Flak 8.8cm - The German Gun That Destroyed Bombers

The German 8.8cm Flak is known as one of the best AA-weapons of World War 2, used against American bombers such as the B-17 and B-24. But how effective was it?
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⚜ Sources ⚜
Fritz Hahn, Waffen und Geheimwaffen des deutschen Heeres 1933-1945, volume 1, Doerfler Verlag,
Flieger-Stabsing, Die Feuerleitung von Flakbatterien, VDI Berlin
ObL Neumann, Handbuch für den Flakartilleristen (Der Kanonier),
John Norris, 88mm FLaK 18/36/37/41 & PaK 43 1936-1945, Osprey Publishing: 2002
Medical Department United States Army WW2, Allan Palmer, M.D., Directional Density of Flak Fragments and Burst Patterns at High Altitude, German 88mm HE-Antiaircraft shell
Medical Department United States Army WW2, Allan Palmer, M.D., Survey of Battle Casualties, Eight Air Force, June, July, and August 1944
Medical Department United States Army WW2, Maj. James C. Beyer, MC, Maj. James K. Arima, MSC, and Doris W. Johnson, Enemy Ordnance Material
Medical Department United States Army WW2, Maj. James C. Beyer, MC, William F. Enos, M.D., and Col. Robert H. Holmes, MC, Personnel Protective Armor,
RL 12/8, Richtlinien für die 4. Flakdivision, Düsseldorf, Sommer 1944,
TM E9-369A, German 88 Aircraft Gun,
Werner Mueller, The 88mm FLAK in the First and Second World War, Schiffer Publishing: 1998
⚜ Visuals ⚜
National Archives
Game footage from IL-2 1946
#Flak88 #Luftwaffe #Flak

[@MilitaryAviationHistory]

Check out MHV's Video on the Flak 88 in the AT-role: kzbin.info/www/bejne/eonReZZvbddka80 *If you enjoy my content, please consider supporting via Patreon:* www.patreon.com/Bismarck *or Paypal:* www.paypal.me/BismarckYT I goofed up in the intro. It's 8.8cm (hence why I saw Acht-Acht) not 8cm (my old curse with numbers continues), Ordnance is spelt like so, and I listed the Survey of Battle Casualties twice - although I'd say better twice than not at all ;)

[@omerashraf9357]

Please do a video on the legendary clashes over Darwin between the famous European aircraft : Spitfire and the the most feared Japanese aircraft of pacific : Zero !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It was a dream come true for ww2 aircraft enthusiasts !!!!!!!!

[@corwinhyatt519]

Audio is very quiet.

[@kstreet7438]

Was wondering just watched his video lol

[@patrickbrennan1317]

How about making a video about the amerika bomber?

[@MrFrazer5800]

this video feels inconclusive, i would have liked some comparisons of aa, how much did the british shoot down from the Luftwaffe over London? i mean i know you have to cut down stuff because the video otherwise gets to long but i would have really enjoyed "more". also you cannont simply mention the psychology effect and then leave it without going into detail :D

[@davefield8100]

My dad was a bombardier from D-Day to the end of 1944. At that time the fighters did not bother him too much, but he dreaded flak. He said that fortunately for him, as lead bombardier he was usually busy setting up the bomb run when the flak was the worst, keeping his attention away from the flak. I saw an Army Air Force video on flak evasion, in which the bomber groups had predetermined maneuvers to evade flak. Every few minutes they would change course slightly, or change altitude 500 feet or more, or a combination of both. This was reportedly effective because it took several minutes for the aiming instructions to get to the various flak batteries. The planes would not be where they were projected to be by the time they flak was fired. However, from the insertion point to the target these maneuvers could not be done during the target set up. This was not covered in this video.

[@SupremeGrand-MasterAzrael]

That’s super interesting. My great grandfather said very similar things about flak. He was also a b-17 bombardier. He actually was basically shot down. They took heavy engine damage and weren’t going to be able stay airborne for long. But they were close to the Swiss border so instead of turning around they flew deeper to get to the Swiss alps. They crash landed in the mountains. My grandfathers legs were both broken. The pilot had bled out from the crash. The copilot was unconscious. The gunners had bailed before the crash. But my grand father and the copilot stayed behind. A local village came to their rescuse and dragged the men on sleds to a village. They were airlifted to a hospital. Everyone but the pilot survived the crash/bailout.

[@davefield8100]

@Plaffed Plaf Thank you. He sure was to me.

[@spudskie3907]

This channel is one of the reasons why I don’t watch TV anymore. Where else am I going to find content like this? Outstanding quality as always!

[@blockboygames5956]

Agreed.

[@captianeddie4554]

back in olden times we found this information at the library

[@jonathangant251]

Same here and now noticed TV people are try to be on KZbin

[@castor3020]

@@captianeddie4554 Back in the oldest days we found this information in the demonstration of a tribal dance.

[@grimfandango6137]

Have you tried the History Channel? /S

[@lteagle101]

Which was a violation of the Versailles treaty but.... *Sips coffee* what are you gonna do about it?

[@bf945]

We already know what the Allies did about it. Nothing. Appeasement never works in the end.

[@ME-hm7zm]

Well I shall write a strongly-worded letter, sir!

[@canisxv9869]

The world powers were acting like ostriches sticking their heads in the ground. They didnt want this conflikt to start and instead of stopping it immideatly when it started in 33 they waited untill the whole of Europe was conquered by those doped up lunatics before they got their asses mooving.

