WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:03.980 So let's set the stage for today's deep dive, 00:00:04.179 --> 00:00:07.200 because the date is really critical here. It's 00:00:07.200 --> 00:00:11.400 early 1945. January 1945, to be exact. Right. 00:00:11.839 --> 00:00:13.519 And Germany at this point isn't just cracking. 00:00:14.039 --> 00:00:16.079 It is actively collapsing. You have the Red Army 00:00:16.079 --> 00:00:18.460 just steamrolling in from the east. The Western 00:00:18.460 --> 00:00:20.660 allies are crossing the borders. And the cities 00:00:20.660 --> 00:00:24.379 are, well, they're being turned to rubble. by 00:00:24.379 --> 00:00:27.160 round -the -clock Allied bombing. It is the absolute 00:00:27.160 --> 00:00:30.079 definition of a gutter -demerung scenario. You 00:00:30.079 --> 00:00:33.399 know the literal end of the world for the regime. 00:00:33.600 --> 00:00:36.039 So logically, you'd assume every single ounce 00:00:36.039 --> 00:00:39.060 of German military energy would be focused outward. 00:00:39.140 --> 00:00:41.340 Outward, yeah. Stopping the tanks. Stopping the 00:00:41.340 --> 00:00:43.520 bombers. Yeah. But looking at the source material 00:00:43.520 --> 00:00:45.140 for today's discussion, that is not what was 00:00:45.140 --> 00:00:46.859 happening inside the low form. No, not at all. 00:00:47.200 --> 00:00:49.320 While the roof was... Quite literally caving 00:00:49.320 --> 00:00:51.840 in, the German Air Force decided to start a civil 00:00:51.840 --> 00:00:53.920 war. An actual mutiny? Effectively, yes. Who 00:00:53.920 --> 00:00:56.179 dat? A mutiny involving the most famous, highly 00:00:56.179 --> 00:00:58.979 decorated national heroes of the air war. Against 00:00:58.979 --> 00:01:00.920 their own supreme commander, Hermann Göring. 00:01:01.039 --> 00:01:03.320 Which is just wild when you think about the context 00:01:03.320 --> 00:01:06.359 of the regime. Oh, absolutely. We're talking 00:01:06.359 --> 00:01:09.280 about the fighter pilot's revolt today. And I 00:01:09.280 --> 00:01:11.040 really want to be clear about the stakes here 00:01:11.040 --> 00:01:14.040 for you listening. In the Nazi regime, you don't 00:01:14.040 --> 00:01:16.480 just file a complaint with HR. No, you usually 00:01:16.480 --> 00:01:19.640 get shot. for looking at a superior officer the 00:01:19.640 --> 00:01:23.680 wrong way. Exactly. Yet these guys, men like 00:01:23.680 --> 00:01:26.739 Johannes Steinhoff and Günther Lutzow, they walked 00:01:26.739 --> 00:01:28.659 into a room to tell the second most powerful 00:01:28.659 --> 00:01:31.459 man in Germany that he was incompetent. It's 00:01:31.459 --> 00:01:34.239 a fascinating study in sheer desperation. So 00:01:34.239 --> 00:01:36.640 our mission today is to unpack exactly how this 00:01:36.640 --> 00:01:39.099 happened. We're going to dive into the disaster 00:01:39.099 --> 00:01:41.579 of Operation Baseplate that triggered it and 00:01:41.579 --> 00:01:44.640 the technical tragedy of the Me 262 jet. And 00:01:44.640 --> 00:01:46.480 we were pulling this directly from historical 00:01:46.480 --> 00:01:48.739 accounts of the incident, including direct testimonies 00:01:48.739 --> 00:01:51.120 from the pilots themselves. Guys like Steinhoff 00:01:51.120 --> 00:01:52.920 who were actually in the room. But before we 00:01:52.920 --> 00:01:55.140 get to that big confrontation, we have to look 00:01:55.140 --> 00:01:57.239 at the personalities involved. Because this wasn't 00:01:57.239 --> 00:01:59.480 just a sudden explosion. Right. It was a slow 00:01:59.480 --> 00:02:01.760 -motion car crash between Göring and