Injury May Have Led to Red Baron's Death

[jamotto]

Link

[Soback]

Yeah, that guy is THE LEGEND in aviation. He shot down the most enemy aircraft ever, not only that but after receiving an open head wound he snuck out of the hospital and that same day shot down some more enemy aircraft (with that open head wound, he just wraped the head to keep it closed). I mean talk about bravery, dedication, patriotism, comraderie...nobody has matched him since then. His flying career (that's what I know of him) is incredible.

[Soback]

Reading that article, what a bunch of freaking bastards:

"In combat, the environment is very austere and the individual has to act quickly and make critical decisions, and he just lost the capacity to incorporate all that data quickly and make solid judgments. He didn't have the mental flexibility to realize he shouldn't pursue that plane."

He has shot down numerious airplanes AFTER the injury, how's that for quick reflexes, he pursued that plane because he though he could shoot it down, he is an ACE, an incredible fighter, nobody matched his skills, ever. Damn, they just have to mud his image somehow, every single hero these days gets analyzed and gets crap spread over his image, what's with these people these days, &*^$^%#<.

[Soback]

Just to put it in perspective, he shot down 80 that's EIGHTY airplanes. If you shoot down 5 you are considered an ace, some were lukcy enough to shoot down about 10 and survive, extreemly rare it was 15 to 20. Nobody even came close to his record, and 7 (I think) or a little less than 10 of those 80 were AFTER the head wound. Maybe then people can understand why they should't be shuffling through his records and saying things like that, that his judgement was clouded and he shouldn't have been flying. He would have been considered an Ace even if he was let fly with an open head wound because he shot down more than 5 AFTER that wound, their whole argument is that people can't be good pilots after a head injury, apparently their whole argument is a sham to get some kind of research grant and a paycheck because Red Baron proved them wrong.

[jamotto]

I don't think they are trying to muddy his image. They are just trying to explain why he followed that plane on that fateful day. For all intents and purposes it was uncharacteristically wreak less of him to do so. He had been in the same situation as the day he was killed, the only difference is that on those days he chose not to pursue. What was different on the day he died? Why did he pursue the plane when we think it should had been obvious that he shouldn't have. It's a question that will never be conclusively answered.

[dreadx]

I also don't think they are trying to muddy his image.

As you say Soback, the Red Baron had no equal.

His British enemies (the rookies at least) were nicknamed "The 20 second-ers" for that was the average time a rookie survived against him.

The Red Baron wrote the book on dogfighting with planes. Therefore people can't believe that he rational deceided to pursue that plane, thereby braking his own (prime) rule.

Never pursue an fleeing enemy. Especially when you are alone (as he was at the time) and certainly not when you're outnumbered (which he also was).

He pursued the plane while they were flying at an altitude that forced both planes to take evasive manoeuvres in order to avoid hitting a church-tower. They were that low. The Red Baron also should have know that pursueing the enemy plane would bring him directly over enemy-ground positions. This combined with the low altitude made him vulnerable to ground-fire.

Recently was determined that one of the sub-machine-gunners on the ground is the most likely person to have shot the Baron through the side of his chest, forcing him to make an emergency landing. The Baron died on the spot.

The Red Baron made a serie of very-uncharacteristic mistakes and showed strange flying behaviour (like doubling back over the ground positions) those last moments. This head wound could be the cause of that.

They don't muddy his image. What they actually say is that, that day, the person flying the red fokker-tri-plane was not (or no longer) the real Red Baron due to the head trauma.

[Soback]

He shot down over 5 planes with that head trauma. So obviously it had nothing to do with the head trauma on that day. Why don't they look at all the other planes that got shot down, did every single pilot have a head trauma? Their research is laughable because just like I said before, it has no basis, he was still able to fly and SHOOT DOWN planes AFTER recieveing the head injury, on that day things just didn't go his way, just like on the day when he received the head injury.

Flying and dogfighting is an art not a science, so there's no 100% chance that you will make it back, and those "researchers" are wasting government money on this @$^^@.

[Captain McMahon]

Soback, the head trama could have caused him to make an error. No one has said that is a fact, just speculation. Even his mothe rand him noticed differences. This is just speculation until you or someone else invents a time-machine. It's a matter of opinion that's all. And all the comments you make prove he was still a great fighter, but that doesn't mean he couldn't have been crazy?