[@canisxv9869]

@@ME-hm7zm Thats so british :-D :-D :-D I can even imagine someone with a thick british accent saying that :-D

[@MrFrazer5800]

Please guys don't forget that France was at the verge of collapse with communist activists, strikes, no national unity and the high losses and damage taken after ww1. Muc like the British empire which was broke as fuck. They didn't ask Germany for that much reperstions just for humiliation. And as we have seen the second world War broke 2 of the largest empires in the world almost a third one if we count the sovjet union. And remember that the sovjets without constant lend lease and financial gifts from the allies would have died essentially. Especially the winter clothing they got helped them from freezing like the Germany because their scorched earth tactic meant that at the front lines nobody hat any cover heating building ect. The allies barely won and without nuclear weapons trying to invade Japan where even women and children would rather die in kamikaze knife attacks then be captured would have costed millions more in casualties. My point beeing if the allies would have tried to stop the Germans early the French would have collapsed without any resistance. The British themself had also a massively reduced war economy to safe money so they would have needed much like in real life years to build up. And without the advances in anti submarine warfare and convoy doctrines the Germans would have sank years Wort of supplies and war material probably starving the UK. Factor in that at that time America was pro German with its own nazi clubs ect and the way history went dowjln was probably the only possible way. Without Hitler declaring on the sovjet union the allies without America can't do anything on the European continent. There is just no way to stop the Germans without them splitting literally in half.

[@davypete7]

Excellent video and research. That bomber on 7.25 actually housed my great uncle - George Abbott - who was a waist gunner on b-17s but was acting bombardier that day for a bombing run over Cologne (the bombardier was sick, I believe). Sadly, as one can tell from the picture, he died when flak exploded in the b-17. Amazingly, no one else died and bomber made it back.

[@blockboygames5956]

My respects to your great Uncle. Thank you.

[@PrinzEisenkarpfe]

My grandfather operated Flaks at the Western front 1943-45. Maybe he shot the shell, maybe he did not. Anyway, I salute you and your great uncle.

[@petro3366]

My respects to your great uncle

[@MrAli171]

The 88 was so versatile and in my opinion the best artillery piece in WW2

[@dwaynezilla]

And it looks and sounds cool too, which is important, lol (only really half-joking)

[@danzervos7606]

Americans had a two piece helmet. The inner part was for comfort and the outer for armor. My father said that they were instructed not to connect the straps for the outer armored shell because a hit could then break one's neck rather than just knocking the helmet off.

[@paulmichaelsmith3207]

Again, sorry for the late post just saw this. Mentioned above that my father was a B-24 pilot in the 15th toward the end. Not many fighters but extreme flak at vaulable targets. He had a real problem with the flak helmet. He was really tall and for some reason when he put on the flak helmet during the bomb run, it would rub against his seat and the front would dip down, obstructing his vision. So he never wore it. My brother and I have still have it, like a metal football helmet with ear flaps.

[@EhoodGarmiza]

The most important function of all these guns is not how many bombers they hit at 20+k feet. It's not having the bombers at 3k feet, where they might have been actually accurate enough for govt work.

[@EhoodGarmiza]

@Call Me Ishmael, with CEP measured in miles, "could" doesn't cut it. Sighting and aiming from below the cloud layers, and shorter times for the wind to deflect the ordnance would both decrease the negative impact of weather on accuracy.

[@attilakatona-bugner1140]

People rarely understand how defensive weapons work, and that their effects have an often much more important part than simple killing

[@SeanBZA]

Correct, at 3k the error between the aiming point touching the circle of the sight, and then releasing the load, is a lot less than at 20k trying to both see your aiming point and decide it had crossed the mark. Even modern planes releasing non guided munitions have the same problem, one heck of a lot easier to hit the target when flying low and slow, than up at near max ceiling with all the different air currents moving the munitions willy nilly. Even with modern aids you are going to be hard pressed to get in the vicinity with any sort of precision. Only way round that is to go the B52 method and lay a carpet with multiple aircraft and multiple sorties, and even then actually hitting a specific target is hard. Attack pilots would go out and definitely make a mark, especially where they have a spotter with a radio saying the target is 1km north of the red smoke. 100% make a chunk of holes 1km north of the smoke, and might actually hit something as well. But more often than not just made the target hot foot it out at high speed back to the border. Good enough in most cases, and better than hitting your own guys. Sucked if you were a cattle herder, you got instant ground beef, and then spent a week rounding up the survivors.

[@dpeasehead]

@@attilakatona-bugner1140 True, but German air defenses both day and night were so effective that both the AAF and the RAF limited the number of missions bombers crews were required to fly because the odds were against their surviving more than 30 or so missions without being shot down by flak or by fighters. Crews were quite aware of those statistics.

[@waywardson8360]

I think the gubmint was glad to lose aircraft fir the obvious reason...so they can build more!

[@jojonesjojo8919]

One video from MAH about the 88mm in its anti-air role and at the same time another video from MHV about the 88mm in its anti-tank role. The Axis are hitting us with combined arms videos!

[@douglasstrother6584]

Hmmm, more Austrian/German collusion! ;)

[@ottomeyer6928]

it was used for both tasks

[@fulcrum2951]

@Mial isus why not?

[@Fitch93]

Relatively speaking, and accounting for the difference in numbers for aircraft, Flak was most effective at bringing down B-24's as opposed to B-17's. While both were built to be rugged and to survive hits, the -24 had a new type of wing design on it. This wing helped it to carry a much larger bomb load over greater distances than the -17's, but it also had a very disturbing tendency to just fail spectacularly when it was hit by flak. Often times, the wing didn't even need to be hit for it to fail. Sometimes a sufficient hit to an engine would cause enough collateral damage for the wing to fail. You don't see too many pics of B-24's that came back with wing parts missing, it's always B-17's. A B-17 could fly back with a literal half a wing, if a B-24 took a hit like that, it never came back.

[@paulmichaelsmith3207]

Late reply cause just came across this. My father, a B-24 pilot with the 15th toward the end of the war, would totally agree with your remarks. Plus, quite simply, the B-24 burned quicker, well noted by Luftwaffe pilots and flak crews. Dad went down when a flak shell hit the bomb bay of the plane in the slot and blew up, causing immense collateral damage. Three planes - and thirty men - went straight down. Dad and some others made it to an emergency strip off Yugosolvia. He said the fighter attacks were terrifying but brief. The flak was relentless. Dad was a cool customer, said riding thru dense flak approaching Vienna and other well protected targets, taught him patience, tenacity, and evoked guts he didn't know he possessed.