the head 00:02:01.760 --> 00:02:04.379 of the fighter arm, Adolf Galland. You really 00:02:04.379 --> 00:02:06.680 have to understand the disconnect there. Galland 00:02:06.680 --> 00:02:09.719 was a pragmatist. Yeah, he's this cigar -chomping 00:02:09.719 --> 00:02:12.759 ace who insists on flying combat missions even 00:02:12.759 --> 00:02:15.400 when he's promoted to general. He sees the reality 00:02:15.400 --> 00:02:18.139 in the sky. He knows the Allied bombers are just 00:02:18.139 --> 00:02:20.419 overwhelming them. And Guring, on the other hand, 00:02:20.560 --> 00:02:23.020 is living in a total fantasy world. Completely 00:02:23.020 --> 00:02:25.860 detached from reality. By 1945, he is obsessed 00:02:25.860 --> 00:02:28.379 with a stolen art collection and heavily popping 00:02:28.379 --> 00:02:31.699 pills. But he still maintains the fragile ego 00:02:31.699 --> 00:02:34.879 of a dictator. And the source material highlights 00:02:34.879 --> 00:02:38.439 one specific thing that really poisoned the well 00:02:38.439 --> 00:02:41.240 between him and his pilots. Cowardice accusations. 00:02:41.360 --> 00:02:43.780 Yes. It wasn't just a one time insult either. 00:02:44.439 --> 00:02:47.319 As the cities burned, Goering just couldn't admit 00:02:47.319 --> 00:02:50.020 that the Allies had air superiority. He couldn't 00:02:50.020 --> 00:02:52.759 admit that his own strategy had failed. So his 00:02:52.759 --> 00:02:55.520 default setting was to blame the men in the cockpits. 00:02:55.719 --> 00:02:58.039 Imagine that for a second. You're a young pilot 00:02:58.039 --> 00:03:00.099 flying a Messerschmitt against a thousand heavy 00:03:00.099 --> 00:03:02.319 bombers in a swarm of escort fighters. You're 00:03:02.319 --> 00:03:04.439 watching your friends get shot down every single 00:03:04.439 --> 00:03:06.659 day. You land exhausted, covered in sweat and 00:03:06.659 --> 00:03:09.039 oil, and the Reich Marshal sends a telegram calling 00:03:09.039 --> 00:03:11.159 you a coward because you didn't magically stop 00:03:11.159 --> 00:03:13.939 the raid. That is precisely why the bitterness 00:03:13.939 --> 00:03:17.439 ran so incredibly deep. The source notes a, quote, 00:03:17.699 --> 00:03:20.840 deep feeling of bitterness, unquote, among the 00:03:20.840 --> 00:03:23.840 officers. They felt utterly betrayed. They were 00:03:23.840 --> 00:03:26.479 risking their lives for a leadership that openly 00:03:26.479 --> 00:03:29.180 despised them. But the breaking point, the actual 00:03:29.180 --> 00:03:31.460 spark that turned all that bitterness into an 00:03:31.460 --> 00:03:34.680 act of rebellion was a specific military operation 00:03:34.680 --> 00:03:38.939 on New Year's Day, 1945. Operation Baseplate. 00:03:39.139 --> 00:03:41.860 This is the moment the dam finally broke. Now, 00:03:41.979 --> 00:03:44.080 in most general history books, this gets maybe 00:03:44.080 --> 00:03:47.340 a passing paragraph. They attacked allied airfields 00:03:47.340 --> 00:03:50.199 and lost. But our sources show this was so much 00:03:50.199 --> 00:03:52.979 more than just a failed attack. It was the absolute 00:03:52.979 --> 00:03:55.539 death blow for the German fighter force. Because 00:03:55.539 --> 00:03:58.719 Gallen had spent months hoarding planes and fuel 00:03:58.719 --> 00:04:01.819 right. Yes, he was desperately hiding them, saving 00:04:01.819 --> 00:04:03.960 them up for one massive defensive interception 00:04:03.960 --> 00:04:06.439 to hit the bomber streams. And Goering just hijacked 00:04:06.439 --> 00:04:08.500 that entire strategic reserve. He took everything 00:04:08.500 --> 00:04:10.659 Gallen had scraped together and ordered a low 00:04:10.659 --> 00:04:13.000 -level offensive strike on allied airfields in 00:04:13.000 --> 00:04:15.360 the low countries. And the result was catastrophic. 