the Air Force Chief of Staff on the Joint Chief’s. During the Cuban Missile Crisis on 1962, he advised JFK to attack. He was very much an aggressive war hawk.

Best episode by far to press. Really felt the loss of Kurt the slo-mo scene of the pilot splitting in two when he hit the plane wing I haven't shrugged off yet! More episodes like this one and u may have something as impactful as the brilliant band of brothers.

The Norden Bombsight was a con, but it made the guy selling them a fortune. Just like the RAF, at this time in the war, most US bombers were lucky to get within 3 miles of their targets. They did hit the ball bearing factory though. It held up war production for 3 weeks, the Germans had millions stored away and were buying more from Sweden.

The rockets the German Pulk Brecher (Group Breaker) Fighters used are portraied wrong. They were not intended to be fired directly at planes since it would be near impossible to hit a plane in mid flight. The rockets got modified from regular ground artillery versions and the accuracy was mediocre at best to begin with.They were ment to be fired into a formation of Bombers from ahead or below to force them to break it up so that following Fighters could hunt them down easier.

@lennyrex1

5 ай бұрын

Inside German airspace, the Bf 109 G-6 fighters of 5 Staffel/JG 11, which had pioneered the fitment of the Werfer-Granate 21 unguided air-to-air rocket weapon system to the Luftwaffe's single engine day fighter force the previous day. Taken from the book concerning the raid.

@hippoace

5 ай бұрын

Perhaps the hits shown were lucky hits.

@sirpurrsalot6588

5 ай бұрын

@@hippoace Not very likley since they show them to be fired at extremly short range as the Attacker was already within the formation. At this short range the detonation blast of this rockets would have killed or badly damaged the attacking fighter too. That is the reason this Rockets were used as standoff weapons.

I have read the books on which this series is based, and the show is very accurate in almost every detail. Without giving too much away, if you take anything away from this episode, it is don't get too attached to any of the main characters.

I thought episodes 1 and 2 were meh and a bit disappointing. However, I was on the edge of my seat during episode 3. I almost had an anxiety attack watching it. Loved watching your reactions! Can't wait for future episodes!

that's why they call it a dogfight

2nd raid on Schweinfurt happened months later It became known as “Black Thursday” 8th AF lost 77 bombers, 640 KIA

TBR and Samantha, I love your videos. There are so many videos about the Allied bombing campaign during WWII. If you want a good foundation about it, you might want to watch the following: 1. "Target for Today"(1944) 2. "Memphis Belle: A story of a Flying Fortress"(1944) 3. "Twelve O'clock High" (1949, starring Gregory Peck) 4. "Memphis Belle"(1990, Starring, Mathew Modine["Full Metal Jacket"], and the singer Harry Connick Jr. I am sure there are plenty other videos that are better. These are my suggestions.

@brianperry

5 ай бұрын

Note ..'World at War', which included raids and mistakes by the RAF, a whole episode on the Raids on the Ballbearing factories and what was known as the 'Big Week' plus the carnage is far more informative ' historically' speaking. It was a hell of a learning curve for all involved...

That was a brutal episode to watch..very emotional especially when you know that it's based on fact..😔🇺🇲🇬🇧🌍

The call out of 190s the Focke wulf 190s nicknamed the butcher bird by the allied air crews, and there is a reason the german Fighter Aces kills were so high, germany's greatest Ace of ww2 Erich Hartmann had 352 air kills from 1400 sorties flown though nearly all of them were on the eastern front against the Russians

I liked Curt, which feels odd to say only three episodes in about a character, but he seemed like good people.

Good day guys i got some movie suggestions for you..."A Bridge too Far"(michael caine/robert redford/sean connery/gene hackman and many others)..."Patton"(george c.scot)..."Dirty Dozen"(lee marvin/telly savalas)..."Battle of the Bulge"(henry ford)...have a nice day.