[@GeFlixes]

"Wir bringen Licht und Wärme in Ihr Cockpit! -- FlaKgruppe Köln" Somewhere around a IL-2 1946 forum a while ago.

[@johanjanssens4530]

Sehr gut !

[@basstib.9343]

Actually it’s the FlaRaK that has this Motto. I met a lot of FlaRaK guys during my twelve years of service. And they often referred to that.

[@duncanmcgee13]

Props to the dude that managed aim 30 seconds ahead and nail a plane in the nose

[@livinglifeform7974]

I would if it were not for the fact he was a nazi that was defending nazi germany.

[@Jonathan-fb1kj]

Most German soldiers were instead Wehrmacht rather than Nazis, that's basically saying all Germans were Nazis where in fact its the opposite.

[@livinglifeform7974]

@@Jonathan-fb1kj It's completely not. If you're volountarily putting your life on the line to defend nazi germany, then you're a nazi. The clean weheramrcht myth is a lie.

[@bennylofgren3208]

Living Lifeform This is a ridiculous argument and discussion. Look at it this way: no matter their political affiliation, they were defending their _homeland_ . Would you not stand side by side with your neighbor in defense of your home town if you were under attack, regardless of whether you saw eye to eye on issues in peacetime or not?

[@Jonathan-fb1kj]

A Nazi is someone that followed the Nazi political Ideology where in fact most German soldiers and citizens did not and were just trying to protect their homeland. I never did mention that the Wehrmacht never committed any war crimes and all sides committed war crimes of some sort their were no "clean" side at all.

[@Claf1643]

My grandfather was a B-17 Bomber pilot. He would tell me all the time that the "German 88" was devastating! He told me about one of his missions on Berlin in 1944. The sky was literally black with flak and bombers were exploding all around the squadron. They were force to go after the secondary target because they were losing so many bombers on the run. He told me this is final mission when he was shot down and became a POW that it was the flak that ripped apart their plane. He said flak blasted into their fuel lines and it was spraying inside and the engines stopped. He said he'd never forget the weird feeling of the plane. It just felt like it was motionless in the air for a few seconds before it began to fall. Luckily they all bailed out before the fires got bad. Ended up a POW at Stalag Luft 3 (literally 2 weeks after the great escape happened there) until the end of the war.

[@ruhri0411]

Since 90% of these air raids on Berlin were directed against civilians, I can well imagine the motivation of the flak units to get these terror bombers out of the sky. At least your grandfather was lucky not to be stabbed with a pitchfork by some angry farmers.

[@davidpeters6536]

"How good were the German AA gunners, well they had a lot of practise..."

[@normannokes9513]

Statistically 16000 rounds of 88mm per victory. The cost equated to the value of a B17.

[@barfuss2007]

mostly half kids...

[@yurifoxx3983]

Mainly good trained and highly motivated teenagers operated the flak

[@rolandscherer1574]

@@barfuss2007 My father was barely 16 when he was drawn to FLAG, and 18 when the war was over.

[@barfuss2007]

@@rolandscherer1574 ja, so war es meistens. Und ganz ungefährlich war dieser Dienst keinesfalls.

[@macahdahma7382]

"There are pictures of the damage, but you don't see them because the planes...they gone." LOL!!!! Going to supporting Bismark on Patreon...

[@TBreezy17]

If you haven’t seen it I highly recommend ‘The Cold Blue’ on HBO. It’s a documentary on B-17 crews, all in color. It’s pretty wild. They were scared shitless of the flak and rightfully so. Ps: my great uncle was killed in his b-17 in November of 1943 over Wiener-Neudstat after their oxygen system was destroyed by flak and they had to drop out of the combat box. Once out they were torn to pieces by 109’s. My uncle was killed by machine gun fire from a 109. This was told to me by a crewman still alive in 2010 when I found and spoke to him. He said the civilians on the ground almost beat them to death before the Germans actually captured them. Anyways. Crazy story. Planes name: The Dirty Bird.

[@dpeasehead]

I am sorry for your family's loss. Reading memoirs about the real air war wipes away any ideas of "glamorous combat in the heavens" real fast.

[@TBreezy17]

PEEPER57 thx. Ya I’m sure it wasn’t so ‘glorious’

[@erinmoody9892]

@Outdoors Bushman I dont blame the Soviets for murdering germs either

[@paulmichaelsmith3207]

My father piloted a B-24 over Wiener-Neudstat on several missions. Said they were two of his scariest. Like Vienna, only one way in and one way out. The Germans always knew when they were coming and were totally prepared. One crew in the squadron went down one day, they all got out. The civilians hung them in the town square. They were in the tent next to my Dad's.

[@TBreezy17]

@@paulmichaelsmith3207 ya that’s intense for sure. The gentlemen I called who was also part of the crew mentioned ‘That was the only time we were glad to see the Germans’ when the townspeople were taking it to them.

[@BrianAchterberg928]

My grandfather was a Flight Engineer/Waist Gunner on a B-24 with the 489th Bomb Group. He said there were times that the flak from the 88’s was so thick you could walk across it. He also said that the 88’s crews were obviously well trained because the were so accurate. Thank you so much for the upload of this video. It was very well done.👍

[@Bob.W.]

Shot down my uncle's B24 on Nov. 5, 1943. He is buried in the Ardennes Cemetery near Liege.

[@JGalt-em4xu]

Salute, good sir.

[@garycook427]

I am sorry for your loss and the premature end to your uncle's life.

[@hansharz9934]

I presume your uncle is 2nd Lt. Winzenburg, quite German sounding name. Too bad, lost also some reltativesin WW2, my Grand cousin sunk by a Catalina in U-620. My paternal grandpa MIA (rather KIA) in Russia Nov 43.