00:04:15.520 --> 00:04:18.339 Completely. Johanna Steinhoff actually testified 00:04:18.339 --> 00:04:20.819 that the fighter reserve's gallon had built up 00:04:20.819 --> 00:04:23.660 were, quote, senselessly dissipated, unquote, 00:04:23.879 --> 00:04:26.220 in this operation. Senselessly dissipated. Yeah. 00:04:26.680 --> 00:04:28.939 But here is the nuance that people often miss. 00:04:29.480 --> 00:04:32.560 It wasn't just about losing the airplanes. Germany 00:04:32.560 --> 00:04:34.939 was actually still producing plenty of fighter 00:04:34.939 --> 00:04:38.079 planes in early 1945. Right. The factories hadn't 00:04:38.079 --> 00:04:40.079 moved underground. They had the metal. They had 00:04:40.079 --> 00:04:42.100 the machines, but they didn't have the men. Exactly. 00:04:42.339 --> 00:04:44.420 Operation Baseplate didn't just lose airframes. 00:04:44.779 --> 00:04:48.079 It wiped out the unit leaders. The Commodores. 00:04:48.519 --> 00:04:50.639 The guys with five or six years of hard combat 00:04:50.639 --> 00:04:53.779 experience. The institutional brain of the entire 00:04:53.779 --> 00:04:56.300 Luftwaffe was just wiped out in a single morning. 00:04:56.360 --> 00:04:58.100 Because you can build a new plane in a week, 00:04:58.339 --> 00:05:01.040 but you cannot build a new squadron leader. When 00:05:01.040 --> 00:05:03.560 those veterans were shot down on January 1st, 00:05:03.600 --> 00:05:06.420 the training pipeline was already broken. Steinhoff 00:05:06.420 --> 00:05:08.540 said the prospects for defense looked, quote, 00:05:08.839 --> 00:05:11.660 gloomy, unquote, after this. Gloomy feels like 00:05:11.660 --> 00:05:14.379 a massive understatement. They basically lobotomize 00:05:14.379 --> 00:05:16.420 their own Air Force. And the pilots are watching 00:05:16.420 --> 00:05:18.709 all of this happen in real time. They know the 00:05:18.709 --> 00:05:21.389 war is lost, but now they're watching their leadership 00:05:21.389 --> 00:05:24.290 actively get their friends killed for what was 00:05:24.290 --> 00:05:26.850 essentially a PR stunt. And that radicalizes 00:05:26.850 --> 00:05:29.589 them. You have to imagine the atmosphere in those 00:05:29.589 --> 00:05:31.670 ready rooms. They aren't just dutiful soldiers 00:05:31.670 --> 00:05:34.069 anymore. Right. They're angry professionals watching 00:05:34.069 --> 00:05:36.689 amateurs destroy everything they built. Which 00:05:36.689 --> 00:05:39.610 brings us to the actual conspiracy. And it really 00:05:39.610 --> 00:05:42.709 does feel like a conspiracy. You have a meeting 00:05:42.709 --> 00:05:45.089 arranged by Karl Kaller, the chief of staff. 00:05:45.290 --> 00:05:48.269 He sets up this massive confrontation at the 00:05:48.269 --> 00:05:51.329 Haus der Pfleger in Berlin. On January 19th, 00:05:51.370 --> 00:05:54.810 1945, Coller is acting as the middleman here 00:05:54.810 --> 00:05:57.470 because he knows the pilots are at an absolute 00:05:57.470 --> 00:06:00.110 boiling point. So he arranges for a delegation 00:06:00.110 --> 00:06:02.810 of the Jagdwaffe, the fighter force, to meet 00:06:02.810 --> 00:06:05.509 with Goering face to face. And the past of characters 00:06:05.509 --> 00:06:08.129 that walks into that room is just staggering. 00:06:08.370 --> 00:06:10.689 If you're going to commit treason, You definitely 00:06:10.689 --> 00:06:12.629 want some heavy hitters with you. Who was there? 