Hanna Reitsch - Third Reich

Third Reich

In 1937 Reitsch was posted to the Luftwaffe testing centre at Rechlin-Lärz Airfield by Ernst Udet. She was a test pilot on the Junkers Ju 87 Stuka and Dornier Do 17 projects. Reitsch was the first female helicopter pilot and one of the few pilots to fly the Focke-Achgelis Fa 61, the first fully controllable helicopter. Her flying skill, desire for publicity and photogenic qualities made her a star of Nazi party propaganda. Physically she was petite in stature, very slender with blonde hair, blue eyes and a "ready smile". She appeared in Nazi Party propaganda throughout the late 1930s and early 1940s. In 1938 she made nightly flights of the Fa 61 helicopter inside the "Deutschlandhalle" at the Berlin Motor Show.

At the outbreak of war in 1939 Reitsch was asked to fly many of Germany's latest designs, among them the rocket-propelled Messerschmitt Me 163 Komet as well as several larger bombers on which she tested various mechanisms for cutting barrage balloon cables. A crash on her fifth Me 163 flight badly injured Reitsch, who reportedly insisted on writing her post-flight report before falling unconscious and spending five months in hospital. Reitsch became Adolf Hitler's favourite pilot and was one of only two women awarded the Iron Cross during World War II. She became close to former fighter pilot and high-ranking Luftwaffe officer Robert Ritter von Greim.

During the winter of 1943 to 1944, she was assigned to the development of suicide aircraft and, under the command of SS-Obersturmbannführer Otto Skorzeny, was the first founding member of the SS-Selbstopferkommando Leonidas (Leonidas Squadron). This project, in which the pilots flew manned bombs and died during the mission, similarly to the later use of Tokkōtai (or "Kamikaze") by the Japanese, was proposed by Hitler on 28 February 1944. It is probable that the idea originated with Reitsch during her testing of the Messerschmitt Me 163 in 1942: she was the first to volunteer for the newly formed unit. The programme met with considerable resistance from the Luftwaffe high command and was never activated: even Hitler was initially reluctant to accept its use. The unit was disbanded one year later.