Good episode!! Wait for BLACK WEEK in October 1943. Americans took such incredible losses that it actually made command reconsider their DAYTIME tactics. American & British fighter escorts just did NOT have the range to provide protection until the P-51 Mustang and later models of the British Spitfire came onto the scene. The 1st time I ever heard about the SCHWEINFURT/REGENSBURG raid was as a kid in the 1970s reading a comic book. Thought the comic book depictions were brutal back then. Also, during this battle the Germans were releasing a special type of fuel tank into the bomber formations which would automatically burst thus covering a certain section of sky with fuel and covering the bomber as they would fly through it which would help increase the likely hood of more damage to the aircraft if/when they got hit. Yep - think this was the 1st introduction of air-to-air missiles in history, if I am correct.

The much vaunted bombsight would have been in German hands likely the previous year, when the first B-17 came down mostly intact in any area controlled by the enemy. Would it shock you to know that one of the architects of this campaign, as air attaché to the UK in 1940, had seen the Battle of Britain with his own eyes. Saw how even the mostly escorted (though only for 10 mins over London fuel wise) German bombers sustained unacceptable losses. The B-17’s compared to the German bombers were much heavier armed but by 1943, so were the German fighters, cannon, those unguided rockets.

The raid on Regensburg was called a succes. It stopped production of Messerschmitts for about a month. The raid on Schweinfurt was a partial succes so they had to bomb it again. In the second raid on Schweinfurt the losses were even higher. The 100th was lucky that time. They had only 8 B-17's left who could fly on that mission and they all made it back. The other BG's of the 8th Airforce were not so lucky. 22% of the bomber crew (650 men), were lost on that raid with 60 B-24-s shot down.

If you want a good bit of real life footage and interviews BBC World at war episode 12 "whirlwind" from 1974 covers the bomber offensive talking to many involved

The sad thing about the heavy losses at the Schweinfurt and Regensburg Raids is that, even though they hit the targets, it did not had the crushing effects on fighter or weapons production the Allies hoped for. Infact despite the massive bombing campaign on Germany and all the damage it did they even managed to increase the industrial output from the end of 43 due to mid 44. Due to decentralising efforts, going underground and even greater use of slave labour. This only changed as the bombing campaign changed its focus on the transport infrastructure of the Reich after the Normandy landings up to a point it became nealry impossible to move any goods during daylight at all.

@martinsv9183

5 ай бұрын

Slave labour? Everyone is a slave during a war...

@jimandaud

5 ай бұрын

A very famous book titled was "Inside the Third Reich'" by Albert Speer. He led the Nazi supply efforts throughout the war and was responsible for countering any bomb damage. He eventually spent time in prison for war crimes (e.g., using concentration camp inmates), but lived for many years.

@RandomStuff-he7lu

5 ай бұрын

Yeah... the only thing in the end that really crushed German production was the Allies capturing the Ruhr, the German industrial heartland.

@newsieboys1171

5 ай бұрын

The US Bombing Survey after the war confirmed. Bombings of the transportation infrastructure & energy sector were decisive.

@antonego9581

4 ай бұрын

@@RandomStuff-he7lu the entire strategic bombing campaign was a waste until they had fighters capable of flying escort the whole way. the minor gains to German industry were not worth the horrific loss rates suffered by the US airmen, while the RAF basically just area bombed population centers killing huge amounts of innocent people for no real gain. these young men were unbelievably brave and there was an important place for the heavy bomber obviously but at this point the strategies were not well developed and these men paid the price

I saw an interview of a B-17 pilot by the name of Lucky, I can't recall his full name, who was talking about this mission specifically!! According to this gentleman although they did destroy the factory in Germany, unbeknownst to them, and not found out until years later, is that the Germans were getting all the ball bearings they needed from Sweden!!! So in essence a very high cost to achieve very little in the way of crippling the German war machine!!! LUCKY also stated that the statistics for accuracy of the bombing raids was that they got within nine miles of their targets only 25% of the time!!! The Norton bomb site was not what it was cracked up to be!! It did not take into consideration crosswinds as the bombs fell from 25,000 ft !! So unfortunately a lot of the payloads of the early bombing campaigns missed their targets terribly!!! It wasn't until they adapted the same protocol as the RAF, which was basically carpet bombing or area bombing as they called it, that their numbers got better!! Anyway there are several interviews of this gentleman named Lucky on KZread and he's quite a fascinating character to listen to!!!