00:06:12.829 --> 00:06:16.290 It was the who's who of German aces. Winther 00:06:16.290 --> 00:06:18.850 Litzow was chosen as the primary spokesman. You 00:06:18.850 --> 00:06:21.610 had Anistrout Loft. Eduard Neumann. Gustav Rudel. 00:06:21.810 --> 00:06:23.889 And of course, Johannes Steinhoff. These are 00:06:23.889 --> 00:06:25.970 men who have diamonds on their night's crosses. 00:06:26.750 --> 00:06:29.550 Their faces were literally on postcards. And 00:06:29.550 --> 00:06:31.550 that celebrity status is the only reason they 00:06:31.550 --> 00:06:33.829 even got in the door. If a regular major tried 00:06:33.829 --> 00:06:36.009 to request this meeting, he'd be court -martialed 00:06:36.009 --> 00:06:38.589 before he cleared his throat. They were heavily 00:06:38.589 --> 00:06:41.810 banking on their status as national heroes to 00:06:41.810 --> 00:06:44.250 protect them from the Gestapo. So they walk into 00:06:44.250 --> 00:06:47.430 the Haus der Flieger. The mood must have been 00:06:47.430 --> 00:06:50.529 incredibly tense. What did they actually say? 00:06:50.569 --> 00:06:52.430 Did they just start yelling at him? Actually, 00:06:52.430 --> 00:06:55.550 it was very structured, which probably made it 00:06:55.550 --> 00:06:58.829 infinitely more infuriating for Guring. According 00:06:58.829 --> 00:07:01.709 to Collor's account, Litzow read from a highly 00:07:01.709 --> 00:07:04.189 prepared list of grievances. What was the first 00:07:04.189 --> 00:07:07.370 point? They addressed the personal insult immediately. 00:07:07.750 --> 00:07:10.110 They flat out rejected the charge of cowardice. 00:07:10.310 --> 00:07:11.610 They basically looked him in the eye and said, 00:07:11.970 --> 00:07:14.050 stop calling us cowards while you sit safely 00:07:14.050 --> 00:07:16.769 in Berlin. A very bold start. And then they went 00:07:16.769 --> 00:07:19.670 straight for the throat. They formally stated 00:07:19.670 --> 00:07:22.490 a, quote, lack of confidence, unquote, in the 00:07:22.490 --> 00:07:25.069 high command. Specifically regarding armament 00:07:25.069 --> 00:07:28.360 and personnel policy. Right. And lack of confidence 00:07:28.360 --> 00:07:30.800 is polite military speak for telling your boss 00:07:30.800 --> 00:07:33.300 he has absolutely no idea what he's doing. It's 00:07:33.300 --> 00:07:35.920 essentially a demand for him to step down. Precisely. 00:07:36.180 --> 00:07:38.839 And they double down by bringing up Adolf Galland. 00:07:39.100 --> 00:07:40.779 Remember, Guring had already fired Galland by 00:07:40.779 --> 00:07:42.740 this point for constantly disagreeing with him. 00:07:42.879 --> 00:07:45.500 So the mutineers tell Guring that the fighter 00:07:45.500 --> 00:07:48.819 force stands behind Galland, quote, virtually 00:07:48.819 --> 00:07:52.180 to a man, unquote. That is a direct challenge 00:07:52.180 --> 00:07:54.699 to Guring's supreme authority. They're openly 00:07:54.699 --> 00:07:56.879 saying we prefer the guy you just fired to you. 00:07:57.069 --> 00:07:59.389 But the most substantive part of the argument, 00:07:59.509 --> 00:08:01.449 and the part that is really fascinating from 00:08:01.449 --> 00:08:04.870 a historical perspective, was about the technology. 00:08:05.110 --> 00:08:08.629 The Mi 262. The world's first operational jet 00:08:08.629 --> 00:08:10.790 fighter. We really need to pause on this for 00:08:10.790 --> 00:08:14.370 a second, because the Mi 262 is legendary. But 00:08:14.370 --> 00:08:18.089 why was an airplane central to a mutiny? It represents 00:08:18.089 --> 00:08:20.490 what we might call the ultimate expert paradox. 