Günther Radusch

Günther Radusch (* 11. November 1912 in Schwetz , West Prussia ; † 29. July 1988 in North beach ) was a German officer , last Colonel of the Air Force of the Armed Forces .

Military biography

Radusch's father was the rector . He passed his Abitur in 1931 and then went to the German Aviation School (DVS) in Schleissheim . 1932, he was bypassing the Versailles Treaty , a secret pilot training in Lipetsk . After its completion, Radusch returned to Germany and was assigned to the 4th Infantry Regiment of the Reichswehr in order to receive his basic infantry training there. He then attended the Reichswehr Infantry School in Dresden , which he graduated in October 1934, now with the rank of lieutenant .

Radusch then worked in the Luftwaffe, which had already been exposed in 1935, as a hunting instructor at the fighter pilot school in Schleissheim until the summer of 1936. From September 1936 to May 1937 Raduschs was employed with the Condor Legion with the rank of first lieutenant , where he flew a copy of the He 112 fighter plane as deputy squadron captain of the pilot fighter squadron 88 as part of the Spanish Civil War . He also had missions on the Messerschmitt Bf 109 . In May 1937 Radusch returned to Germany with an aerial victory.

From June 1937 to May 1939 Radusch was involved in the development of the night hunting weapon. Here, as a squadron captain, he led a destroyer training group in Barth , which experimented with Bf 110 day and night hunting with machines of the Ar 68 type . In May 1939 Radusch was posted to the Reich Ministry of Aviation , where, with the rank of captain , he served as a destroyer and night hunting advisor for the inspection of fighter pilots there .

After the end of the campaign in the west , Radusch was appointed squadron captain of the 2nd squadron of destroyer squadron 1 . Group I, in which Radusch's squadron was also involved, was converted to night hunting from July 1940 in Düsseldorf . The group was absorbed into Nachtjagdgeschwader 1 that same month . The NJG 1 then flew air defense missions in the Netherlands and on the Lower Rhine . As the group commander of I./NJG 1 , Radusch acted as a trainer for other night hunting associations in Vechta and Schleswig .

On August 1, 1943, Radusch was entrusted with the command of night fighter squadron 5 , which was being set up in Döberitz . The squadron was tactically subordinate to the 4th Fighter Division . On February 13, 1943, Radusch was awarded the German Cross in Gold and on August 29, 1943 the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross . On February 1, 1944, Radusch, meanwhile promoted to lieutenant colonel, was the successor of Prince Heinrich zu Sayn-Wittgenstein, who had fallen on January 21, 1944, as commodore of night fighter squadron 2 . Here, on February 6, 1944, Radusch was the 444th Wehrmacht soldier to be awarded the Oak Leaves for the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross. On November 1, 1944, Radusch was appointed commodore of night fighter squadron 3 . There he succeeded Helmut Lent , who died on October 7, 1944 from his injuries sustained in an aircraft accident. In January 1945 Radusch was promoted to colonel . In February 1945 Radusch was briefed for the night fighter Focke-Wulf Ta 154 . However, in his capacity as a squadron commodore of the NJG 3, he refused to use this type of aircraft due to poor performance. In around 140 enemy flights, Radusch recorded 64 victories, including one day's kill in Spain . Other sources put the number of his night victories at 63.

At the end of the war, Radusch was taken prisoner by the British , from which he was released in 1947. He then temporarily joined the US armed forces . On September 1, 1958, Radusch joined the Bundeswehr with the rank of colonel . Until the end of March 1964 he commanded the pilot school A in Landsberg am Lech . Radusch was then a staff officer in air defense until his retirement in 1971 . After retiring, Radusch moved to Munich .

In 1988 Radusch died in Nordstrand .

Individual evidence

1. ^ Georg Brütting : The book of German flight history , Drei Brunnen Verlag Stuttgart 1979, Volume 3, p. 484.
2. ↑ Brütting p. 484.
3. ↑ ^{a b c d e f} Brütting p. 485.
4. ^ Patrick Laureau: Condor: The Luftwaffe in Spain, 1936-39. Stackpole 2010, pp. 347., 376.
5. ↑ Georg Tessin : Associations and troops of the German Wehrmacht and Waffen-SS in World War II 1939–1945 , Volume 14, Flying Associations, Biblio-Verlag 1998, ISBN 978-3-7648-1111-2 , p. 327.
6. ↑ on equipment, locations and areas of use, including the units listed below, see Wolfgang Dierich: The Air Force Associations 1935-1945 - structure and short chronicles, Motorbuch-Verlag Stuttgart 1976, pp. 64f., 67f., 70, 79; Radush is not mentioned in the book.
7. ↑ ^{a b} Veit Scherzer : The owners of the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross 1939 from the army, air force, navy, Waffen-SS, Volkssturm and armed forces allied with Germany according to the documents in the federal archive. Scherzers Militaer-Verlag, Ranis / Jena 2007, p. 610
8. ↑ Dietmar Hermann: Focke-Wulf Nachtjäger Ta 154 "Mosquito" - Development, Production and Troop Testing, Lemwerder Stedinger 2006, ISBN 978-3-927697-46-1 , p. 159.
9. ↑ Dietmar Hermann: Focke-Wulf Nachtjäger Ta 154 “Mosquito” - Development, Production and Troop Testing, Lemwerder Stedinger 2006, ISBN 978-3-927697-46-1 , pp. 162f.
10. ↑ Trevor J. Constable , Raymond F. Toliver: Horrido! Fighter aces of the Luftwaffe. Macmillan New York 1968, p. 136; Christopher Chant: The Illustrated History Of Airforces Of World War 1 And World War 2. Galley 1979, p. 275.
11. ↑ Obermaier: The Air Force Knight's Cross - Stuka and Attack Airmen 1939–1945. Verlag Dieter Hoffmann, Mainz 1976, p. 69.
12. ^ Raymond F. Toliver, Trevor J. Constable : These were the German Jagdflieger-Ase 1939-1945 , Motorbuch-Verlag Stuttgart, 15th edition 1994, ISBN 3-87943-193-0 , p. 404.
13. ↑ Len Deighton: Bomber. Signet 1971, p. 446.