[@Bob.W.]

@@hansharz9934 yes, his body washed up on shore near Goes, in the Netherlands. They found the plane a few years ago in 10m of water. Sorry for your losses as well. We had a relative manning an antiaircraft gun for the German side as well. Different city, so he didn't shoot his own relative down.

[@hansharz9934]

@@Bob.W. Ja, that would have been even more dramatic. Ususally I prefer original vidio stuff, but can recommend to you the Baltic movie "1944" (or Brothers-enemies) from 2015. It' comes with almost no ideological crap and covers the situation when brothers meet on the battlefield as enemies.

[@dansotelo228]

Dear Bismarck, Your information on Flak is simply amazing. You see I'm 63 yrs old and my best friend's father was a B-17 ball turret gunner late 43 ~ thru 44 in the 8th, Box K squadron, his name was Wayne Schofield. He was very open about telling us stories which were startling, like the time they made it back all shot up and his ball was full of Flak shrapnel. Once 3 crew were severely injured and his plane had to be scrapped. He went thru 3 B-17s and kept the altimeter of each one of them and had them on his desk. He often told us funny things that happened like the time he got tired of cranking the ball up to go take a piss. He took a used heated suit and wrapped the heating unit around a hose with a funnel, and pissed in it. Only to land from a mission and his ball and himself were covered with piss because it didn't work. Like the story of how he ended up being a ball turret gunner is simply hilarious... He was training in Nebraska, and one day in a huge field AAF held a training exercise when several officers went around screaming YOu YOu You file in here! You, You, YOu file in here!!!. Next thing he knew and began to notice that this officer was targeting small men about 5ft 4in and smaller. There were 3 long lines of small men and when he got to the desk an officer on a table gave him two choices "BALL TURRET or TAIL GUNNER!"!! Wayne simply said Ball SIR! Next thing he knew he was out shooting shotguns out of a moving truck for days on end. By the end of the training, Wayne felt very comfortable in the ball, and would not trade his position being anything else. He got to see things many of the plane crew never even came close to seeing. And yes he did have a 45 in case the ball got stuck and had to belly land, and said of all things that happened, that was his biggest fear.

[@guavaburst]

A video of the Luftwaffe in the Courland pocket would be a great subject I think. Edit: Luftwaffe defending the Ploeste oilfields would be interesting too.

[@MilitaryAviationHistory]

Planned :)

[@guavaburst]

Legend status. 😎✌

[@levski19]

Can mention something about the Luftwaffe cooperation with Bulgarian air force. It's kind of related to the defense of the Ploeste oilfields, though I know it's not that much to talk about.

[@neilwilson5785]

That would be amazing. Just been watching TIK's epic Courland series. He works too hard, but the content is great.

[@Filmpilot]

guavaburst One man from my hometown led that raid, General Uzal G. Ent, and picked the crew for the Enola Gay which happened to be my cousin Teddy (Dutch) Van Kirk. Ploesti turned out to be total Charlie Foxtrot.

[@bf945]

There is a US Army Air Corps video on KZbin showing bomber crews the best techniques to avoid German flak. It discusses the different barrage techniques used by the Germans and how best to combat it.

[@kanjtrader1740]

There it is, fascinating

[@PilotSpOB]

Just came across this channel within the last couple of weeks and it easily one of my favorites! Keep up the good work!

[@DavidSmith-ss1cg]

What a great video! I have to admit, I'm especially keen on knowing more about the World War, Part 2; and I've been looking into it for a long time. But between your work and MHV, I am getting lots of details, well-researched, presented in a serious way. I hope that you are able to continue making videos, and that both you men stay well.

[@richb.4374]

My father served in WW2 in Italy. He was not in the army air force but he was fired upon many times by 88's during his tour. They served very well as land target artillery as well as antiaircraft. He once told me that as scary as being in combat was, the one thing he feared more than any German weapon was the German 88. Very high velocity and very accurate. Probably the most menacing weapon the German army had in it's arsenal. Our tank crews feared them more than the ground troops. A Sherman could not take direct hits from an 88.

[@wunderwaffeyt4077]

It's kind of ironic for a man named "Bismarck" to talk about anti-air flak guns and military aviation. Don't judge me, I'm new to the channel

[@pinngg6907]

swordfish go under the flak XD

[@zigjib]

"this was against the treaty of Versailles but.... what are you going to do about it??".... i'm using this line every chance i get, regardless of context

[@andraslibal]

88mm + proximity fuse would have been devastating

[@watchfordpilot]

A fascinating presentation and analysis of a very important subject. Without your video it's doubtful that this would have come to light in such an objective and educational way. Thanks again Mr Bismark.

[@peterbourne5926]

Another great video from you Bismarck I love all your shows I’m trying to watch as many of them as I can thank you from the bottom of my heart. Pete

[@ferdo666]

Direkt geklickt.. und direkt geliebt! Ich liebe deinen Content Bismarck,man lernt soviel von dir

[@user-kp1tj9bo7p]

ferdo666 lädierten ya

[@neilwilson5785]

Wait, I can understand this even though I don't speak German! 'Clicked straight away, love your content... I learned a lot (?)' Cool.

[@user-kp1tj9bo7p]

Neil Wilson älter sind sie ja schon

[@KateLicker]

Ich liebe Bismarck auch, und seine Schwester Tirpitz ist schon auch..

[@user-kp1tj9bo7p]

KateLicker ya Läden dis 8cm flügabwehrkanone über alles

[@jjc5475]

long time since i watched a vid of yours. glad i didn't miss this one. flak always interested me.

[@starfrost276]

I feel that the mere fact that the US had to develop equipment and add armor to bombers as well as crew to combat the Flack 88 confirms that it was effective in that in had a pronounced effect on how the US and Allies in general engaged in The War. Even if the actual effective harm was no more than other enemy measures, its affect was to sew fear of what it might do if the golden BB hit you. In movies / dramatizations we can even see cases of bomber crews desiring to drop their payload early just so they can call the mission over and break off and be clear of the ground based AA batteries.