00:08:20.910 --> 00:08:23.170 The pilots knew exactly what this machine was 00:08:23.170 --> 00:08:25.970 capable of. It could fly over 500 miles per hour. 00:08:26.060 --> 00:08:28.720 It was an absolute shark in the air. It could 00:08:28.720 --> 00:08:31.160 slash through allied bomber formations so fast 00:08:31.160 --> 00:08:33.279 that the American escorts couldn't even track 00:08:33.279 --> 00:08:36.279 it, let alone shoot it down. Speed is life in 00:08:36.279 --> 00:08:39.360 aerial combat. Speed is everything. And Steinhoff 00:08:39.360 --> 00:08:41.360 told Guring that the fighter force could still, 00:08:41.360 --> 00:08:43.820 quote, relieve the country by putting at least 00:08:43.820 --> 00:08:46.379 a temporary halt to the bomb horror, unquote, 00:08:46.779 --> 00:08:50.179 even at that late stage in 1945. Yes. They truly 00:08:50.179 --> 00:08:52.419 believe that if they use the jets correctly, 00:08:52.559 --> 00:08:55.200 they could inflict such incredibly heavy losses 00:08:55.200 --> 00:08:58.100 on the bombers that the allies would be forced 00:08:58.100 --> 00:09:01.019 to pause the raids. But there was a massive catch. 00:09:01.820 --> 00:09:03.419 They weren't allowed to use them as fighters. 00:09:03.500 --> 00:09:06.460 Which defies all logic. Why build a jet fighter 00:09:06.460 --> 00:09:09.220 and not let it fight? Because Hitler and by extension, 00:09:09.419 --> 00:09:12.100 Goering had this total obsession with revenge 00:09:12.100 --> 00:09:14.740 weapons. They didn't want a defensive interceptor. 00:09:14.759 --> 00:09:17.259 They wanted a blitz bomber. A fast bomber. to 00:09:17.259 --> 00:09:19.059 hit the allied troops advancing on the ground. 00:09:19.279 --> 00:09:22.000 So they took this incredibly sleek aerodynamic 00:09:22.000 --> 00:09:24.440 shark. And they literally bolted bomb racks onto 00:09:24.440 --> 00:09:26.620 the bottom of it. Which completely ruins the 00:09:26.620 --> 00:09:28.679 physics of the aircraft. You add massive drag. 00:09:28.840 --> 00:09:31.659 You add weight. But even worse than that, to 00:09:31.659 --> 00:09:34.440 drop a bomb with any kind of accuracy, you have 00:09:34.440 --> 00:09:38.679 to fly low and slow. So you take a machine engineered 00:09:38.679 --> 00:09:40.940 specifically for the stratosphere in high speed. 00:09:41.000 --> 00:09:43.710 And you force it to fly down in the mud. where 00:09:43.710 --> 00:09:46.909 every single GI with an anti -aircraft gun can 00:09:46.909 --> 00:09:49.149 take a pot shot at it. It's maddening. The pilots 00:09:49.149 --> 00:09:50.850 are basically screaming at him saying you're 00:09:50.850 --> 00:09:53.389 using a scalpel to chop wood. And getting their 00:09:53.389 --> 00:09:55.750 best pilot slaughtered while doing it? Their 00:09:55.750 --> 00:09:58.490 demand to Guring was explicit. They demanded 00:09:58.490 --> 00:10:02.129 that all Mi -262s be released immediately, strictly 00:10:02.129 --> 00:10:04.909 for fighter operations. Stop the blitz bomber 00:10:04.909 --> 00:10:07.450 nonsense and let us actually shoot down the heavy 00:10:07.450 --> 00:10:09.429 bombers. They also demanded that the reserve 00:10:09.429 --> 00:10:12.110 bomber units be put under the command of experienced 00:10:12.110 --> 00:10:14.470 fighters. officer. Which is just another massive 00:10:14.470 --> 00:10:16.409 slap in the face to Guring. They were essentially 00:10:16.409 --> 00:10:18.470 saying the bomber commanders are useless and 00:10:18.470 --> 00:10:20.250 we need to take over the air war completely. 