@jameswg13

5 ай бұрын

You are on about Lucky Luckadoo. Actually the regensburg part of the mission was a total success. The ball bearing factory which the other task forces hit was mostly a failure. Even then Albert speer said the German production was immediately down 37% from it and If there had been more follow up raids more quickly likely would have crippled profiction. As it was they found surplus across Germany and elsewhere

@bernardsalvatore1929

5 ай бұрын

@@jameswg13 yes sir that is the gentleman that I'm speaking of!!! Did you happen to see the Q&A with him and some doctor is about an hour long video on KZread somewhere???

@matthewcharles5867

5 ай бұрын

​@@bernardsalvatore1929 on D day they had 45 static targets to hit and didn't get any. Some days it worked some days it didn't. The RAF had plenty of days when their plans went to shit as well.

That "biggest air armada" comment was inaccurate. The RAF put up 1000 bomber raider on three occasions in the summer of 1942.

@ScotsDestroyer

5 ай бұрын

1000 bomers were over three nights

If you talk to combat veterans. One of things that they all say. Is " 99% of the time is boredom, 1% of absolute terror." Regardless of whether the veteran was in the infantry, armored, combat engineers, or air crews. I have talked to many veterans of WW2, Korea, Vietnam, Desert Storm, Afghanistan, and Iraq. Regardless of the time period, all of the veterans had similar things to say about time in combat.

Schweinfurt-Regensburg raid. Also known as Black Thursday. An example of misplaced confidence and the tragic loss of young lives.

They speak French in Belgium, where the one guy who has to bail landed

9:15 those screams are horrifying. What's worse is this probably happened way more than we'd like to admit...

These are great, I'm only watching yours!

2:05 All of these characters are real people. There is a wiki page that actually tells the biography of each of the real men portrayed in this show.

Sad news: Actor, director, and American football linebacker Carl Weathers who was known for his roles as boxer Apollo Creed in the first four Rocky films (1976-1985), Colonel Al Dillon in Predator (1987), and Combat Carl in the Toy Story franchise died yesterday at the age of 76. 😢💔

It wasn't the worst idea, but they really just didn't have the means to do all that much damage to the ball-bearing plants to the point that the Germans would run out of them. Even if they'd have had long range escorts, it still ultimately wouldn't have worked - Schweinfurt ultimately got pretty well flattened and the Germans still never really lacked for ball bearings.

It is very interesting to hear people who are not history nerds react to this. Too many reactions are focused on historical nuance and miss the human stories.

The worst part of the operation is that hitting the factory with that many bombs didn't actually do that much. The Germans had huge amounts of ball bearings stocked up in warehouses, and the production resumed before the engine factories ran out of stock. So the production of plane and tank engines did not actually get much affected by it.

The German fighters weren't shooting rockets-they were shooting small cannons. They had a longer range and caused more damage than the bullets the B-17 gunners were shooting.

@Amrod97

5 ай бұрын

They also used rockets. They were called Werfer-Granate 21 and were simply modified Nebelwerfer rockets. They were not used as shown in the series. They were fired from a safe distance and hoped to hit something at least with shrapnel. In 1944, the first true R4M "Orkan" air-to-air missiles were developed. They were very effective but they started using them too late to matter.

@bbraun4966

5 ай бұрын

Thank you for the info.@@Amrod97

Man Austin Butler has a great deep voice.

First flown in 1935, Boeing Aircraft Company’s B-17 was based on technology of the 1920s and early 1930s and was not the airplane the Army Air Corps actually had in mind for a long-range bomber. Consolidated’s B-24 was designed to replace the B-17 and was in many ways a much better airplane,