Martin James Monti

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Martin James Monti (born October 24, 1921 in St. Louis , USA ; † September 11, 2000 ) was a fighter pilot in the United States Air Force and a deserter who joined the Waffen-SS during the Second World War .

Life

Monti was one of his parents' seven children. His father was a finance broker whose ancestors had emigrated to the United States from Italian confederations in Switzerland , while his mother had German ancestors. Monti himself was a listener and supporter of the anti-Semitic priest Charles Coughlin during the 1930s , who appeared on radio broadcasts with inflammatory speeches.

On November 29, 1942, Monti volunteered in the United States Army Air Forces , where he completed training as a pilot from early 1943. In August 1944 he was relocated to Karachi in British India and served in the 126th Replacement Depot.

Monti applied to be transferred to Italy, but it was rejected. On October 1, 1944, he left the force on his own, traveled via Cairo and Tripoli to Naples and reported on October 10 at the Air Force base near Foggia , where the 82nd Fighter Group was stationed. There, too, his request to serve in a combat squadron was rejected. Monti went to Pomigliano d'Arco to the 354th Air Service Squadron. There he pretended to be a pilot of the 82nd Fighter Group on October 13th and stole a P-38 Lightning . With that he flew to the German-controlled northern Italy and landed on a meadow near Milan , where he was taken prisoner. However, he was able to convince the Germans of his intention to take part in the war on their side, whereupon he was brought to Berlin and joined Kurt Egger's SS standard . His aircraft was handed over to a test squadron of the Air Force .

Monti took part in some German propaganda programs on the radio, albeit with little success, and was transferred back to Italy towards the end of the war.

After the war ended, he reported to the American troops on May 10, 1945 . He pretended to have been shot down and captured by the Germans in his P-38. He received the SS uniform he was wearing from partisans on the run. A court martial sentenced him to 15 years of forced labor for the theft of military equipment and desertion, and he was demoted. Monti was released in 1947, however, and left the Air Force as a private the following year . However, following an investigation by the FBI into his support for the enemy, he was tried again shortly afterwards and sentenced to 25 years in prison and a US $ 10,000 fine for high treason . In 1968 this sentence was suspended.

Individual evidence

  1. ^ StrategyPage: The Curious Case of Martin James Monti. Retrieved February 13, 2016 .
  2. ^ Richard Lucas: Axis Sally: The American Voice of Nazi Germany . Casemate Publ, 2010, ISBN 978-1-935149-43-9 , pp. 114 ( Google Books ).
  3. ^ Ex-Army Officer Held for Treason; He Is Indicted by Brooklyn Jury on Charge of Deserting Post, Cooperating With Nazis . In: New York Times . October 15, 1948.
personal data
SURNAME Monti, Martin James
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American fighter pilot and deserter
DATE OF BIRTH October 24, 1921
PLACE OF BIRTH St. Louis , United States
DATE OF DEATH September 11, 2000