00:10:20.370 --> 00:10:22.450 Okay, so just picture the scene in that room. 00:10:22.970 --> 00:10:26.830 You have Guring, this authoritarian, who is entirely 00:10:26.830 --> 00:10:30.230 used to total unquestioning obedience. Standing 00:10:30.230 --> 00:10:34.049 there listening to his own subordinates absolutely 00:10:34.049 --> 00:10:36.470 dismantle his leadership style, his strategy, 00:10:36.470 --> 00:10:38.590 and his technical decisions. How long did he 00:10:38.590 --> 00:10:41.350 actually last before exploding? Not long at all. 00:10:41.559 --> 00:10:44.179 Steinhoff's written account is pretty chilling. 00:10:44.720 --> 00:10:48.220 He wrote, quote, At this time, there was no holding 00:10:48.220 --> 00:10:50.740 Guring, unquote. He just completely lost it. 00:10:50.840 --> 00:10:53.960 He snapped. You have to remember, his authoritarian 00:10:53.960 --> 00:10:56.500 nature had already been forced to swallow so 00:10:56.500 --> 00:10:59.120 much. perceived insubordination from Galland 00:10:59.120 --> 00:11:01.379 over the months. And now he's trapped in a room 00:11:01.379 --> 00:11:04.799 with a half dozen Gallands. He shouted. He threatened 00:11:04.799 --> 00:11:07.399 them. In fact, the source material notes that 00:11:07.399 --> 00:11:09.879 he explicitly wanted to execute them. He wanted 00:11:09.879 --> 00:11:12.120 to put Steinhoff and Lutzow in front of a firing 00:11:12.120 --> 00:11:14.179 squad. He wanted them dead. So why didn't he? 00:11:14.200 --> 00:11:16.539 This is the Third Reich. People disappear for 00:11:16.539 --> 00:11:19.820 much less. Public relations. Seriously. The regime 00:11:19.820 --> 00:11:23.059 is falling and they're worried about PR. Seriously. 00:11:23.700 --> 00:11:26.480 As the source explicitly states, each man was 00:11:26.480 --> 00:11:28.659 a national hero. Right. You can't just take the 00:11:28.659 --> 00:11:30.679 literal face of your recruitment posters and 00:11:30.679 --> 00:11:32.559 shoot them without explaining why to the public. 00:11:32.840 --> 00:11:35.659 It would have completely destroyed whatever tiny 00:11:35.659 --> 00:11:38.200 shred of morale was left in the military. He 00:11:38.200 --> 00:11:40.559 needed time to build a formal legal case against 00:11:40.559 --> 00:11:42.419 them. But he also couldn't just let them walk 00:11:42.419 --> 00:11:44.659 out and go back to command their units. No. He 00:11:44.659 --> 00:11:46.879 had to break the group apart immediately. And 00:11:46.879 --> 00:11:48.940 the punishments he handed out were... Well, they 00:11:48.940 --> 00:11:52.259 were incredibly petty, but effective. Let's run 00:11:52.259 --> 00:11:55.000 through those. What exactly happened to Litzow 00:11:55.000 --> 00:11:57.899 since he was the spokesman? Banished. Goering 00:11:57.899 --> 00:12:00.299 sent him down to Italy to sit behind a desk. 00:12:00.500 --> 00:12:03.080 And he did the same for Rudel and Neumann. Basically 00:12:03.080 --> 00:12:05.399 telling them to get out of his sight and go push 00:12:05.399 --> 00:12:08.000 papers in a theater that barely mattered anymore. 00:12:08.220 --> 00:12:11.610 And what about Trotloft? Fired from combat operations 00:12:11.610 --> 00:12:14.330 entirely and sent to run a flying school. Which 00:12:14.330 --> 00:12:17.169 is just a massive insult for a frontline combat 00:12:17.169 --> 00:12:21.070 leader. Go teach teenagers how to taxi. But Steinhoff, 00:12:21.330 --> 00:12:23.350 his punishment really seems to show how much 00:12:23.350 --> 00:12:27.269 he got under Guring's skin. It feels deeply personal. 