[@TheRaptorXX]

Yet another classic cauldron of great information Bizzie! Thanks mate.

[@yankeeairpirate1799]

Good info, well done. I hope you do one on The Ho Chi Ming Trail in Laos and N Viet. As an USAF pilot, I got hosed much...by Russian guns..37mm, 57mm and radar controlled 85mm...lost a lot of buddies. I was flying the O-2 as a FAC, at 4500 feet AGL. I directed the fighters onto the trucks and guns...they hated me the most...I enjoyed returning the favor. Blessed to be alive.

[@booster5329]

Excellent video bis,it answered many questions about the 88 flak configuration that I always wondered brugh.Thanx again man.

[@barryjobe]

Excellent presentation - thanks for pulling it together

[@scottbruner9987]

This is the first of your videos that I've watched. I wish I had seen you earlier! VERY detailed. EXTREMELY well presented. THOROUGHLY and ACCURATELY researched. I am officially addicted to ur channel. Sehr gut, sehr gut!

[@MilitaryAviationHistory]

Thanks Scott

[@briankofke]

My grandfather was a tail gunner on a B17 in WW2. The flak was devastating. He told me horrific stories of death due to it.

[@jamesricker3997]

Fighters were worse Bombersformations flew into flak to escape Fighters

[@filmandfirearms]

@@jamesricker3997 Depends on the situation. At low altitude, anti air fire, flak included, would tear a bomber to pieces in a matter of seconds. I'd much rather face a fighter than that. At high altitude, anti air fire is barely a threat to a bomber, but because fighters are more fragile, they have more to be afraid of

[@logankratzke6793]

Thanks for this info I've never actually really thought about flak so this is really cool.

[@rektalproblems9043]

Love this guy, always using archive information to make his videos. Doing more homework than most of the other military historians

[@wideyxyz2271]

Great video as always Bis and the Peace Lilly and books make a nice backdrop.....

[@Icarus931]

Brilliantly spoken.... most people don’t know that you are not only German but hearing impaired..... your English is fantastic!

[@kennethsmith2758]

He would be used to interview the POWs. Dressed in full uniform and offering a American cigarette. Talking of his time in London before the war.

[@derekbrunette222]

bismark, never thought I'd see your face after watching a handful of those war thunder videos. loved that it was always clear that you knew what you were talking about from the start. keep it up, friend

[@grecko8762]

Great channel and thank you for this - adds context to my grandfather's stories. He was a bombardier aboard a B-24 in the 8th Air Force. His plane was damaged by flak and had to crash land after a Ploiesti raid. He had to manually release the bombs before they crashed since the contraption was damaged or they would all have blown up. He personally considered the raids a horrific waste because of to much flak but what a hero.

[@dukecraig2402]

My mother's first cousin was in the 15th Air Force and was a navigator on a B24 crew that did 3 runs on the oil fields at Ploeisti, he was later shot down and killed during a run on the Ferrara railroad bridge on 27 Aug 1944, he was buried in Italy until 1949 when his body was moved to Arlington National Cemetery, I just found out about all of this in the past couple of months and even got to speak to the widow of the pilot (he survived the war and just passed away in 2015) on the phone a couple of weeks ago, turns out when the crew was assembled in Boise idaho she traveled there to marry him and met members of my family who traveled there at the same time, after the plane was shot down the Army couldn't tell the families anything except that 3 parachutes were seen coming out of the plane, she actually traveled from NYC to southwestern Pennsylvania to be with my family during the weeks they were waiting to find out who made it and who didn't, the funny thing is I found out about her and talked to her on the phone the week I moved back to southwestern Pennsylvania from having lived 11 years in Ohio right up the road from her and him, how's that for irony?

[@brucecaldwell5239]

One of my late father's associates & good friend in a law firm was a navigator on a B-17 & he told my dad that without a doubt that flak caused the most fear in the minds of bomber crews. He said on one mission a plane right beside them took a direct hit in the bomb bay while on the bomb run & basically disappeared. His plane was damaged pretty badly too from the debris of the other plane & that they were lucky to get back to England. This man was around 5'-3" or 4" tall & he would get in the fetal position & cover up as best he could with a flak jacket whenever possible. I have the utmost respect & admiration for what those young American & British men did.

[@betraktare1]

I have zero respect for what they did. They destroyed our common European cultural legacy leveling every town in Germany and killing hundreds of thousands of civilians in the process. It was genocidal. No wonder the victors had to come up with excuses to do so for the post-war narrative. The victors write history as is well known. WW2 was not a crusade for "liberty" or any of that moral bullshit. It was economical with the banksters not satisfied with a major european country defecting from the international credit market, abandoning the gold standard and creating a currency tied to country's production. Simply put: they could not allow that to happen as that was a major threat to the fraudulent economic system we still live under - The ever expanding debt economy. You think you live in democracies? ROFL

[@brucecaldwell5239]

@@betraktare1 You are an idiot & moron. Sorry but the allies get to take the moral high ground here pal. Germany sowed the wind & they reaped the whirlwind as Harris put it.

[@mrwhips3623]

@@betraktare1 you are a wise man. Couldn't have said it better myself.

[@mrwhips3623]

@@brucecaldwell5239 history is written by the victor. You buy this propaganda? American was just about as racist as germany in ww2, they just managed to find them selfies on the allied side because of political reasons.

[@philgiglio7922]

@@mrwhips3623 ...who paid to rebuild both Europe and Japan. It wasn't the countries that started it all.

[@hansvonmannschaft9062]

Did I tell you about that day, when I got on KZbin to find some video on how to properly sharpen an axe, and ended up watching a WWII German AA video instead? Man, isn't life weird sometimes.

