NAZI SCAPEGOAT

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXVII, Issue 20142, 11 January 1940, Page 11

NAZI SCAPEGOAT

AIR WAR FAILURE GOOD TURN FOR ALLIES Hermann Goering, only member of the German Air Force too fat to get into a pursuit plane, has rendered the Allies an incalculable service by picking Ernst Udet as scapegoat for Nazi failures in the air war. Lieutenant-General Udet has long been regarded by those who have watched German aerial development with an experienced eye as “the man behind the gun." Key-man of German aviation, Udet has directed the design and production of all German warplanes for the past three years. A carefree barnstormer from the end of the Great War until Nazism rose to power, he then returned to Germany to “do his bit.” In 1936, lie was given charge of the technical division of the German Air Force. Under him, factories were laid out like model villages, and his workers were the most pampered in Germany.

Even his uncanny skill, however, could not eliminate the big flaw in the German war machine —lack of taw materials.

Udet was 1!) when, in 1915, lie joined the 'German Air Force. He served with Richtofen’s famous squadron, and shot down 62 Allied planes.

After the war, he became a stunt flyer, barnstorming through Europe and the United Slates. Once a playboy, now a good Nazi. Udet is 48, and carries 22 pieces of shrapnel in his body. lie walks with a limp and feels nervous in fast lifts. But he is still among the world’s best flyers, and certainly one of the 10 greatest technicians. And this is the man whom Goering has “fired.”