The first German serviceman killed in the war was killed by the Japanese (China, 1937), the first American serviceman killed was killed by the Russians (Finland 1940), the highest ranking American killed was Lt. General Lesley McNair, killed by the US Army Air Corps. So much for the allies.
From John Arterbury. Lt. General Lesley McNair was killed by accidental Allied bombing in France. Cite: Crusade by Rick Atkinson
Further, from Captain Robert A. Lynn, The highest ranking U.S. general killed by enemy fire was Lt. General Simon Bolivar, Jr. He was junior to Lt. General Lesley J. McNair, who was killed by U.S. bombers.
The youngest US serviceman was 12 year old Calvin Graham, USN. He was wounded in combat and given a Dishonorable Discharge for lying about his age. (His benefits were later restored by act of Congress.)
The item above was confirmed by a note from Richard Graham of Canton, TX who says: The story about Calvin Graham enlisted in the navy at the age of 12 is a true story. he was a cousin of mine. The last time I talked to Calvin was at a family reunion several years before his death.
At the time of Pearl Harbor the top US Navy command was called CINCUS (pronounced "sink us"), the shoulder patch of the US Army's 45th Infantry division was the Swastika, and Hitler's private train was named "Amerika." All three were soon changed for PR purposes.
Dave Walker writes: Insignia of the 45th Infantry Division. The 45th Infantry Division gained its nickname, "Thunderbird" division, from the gold thunderbird. This Native American symbol became the division's insignia in 1939. It replaced another previously used Native American symbol, a swastika, that was withdrawn when it became closely associated with the Nazi party.
More US servicemen died in the Air Corps than the Marine Corps. While completing the required 30 missions, your chance of being killed was 71%.
Not that bombers were helpless. A B-17 carried 4 tons of bombs and 1.5 tons of machine gun ammo. The US 8th Air Force shot down 6,098 fighter planes, 1 for every 12,700 shots fired.
Bill Talbott, Major, USMC (Ret) offers some interesting Discussion of Aircraft Kill Claims.
Germany's power grid was much more vulnerable than realized. One estimate is that if just 1% of the bombs dropped on German industry had instead been dropped on power plants German industry would have collapsed.
Generally speaking there was no such thing as an average fighter pilot. You were either an ace or a target. For instance Japanese ace Hiroyoshi Nishizawa shot down over 80 planes. He died while a passenger on a cargo plane.
It was a common practice on fighter planes to load every 5th round with a tracer round to aid in aiming. This was a mistake. The tracers had different ballistics so (at long range) if your tracers were hitting the target 80% of your rounds were missing. Worse yet the tracers instantly told your enemy he was under fire and from which direction. Worst of all was the practice of loading a string of tracers at the end of the belt to tell you that you were out of ammo. This was definitely not something you wanted to tell the enemy. Units that stopped using tracers saw their success rate nearly double and their loss rate go down.
When allied armies reached the Rhine the first thing men did was pee in it. This was pretty universal from the lowest private to Winston Churchill (who made a big show of it) and Gen Patton (who had himself photographed in the act).
German Me-264 bombers were capable of bombing New York City but it wasn't worth the effort.
According to Bill Douglas, the Me-264 was a prototype that never went into production. Although the design was theoretically possible of a mission to New York, there was never an operational aircraft to test the theory. One reason for canceling the project was that Hitler felt the isolated bombing of New York would do more to rile the US public against Germany than any damage that was achieved.
According to Captain Robert A. Lynn, the Me-264 V-1 DID FLY on 23 December 1942 but the Me-264 V-2 was destroyed in an air raid. The Ju-290 was the designated mid-air refueler for the Me-264. There was no loss of effort on the Germans part but the project suffered from the following: shortage of design and construction capacity, personal rivalries between Goring, Milch, and Messerschmitt, and shortage of production capacity. An air raid on 18 July 144 on Memmingen destroyed the Me-254 V-1 as well as parts of the V-3 and V-4. (cite: Hitler's Miracle Weapons-Volume 1: The Luftwaffe and Kriegsmarine by Friedrich George)
A number of air crewman died of farts (ascending to 20,000 ft. in an unpressurized aircraft causes intestinal gas to expand 300%).
The Russians destroyed over 500 German aircraft by ramming them in mid-air (they also sometimes cleared mine fields by marching over them). "It takes a brave man not to be a hero in the Red Army" - Joseph Stalin
The US Army had more ships than the US Navy.
The German Air Force had 22 infantry divisions, 2 armor divisions and 11 paratroop divisions. None of them were capable of airborne operations. The German Army had paratroops that WERE capable of airborne operations. Go figure.
When the US Army landed in North Africa, among the equipment brought ashore were 3 complete Coca-Cola bottling plants.
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