maddie Report This Comment
Date: August 14, 2009 05:56PM

Charlie Brown was a B-17 Flying Fortress pilot with the 379th Bomber Group at Kimbolton, England. His B-17 was called 'Ye Old Pub' and was in a terrible state, having been hit by flak and fighters. The compass was damaged and they were flying deeper over enemy territory instead of heading home to Kimbolton.
After flying over an enemy airfield, a pilot named Franz Steigler was ordered to take off and shoot down the B-17. When he got near the B-17, he could not believe his eyes. In his words, he 'had never seen a plane in such a bad state'. The tail and rear section was severely damaged, and the tail gunner wounded. The top gunner was all over the top of the fuselage. The nose was smashed and there were holes everywhere.
Despite having ammunition, Franz flew to the side of the B-17 and looked at Charlie Brown, the pilot. Brown was scared and struggling to control his damaged and blood-stained plane.
Aware that they had no idea where they were going, Franz waved at Charlie to turn 180 degrees. Franz escorted and guided the stricken plane to and slightly over the North Sea towards England. He then saluted Charlie Brown and turned away, back to Europe.
When Franz landed he told the CO that the plane had been shot down over the sea, and never told the truth to anybody. Charlie Brown and the remains of his crew told all at their briefing, but were ordered never to talk about it.
More than 40 years later, Charlie Brown wanted to find the Luftwaffe pilot who saved the crew. After years of research, Franz was found. He had never talked about the incident, not even at post-war reunions.
They met in the USA at a 379th Bomber Group reunion, together with 25 people who are alive now - all because Franz never fired his guns that day. Research shows that Charlie Brown lived in Seattle and Franz Steigler had moved to Vancouver, BC after the war. When they finally met, they discovered they had lived less than 200 miles apart for the past 50 years!!

doofy Report This Comment
Date: August 14, 2009 07:14PM

Thanks for the amazing story,I remember reading it years ago in the Vancouver Sun newspaper and it was quite compelling.

I also remember a part where the German pilot thought to himself "I've had enough killing for one day" just before deciding to

escort the Yankee fly-boys home.

fossil_digger Report This Comment
Date: August 14, 2009 11:50PM

i thought MAddie and Mex anti-war

maddie Report This Comment
Date: August 15, 2009 05:51PM

I am against WAR. But WAR does happen and SOMETIMES necessary.

We fought a country with no :
Planes
Helicipters
Attack Carriers
Tanks
No Standing Military
and basicaly a dirt shit country with no DEfense.

And we managed to BREAK our Economy doing it.
Bush and friends knew that this war would bring great profit as well as loot from invading that countrys plunder.
WERES OUR RETURN ON MY MONEY INVESTMENT...........
Money doent go away. Follow the Money trail.

No ,not against NECESSARY WAR. Just one were gonna get screwed out of our Nations Wealth.

fossil_digger Report This Comment
Date: August 15, 2009 06:24PM

i would say we dominated the air space and all the tanks fell for the old end around. and we spent ourselves into this mess. but that's me.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 15/08/2009 06:26PM by fossil_digger.

FrostedApe Report This Comment
Date: August 16, 2009 03:03AM

I was originally for the invasions of both Afghanistan and Iraq, but I'm having second thoughts now. I think we would have ultimately been better off if we had invaded Venzuela, and just let the ragheads kill each other off. Nobody on Earth is as enthusiastic about, and efficient at, killing ragheads, as other ragheads. Maybe carpet bomb whichever side starts winning too much, until they're more or less even, then air-drop guns and ammo to both sides.