00:12:27.629 --> 00:12:30.230 What was the order against Steinhoff? Guring 00:12:30.230 --> 00:12:33.190 officially banned him from all airfields. He 00:12:33.190 --> 00:12:35.870 grounded one of his top fighter aces. Worse than 00:12:35.870 --> 00:12:38.980 grounded. He banned him from even stepping foot 00:12:38.980 --> 00:12:42.559 onto any airfield facility. And he strictly forbade 00:12:42.559 --> 00:12:44.919 him from contacting any of the other mutineers. 00:12:45.259 --> 00:12:49.240 He wanted Steinhoff totally isolated, silent 00:12:49.240 --> 00:12:52.340 and removed from the war. It really highlights 00:12:52.340 --> 00:12:54.840 the total disintegration of reality at the top 00:12:54.840 --> 00:12:57.759 of the command chain. The revolt wasn't crushed 00:12:57.759 --> 00:13:00.360 by a better strategic counter argument. It was 00:13:00.360 --> 00:13:03.059 crushed by pure ego. Goering would rather lose 00:13:03.059 --> 00:13:06.000 the war his way than let the actual experts try 00:13:06.000 --> 00:13:08.639 to save it their way. But, and here's the really 00:13:08.639 --> 00:13:10.899 fascinating twist in the story, it doesn't end 00:13:10.899 --> 00:13:13.529 with them just sitting at desks in Italy. No, 00:13:13.529 --> 00:13:15.789 because the noise from this confrontation was 00:13:15.789 --> 00:13:18.850 so loud that it actually reached the Fuhrer bunker. 00:13:19.110 --> 00:13:21.389 Hitler found out about the mutiny. He did. And 00:13:21.389 --> 00:13:23.409 usually when Hitler gets involved in a dispute 00:13:23.409 --> 00:13:25.230 between a general and a field marshal, people 00:13:25.230 --> 00:13:28.230 just disappear. But surprisingly, Hitler intervened 00:13:28.230 --> 00:13:31.330 in a way that deeply humiliated Goering. He realized 00:13:31.330 --> 00:13:33.929 that sidelining Galland and the top aces while 00:13:33.929 --> 00:13:35.730 the German cities were burning to the ground 00:13:35.730 --> 00:13:38.830 was completely insane. So he didn't reinstate 00:13:38.830 --> 00:13:41.269 Galland as general of fighters, but he did do 00:13:41.269 --> 00:13:44.000 something else. What was the order? He explicitly 00:13:44.000 --> 00:13:47.059 ordered Guring to allow Galen to form his own 00:13:47.059 --> 00:13:50.360 entirely independent elite unit. Jagverband 44, 00:13:50.919 --> 00:13:53.740 the famous JV -44, often called the Squadron 00:13:53.740 --> 00:13:57.299 of Experts, and the supreme irony of this entire 00:13:57.299 --> 00:14:00.879 saga. In this new unit, Galen and the other mutineers, 00:14:00.980 --> 00:14:04.379 including Steinhoff, ended up flying the Mi -262. 00:14:04.419 --> 00:14:07.399 The very plane they had just risked execution 00:14:07.399 --> 00:14:09.840 arguing about. Yes, and they flew it exactly 00:14:09.840 --> 00:14:13.059 how they wanted to, as a pure fighter. No bombs 00:14:13.059 --> 00:14:15.500 attached. Just heavy cannons and unguided rockets. 00:14:15.840 --> 00:14:17.700 So did they win the argument in the end? In a 00:14:17.700 --> 00:14:19.759 tragic micro sense, yes they did. They got their 00:14:19.759 --> 00:14:22.019 jets. They got to fly them as dedicated interceptors. 00:14:22.039 --> 00:14:24.000 And we were actually shooting down bombers in 00:14:24.000 --> 00:14:26.000 those final weeks with this incredible technology. 00:14:26.259 --> 00:14:29.250 But strategically, no. It was far too late. The, 00:14:29.250 --> 00:14:32.049 quote, senseless dissipation of Operation Baseplate 00:14:32.049 --> 00:14:34.610 had already happened. The damage was done. Exactly. 00:14:34.809 --> 00:14:38.149 They were just a tiny, isolated island of competence 00:14:38.149 --> 00:14:40.830 and a massive sea of defeat. They were winning 00:14:40.830 --> 00:14:42.750 dogfights over airfields that were literally 00:14:42.750 --> 00:14:45.669 being overrun by allied tanks an hour later. 