[@thegreatlongdingo]

Great video, every question I thought of was answered seconds later. Thank you so much

[@Rob-fx2dw]

It would be interesting to compare the difference late in the war in flak kills compared with fighter kills by taking into account the relative amount of contribution that the presence of long range fighters such as the P51 and P47 fighters made. No doubt there would have been a significant difference in comparable flak kills given where defensive fighters operated flak was often reduced to avoid hitting friendly aircraft.

[@ralfkleemann4325]

I'm very impressed by the personal presentation and quality of reasearch. Keep up the great work!!

[@philquintana7790]

My dad was a waist gunner on a B-17 and he said they, the crew, were always more concerned with flack than the fighters. He said, and I'm paraphrasing, "You could shoot at a fighter, you couldn't shoot at a puff of smoke".

[@paavobergmann4920]

imagine the horror...phew...

[@paavobergmann4920]

I always thought the hardest part to stomach in "Catch-22" is the agonizingly slowly revealed story of the waist gunner. That is so awful.

[@EK-gr9gd]

There is one other important thing, not to forget: a fighter will aim at the engines. The desired result was to force the bomber to crash. A heavy flak grenade intends to "desintegrates" a bomber Its aim was to damage the plane in any possible way.

[@barron8006]

THis is a contentious issue. More planes feel to Flak than planes, but more resources were put into Flak than fighter planes (or at least a comparable amount.) Frankly, I'm not sure why Flak wasn't more effective, given the tech of the time.

[@tlw4237]

@@EK-gr9gdDeliberate aiming at engines was not easy when attacking a USAAF bomber formation. Instead of attacking like the RAF did in the Battle of Britain the Luftwaffe frequently attacked USAAF B17 or B24 daylight formations by the ground controllers setting up the fighters to make a head-on pass at the bombers. That way the fighters took the least possible defensive fire during the attack because there were fewer .50 Brownings pointing at them compared to an attack from any other angle. Also, the plexiglass noses of US bombers were quite vulnerable and it needed surprisingly few hits from a 20mm or 30mm cannon to do them an awful lot of damage. If the nose was smashed apart by auto-cannon fire the result often included significant crew casualties, and if the the plane didn’t crash as a consequence of the damage it would often have its aerodynamics and structure so badly compromised it had to dump its bombs and drop out of formation - which made it a very vulnerable thing indeed. The downside to the tactic was the high closing speed which meant that there wasn’t much time to locate and take aim at a bomber, and burst times would have to be very short. After their initial pass the fighters would evasively dive through the bomber formation at high speed then turn to gain distance ahead of it while gaining altitude to be ready for another pass. Assuming the bomber tail and ball gunners, who would fire on them as the passed underneath and behind the bombers, or escorting P-51s and P-47s didn’t give them something rather more urgent to worry about.

[@loulap6937]

Great job you did here, thank you!

[@richardsharp6875]

Thank you, that was excellent, informative and very well researched and well presented. A topic I had always been curious about but something that was avoided by sources. Greatly appreciated your extensive examination of the subject

[@mack123abc48]

6:54: Am I thirsty? 7:00: Nah.

[@roccozocco9630]

I only watch this video to see a guy with a red baroon cup never drinking from it.

[@electrichellion5946]

Mocco Zocco - LoL

[@Paaanzaaa]

Bewegliches Sperrfeuer is meant to be done like a creeping barrage of artillery. Each one to four batteries were assigned an area of airspace, which got divided into different sectors. When huge bomber formations were approaching, they'd shell every sector with a couple of shells and then change to another, making it harder for the bomber's pilots to evade the zones being fired in. Mostly this tactic has been used when A. Not enough AA-Guns were available for the airspace to cover or B. If the batteries had to be placed spread out over a big area to cover it or C. As ammunition was hardly available in needed amounts Can't give you a written source to it, as it has been taught to me in military training for air-defence.

[@stevensanders1061]

Your presentations are just great, all of them. Your what keeps history alive, please keep up the fine research tou do and tell the world..

[@KorbinX]

You always have fantastic videos, thank you my friend.

[@neurofiedyamato8763]

6:53, lifts cup but doesn't drink. I love it :P Its a oddly satisfying motion without actually being distracting to the content. I don't know why it works but it does.

[@Blablablabla1ify]

Bismarck, there is no way to overstate your status as a bit of an internet hero. I’d like to think that when Tim Berners-Lee released this wild beast upon us, it was future legends such as your good self that he was hoping would dominate the airwaves (or rather fibre cables) instead of gossip and waffle. Thank you for your dedication! German excellence at its finest 😁

[@jenslichtenthaler2840]

My father was a professional soldier and served in a Fak unit throughout World War II. He told me long stories about his experiences in the war. First he was traveling with his unit via Poland to Russia. The advance through Ukraine to Odessa was very quick. Some units couldn't keep up with the pace. So it came about that the Fak cannons faced attacks by Russian T-34s. This is where the ingenious design of the Flak 8.8 came into effect. In mobile use, the cannon stood on a low platform truck with 4 rubber tires. The cannon could be fired directly from this car in any direction. The cannon weighed approx. 7 to 8 tons with the car. In this way the entire gun could be maneuvered by the crew on the ground. In the basic position, a shell was pushed into the chamber at high speed, or better thrown. As a result, the cocked breech was closed and immediately fired when continuous fire was stopped. The pipe ran back, was braked by the return damper and the lock automatically opened and tightened again, ready for the next end. A cycle lasted only a few seconds. Different with a direct shot. The gunner aimed directly at a tank with a telescopic sight, aimed the barrel with cranks, and then released the end. The shell left the gun barrel at a speed of about 4000 k / hour. Every T-34 could be destroyed at a distance of 2 km. My father's unit was moved from the Ukraine to Hamburg for anti-aircraft protection. He was stationed on the flak bunker in Hamburg - Wilhelmsburg. On a summer night in 1943, 600 British bombers attacked Hamburg. My father was on duty and was standing on the top platform of the bunker when the bombs rained down. All anti-aircraft guns fired in continuous fire: 8.8, 10.5 and 12.7 cm. As my father said, the anti-aircraft tower turned into a fire-breathing mountain. Soon Hamburg was totally bombed and the flak unit was relocated to France. On the night before D-Day, US paratroopers jumped off near the location of the anti-aircraft unit. The planes flew low and were hit by the headlights. All calibers, from 12.7 to 2.0 cm Vierling Flak and of course MG 42 fired from all barrels. The picture is known from the paratrooper who jumps off and gets stuck on the hand of the church clock in the commune of Sainte-Mère-Église. From then on it just went back. In the spring of 1945, the flak unit was able to cross the Rhine near Bad Godesberg with an undamaged ferry. The flak unit was then stationed on the right bank of the Rhine, above the Remagen bridge. The advancing Americans came under heavy fire. Then the ammunition ran out and the fuel ran out. About 20 km from Remagen, in a northerly direction, the anti-aircraft unit was disbanded. The cannons destroyed and my father got the discharge papers. That night my father marched with a comrade through the woods and the American lines. After about 20 km he arrived home. The uniform was burned and he put on a peasant smock. With that the war was over for my father.

