Hitler's Spyplane Over Normandy, 1944: The World's First Jet

By Philippe Bauduin and Heather Williams

A pictorial history of the groundbreaking jet bomber known as the Arado 234, including never-before-seen archival photos.
 
This is the story of the Arado 234, an aircraft that on one day in 1944, in the skies above Normandy, heralded the beginning of a new era in military aviation.
 
Many individuals over many years have contributed to the field of developmental aviation. One of these key players is Heinrich Lubbe, a man who marked the evolution of aerial transportation through his cultivation of technological excellence. From flying lessons given to him by his friend Roland Garros, to the creation of the Arado business, Lubbe made a significant impact and left a lasting legacy. His machines were flown by exceptional pilots such as Horst Gotz and Erich Sommer, known as “des moustachus” (the moustachioed). In Hitler’s Germany, the Arado jets were put to work in a variety of contexts. Perhaps most significantly, they were employed in the task of photo-reconnaissance during the Battle for Normandy, following the iconic landings of June 1944. In this role, they brought back extraordinary images from the invasion beaches, revealing with astounding detail the positions and plans of the Allied forces. These images, previously unseen by the public, shed new light on the battle, at the same time proving the Germans’ indisputable superiority in the field of jet aviation. The fact that American troops hastened to transfer the Arado AR234 and Messerschmitt 262 to the USA to uncover all their secrets post-war says a lot about how they were viewed in the eyes of the enemy.
 
In addition to many top-secret aerial images, this book is enriched with photographs from the personal archives of Erich Sommer, the Arado pilot, which have never before been published. Packed with both color and black and white images, this book and represents an impressive pictorial history of the world’s first jet bomber.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Open Road Integrated Media
• Release date: Jun 9, 2014
• ISBN: 9781473842960

Book preview

Chapter One

Operation Lusty: Technology Worthy of James Bond

In the afternoon of 29 June 1945, Louis Lemarquand, a 14 year old boy from Querqueville in the suburbs of Cherbourg, heard loud noises coming from the airfield near the village. It was a place he had frequented for nearly a year; he knew every corner and every aeroplane, not to mention ‘his’ GIs, who would share their chewing gum with him from time to time. With the war in Europe over and the atmosphere on the base pretty relaxed, Louis headed over to the airfield as soon as he could. Once there, he was astonished to see aeroplanes without any propellers. He asked what they were and was told they were Arados as well as Messerschmitts and other unknown aircraft. The man he spoke to may well have been Flight Lieutenant Roy Brown of the USAAF (United States Army Air Force), who had just landed with his Me 262 ‘Pick II’.

Louis Lemarquand and Roy Brown have each described their individual memories of the last moments of Operation Lusty. Similar to Operation Dick Tracy (mentioned in the introduction), it consisted of capturing the Luftwaffe’s most interesting technological innovations, in order to deconstruct and study them back in America.

The Messerschmitt Me 262 ‘Pick II’ on the ground at Melun-Villaroche.

Intelligence gathering

Intelligence gathering from both allies and enemies, has always been one of the main springboards of technological progress. For example, when the Americans entered the First World War in 1917, they had virtually no military aircraft; just fifty-five training aircraft in the United States, of which fifty-one were unusable. Major Raynal C. Bolling was therefore charged with collecting intelligence from the Allies and as a result he acquired aircraft, engines and licences from companies such as de Havilland, Sopwith, Nieuport, Breguet, Caproni, Isottas, Rhone and Gnome. The Americans, entering the war in 1917 with only 55 training aircraft on their soil, had 1200 in Europe by 1918. This was increased to 11,760 by November 1918 and afterwards continued to increase at a rate of 13,500 a year. This clearly demonstrated the importance of intelligence gathering that would be seen later in the form of Operation Lusty.

Despite Lindberg’s warnings in 1938, in which he claimed that the German air force was superior to those of Britain, France and Russia combined, history repeated itself and in 1941 the USA did not have sufficient numbers of aircraft, meaning they were unable to protect their ships on the east coast. As a result, they had to ask the British to hunt down enemy submarines using the RAF Lockheed Hudson planes based in Guantanamo.

Lieutenant Roy Brown in front of the Messerschmitt Me 262 ‘Pick II’ at Melun-Villaroche.

Air Technical Intelligence (ATI)

The concept of Air Technical Intelligence was born from a meeting between General Arnold and Dr T. von Karman, a professor at the California Institute of Technology. Its aim was to bring together all the technological developments made during the war. Von Karman was an eminent specialist in aerodynamics and during the First World War had built an observational helicopter for the Austro-Hungarian Army, that worked in a similar way to a captive balloon.

In early 1942, at Wright Field near Riverside in Ohio, an organisation was created that would collect and study information on all aircraft wrecks and crashes, as well as looking at all the characteristics of enemy planes. One of the most memorable of these cases was the discovery on 25 June 1942, of a previously unknown aluminium alloy in the wreck of a Nakajima 27 MK-3. The exceptional properties of this alloy would mobilise the specialists working at the Aluminium Company of America and Reynolds Metal Company.

After the Normandy Invasion, some of these specialists, the Crash Intelligence Officers, were sent to work in France. On 10 August 1944, they reportedly took part in the capture of an important radar centre at Perros-Guirec, Brittany. Amongst the group were specialists from Benito, Coastwatcher, Freya Hoarding, Windjammer and Würzburg, who collected all the equipment together and immediately sent it back to Wright Field. In September, the same intelligence officers discovered a V1 flying bomb near Cherbourg and sent it back to Ohio on 8 September.

The Scientific Advisory Group (SAD)

It was not until the liberation of Paris that the American services became independent from the RAF and on 5 September they installed the Air Technical Intelligence Section at Saint Germain-en-Laye. On 11 December 1944, General Arnold created the Scientific Advisory Group and Wright Field established a ‘blacklist’, containing the thirty priority targets the intelligence officers should capture; notably the Me 262 and the Arado 234, the latter of which needed to be seized

Reviews for Hitler's Spyplane Over Normandy, 1944

[Richard kaczmarek · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Coverage of the aircraft was sparse - could be due to very little surviving original documents.
No blueprints or drawings as are found in most aircraft books.
Too many aerial photographs whose small size reveals very little to a non-phoyo interpreter.

[John Kelley · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Terrific detailed history! The author sought out some wonderful first-hand information on an often under appreciated aircraft. Aircrew stories are a real treasure!