00:14:46.070 --> 00:14:49.309 It paints such a bleak, incredible picture. You 00:14:49.309 --> 00:14:52.629 have these guys, the absolute best in the world 00:14:52.629 --> 00:14:55.960 at what they do. finally getting the tool they 00:14:55.960 --> 00:14:58.919 begged for. Finally using it the correct way. 00:14:59.080 --> 00:15:01.100 But doing it in the middle of an apocalypse that 00:15:01.100 --> 00:15:03.620 they had absolutely no power to stop. It brings 00:15:03.620 --> 00:15:05.980 us right back to that expert paradox. Yep. The 00:15:05.980 --> 00:15:08.980 entire regime's system was designed from the 00:15:08.980 --> 00:15:12.379 ground up to reward blind loyalty over actual 00:15:12.379 --> 00:15:14.220 competence. And by the time the system finally 00:15:14.220 --> 00:15:16.440 broke down enough to let that competence shine 00:15:16.440 --> 00:15:19.769 through, like we saw with JV -44, the war was 00:15:19.769 --> 00:15:22.149 already entirely lost. It really challenges that 00:15:22.149 --> 00:15:24.889 old lingering myth of the German military as 00:15:24.889 --> 00:15:27.129 this perfectly oiled monolithic machine. Oh, 00:15:27.210 --> 00:15:29.629 absolutely. This incident proves it was just 00:15:29.629 --> 00:15:32.110 a chaotic snake pit at the top. The revolt shows 00:15:32.110 --> 00:15:34.590 us that in those final days, the Luftwaffe's 00:15:34.590 --> 00:15:36.570 top talent was fighting their own high command 00:15:36.570 --> 00:15:39.129 just as viciously as they were fighting the Allies. 00:15:39.409 --> 00:15:41.190 And they ended up losing both of those wars. 00:15:41.509 --> 00:15:44.190 Yes. They lost the argument with Guring. They 00:15:44.190 --> 00:15:46.269 were banished, humiliated, and threatened with 00:15:46.269 --> 00:15:48.970 death. And they lost the air war because the 00:15:48.970 --> 00:15:51.429 fatal decisions had already been made years prior. 00:15:51.789 --> 00:15:54.649 So as we wrap up this deep dive, I really want 00:15:54.649 --> 00:15:56.870 to leave you with a thought about that gloomy 00:15:56.870 --> 00:15:59.009 prospect Steinhoff mentioned. It's the great 00:15:59.009 --> 00:16:02.549 historical what if. Right. We look at the Mi 00:16:02.549 --> 00:16:05.549 -262 today and think, wow, what an incredible 00:16:05.549 --> 00:16:09.330 piece of technology. And the pilots truly believed 00:16:09.330 --> 00:16:12.220 it could have halted the bomb horror. But let's 00:16:12.220 --> 00:16:15.019 ask the harder question here. What if Guring 00:16:15.019 --> 00:16:17.600 had actually listened to them? What if they hadn't 00:16:17.600 --> 00:16:20.059 wasted all those vital reserves on baseplate? 00:16:20.399 --> 00:16:22.720 And what if they had unleashed those jets as 00:16:22.720 --> 00:16:25.659 pure fighters six months earlier, like the experts 00:16:25.659 --> 00:16:28.139 requested? What if it fundamentally changed that 00:16:28.139 --> 00:16:31.490 gloom prospect of the air war? or was the senseless 00:16:31.490 --> 00:16:34.509 dissipation of forces already too far gone to 00:16:34.509 --> 00:16:36.850 ever reverse? It's something that really makes 00:16:36.850 --> 00:16:39.649 you reevaluate the timelines of those final months. 00:16:40.009 --> 00:16:41.429 Absolutely. It's a complex piece of history, 00:16:41.570 --> 00:16:43.549 but definitely one worth understanding. Something 00:16:43.549 --> 00:16:45.649 for you to explore on your own. Thank you for 00:16:45.649 --> 00:16:47.590 joining us for this deep dive. We'll catch you 00:16:47.590 --> 00:16:48.070 on the next one.