[@Ozymandias3505]

Great video, as always

[@harrisaqeel]

Its raining and there’s thunder abound. I look into the bathroom mirror and think “ my skull to body ratio is only helping my chances of being wounded in the body if I was in a ww2 bomber.”

[@jeffreyhueseman7061]

The flipping of the percentage of flak between the B-17 and B-24 versus the wing spars, low for the B-17 versus high for the B-24.

[@nickmaclean5816]

Great video. Very well explained!!

[@gfg_horseman7159]

Awesome video Bismark! Thanks for the information. :)

[@bluesnowfox361]

You sound like a very American German or a very German American. On an unrelated note, wonderful video!

[@HaakonDueland]

My dude, you really need to work on your audio. I have to go like super high on my volume compared to every other video to even be able to hear what you're saying.

[@MilitaryAviationHistory]

Hey Haakon, I've heard after uploading that it is a bit quiet. I'll try to keep it in mind for future renders however, for me this video at System volume: 50 and YT volume: 20 is about as loud as I could call comfortable.

[@t3chn0m0]

Must be your System. Sound is perfectly fine vor me.

[@schmitty5461]

Same I have no audio issue either are you watching on a phone?

[@vire559]

@@MilitaryAviationHistory I have the same problem. I watch from my phone

[@lonerangerv1224]

Yeah this video is so much quieter than everything else and i had to turn the sound up a lot to be able to hear what was being said

[@mattrowland473]

As usual, an outstanding analysis and presentation of the WW2 technical info.

[@WCW4469]

Great info and analysis, thank you for the great content!

[@SeanBZA]

My father was taken out by a night fighter shooting his Lancaster out from underneath him. He landed in Austria, and woke up 6 weeks later in a hospital, with another one of his squadron there as well. Learnt from the unhappy doctors and nurses that when he was considered well enough to release he would be sent to Buchenwalt, so they planned an escape, and got across the Swiss border. Every time he went for a chest X ray the doctor said he had massive TB , but that was in fact the shrapnel from the plane, as his entire back was scar tissue from the parachute burning.

[@nejlaakyuz4025]

Your father is a certifiesd badass and a war hero.

[@Vargsohn]

Nightbombing civilians

[@SeanBZA]

@@Vargsohn Funny enough on his way to leave presents at a factory he actually did live near. He had a very good reason not to have too much in the line of incidental damage. Funny thing that, if he had not been in Liverpool and Glasgow in 1939......

[@garycook427]

@@Vargsohn take your ball and go home..

[@garycook427]

My comment was meant for: Vargsohn Vargsohn 2 weeks ago Nightbombing civilians

[@_datapoint]

The audio is very quiet when compared to other channels I watch. But good show! A lot of information I was always curious about.

[@talijamir5395]

Affirmative narration... Thank you

[@drbbtube]

Good job. Nice graphics and solid references!

[@cwscoldie]

His pronunciation of "Sprengranate" is so german, even i (being a german) had to laug... It kinda sounds as if his mouth was literally exploding Very phonetically vivid Sir!

[@GigglesClown]

I dont know how you guys say the things you do, out of every language I've ever heard german is the most foreign to me, hell swahili is easier for me to pronounce than german

[@Leon_der_Luftige]

Noah Gephart And where might you be from then?

[@isni1946]

Simple request but could you please increase sound volume of your video ? it's really low on average

[@LTPottenger]

to say the least

[@thENDweDIE]

One could buy ear buds for as low as $1.00usd...

[@abarthcorsa3493]

Turn volume up?

[@GRANDMASTER3D]

Can't hear it. Very disappointing. Not finishing vid.

[@steveolson69]

@@thENDweDIE it's still hard to hear!

[@CDeanhartman]

So good I had to watch it twice.

[@richardstuart325]

Flak is what finally brought down my uncle's Lancaster. They had managed to shoot down a JU88 and fought off a few more fighter attacks, but in the end it was a flak burst under the belly of the aircraft that brought them down.

[@bradleyanderson4315]

The 88 was deadly against US tanks and vehicles also. An old coworker was missing digits on his right hand due to "a cussed 88".

[@filmandfirearms]

American soldiers also had a tendency to call every heavy German gun they didn't actually know "an 88". For example, look at the reports of American units taking fire from German 88s at Anzio. We know from German reports that not a single one of the 88s at or near Anzio was used for indirect fire. Naturally, I would expect the men firing the guns to know what they were firing them at. Those soldiers had most likely heard about the 88 from their air corp buddies and thought "the Germans sure are hitting us with a big gun. Must be that 88 that bombardier was telling me about."

[@NotSoHeavyD3]

I wish I had seen this video before I went to the local tank museum. They've got an 88 and even a Kommandogerät to go with it.

[@georgeslater9289]

You could not get a more German analysis of this topic. Love the video! Danke!

[@archlefirth2279]

Didn't expect a video on Flak to be my favorite MHV video but damn, that was a comprehensive overview. Getting into the studies findings down to numbers, percentages and statistical significance is what made this especially good.

[@MilitaryAviationHistory]

I'm MAH, not MHV :) But thank you very much!

[@mathewritchie]

When I first heard how many shells it took to bring down a bomber my immediate thought was to ask how many fighters could they have put into service for the same cost,and would it have been more effective?

[@jrd33]

AA guns are MUCH cheaper than fighters. Fighters also need all the infrastructure of airfields, aircraft maintenance and repair, refueling, pilot training, etc, etc. And Allied fighters could shoot down German fighters much more easily than they could neutralize German AA batteries. AA guns also work in all weather, unlike fighters.

[@filmandfirearms]

Needless to say, an AA gun is significantly cheaper than a fighter. It's also significantly easier to train an AA gun team than it is to train a good pilot. There's also no limitation of training for a rookie AA gunner as the enemy closes in. If the enemy has air superiority, you can't give new pilots the flight time they need because they're just going to get shot down. A brand new AA gun crewman, on the other hand, gets more opportunities to learn his craft the more the enemy closes in because he has more targets to shoot at. A shell also arrives on the scene far quicker than any aircraft could ever hope to

[@massimookissed1023]

One huge purpose of Flak is to give the people on the ground a feeling that they're not helpless.

[@WonderDog1991]

this was very well done!

[@petervad]

Excellent! Thank you.

[@Xino6804]

Now imagine if they had the VT shell

[@melvillesperryn9268]

@the Germans were developing a similar fuze, but which used magnetic influence rather than radar

[@adamweaver1594]

I watched videos of british and U.S. pilots saying german flak was very accurate and thats enough for me.

[@johngreally9599]

Utterly fascinating... I could joyfully gobble up another 3-4 hours on that topic. Maybe a month long course.

[@zulubeatz1]

Strangely this is something I've always wanted to know about. Thank you

[@keaaul808]

I can imagine the AAA explosion debris raining directly underneath, back down at the sources. Wasn’t that a problem in itself not mentioned in history?

[@filmandfirearms]

I would be very surprised if it came down in any concentrated amount after falling as far as it did, and people generally stayed in bunkers during air raids. Besides, when you consider that their goal was to bring massive aircraft crashing down to earth, sometimes demolishing entire houses on impact, a few shards of metal is basically irrelevant

[@lbnesquik3114]

I think your audio is a bit too low

[@WillKrcelic]

Great video, I especially like the way you presented yourself. I like the coffee mug and casual stance that you chose.

[@Filmpilot]

Very informative, thank you!

[@Bird_Dog00]

Looking at the casualties of the different crew men, I wonder if the high casualties of waist gunners isn't typical survivor bias (you mentioned the issue but didn't go into details): Their position does not contain anything vital for the aircraft other than the cables for the tail controll surfaces. Same goes for the bombardier. We have pictures of B-17s with their nose missing that made it back. So getting hit there won't kill the plane, just the bombardier. The top guner and radio operator on the other hand are sitting near the wings and engines. So a hit there will more likely compromise the aircrafts ability to make it into the statistic. I would have expected the pilot and copilot to have the lowest casualty rate among aircraft to return, but you mentioned that the ventral turret was often not ocupied, so this position beating the flight crew makes sense.

[@dukecraig2402]

My mother's first cousin, 2nd Lt Virgil Davison, was a navigator on a B24 and was killed by fire from an 88, on 27 Aug 44 during a run on the Ferrara railroad bridge in Italy and about 2 seconds after bomb release the first shell hit the #3 engine setting it immediately on fire, about 2 seconds after that the 2nd shell hit in the foreward area of the fuselage and exploded and is undoubtedly the hit that killed him. The pilot, Solomon Weiss, and 2 other crewmembers made it out of the plane and spent the rest of the war in a POW camp, I just found out about the existence of my mother's cousin and his death in the war in the past couple of months, and just weeks ago found out that the pilots wife was still alive and got to speak to her on the phone, turns out that after the plane was shot down it was 5 to 6 weeks until the Army could tell the families the fate of the individual crew members and during that time she traveled from NYC to southwestern Pennsylvania to be with my family while everyone waited to hear who was dead and who was a POW, Solomon Weiss survived the war and went on to get an engineering degree in aeronautics and worked at the NACA in Cleveland which eventually became NASA, he was part of developing the potassium reactor that was used on the LEM of the Apollo missions. Here's the really ironic part of the story, when I was born in 1965 the family gave my parents Virgil's old bed for me, as I said I never knew anything about him until recently, after growing up sleeping in his bed and not knowing anything about him I graduated high school in 1983 and joined the Army as an Air Defense gunner (Vulcan), you can't make this kind of stuff up folks. Here's a little more irony for you, I found out about the pilot and him surviving the war the week after moving back to southwestern Pa after living in Ohio for 11 years and that Solomon lived not far up the road from me until his death in 2015, like I said, you can't make this kind of stuff up.

[@HvH909]

I really enjoyed this and the details!

[@beachboy1234]

You are good at this. Keep it up!

[@cannonfodder4376]

A Greg video yesterday and now this and MHV's video, you all spoil us. TV has nothing on this. An Informative look at something that actually get little attention among us.

[@kubauhlir1730]

The video was incredibly quiet, i had to put it onto my bluetooth speker to hear something... An ad then blew my ears off :/

[@magnusforsman9150]

War is hell ! 😉

[@jarikinnunen1718]

In Finland they added magnesium in 88`s shells for disturb night bombing. It work. Only 5 % of buildings damaged. Fake fires at outside of Helsinki helped. Two radars was in use and night fighters also.

[@rodrigoquiroga8590]

Excellent work !! Congrats