You may know RAF Scampton best for the Dambusters & the Red Arrows - but are you aware of all the other fascinating histories & period features of the site? Let's take a closer look in this thread...🧵 #avgeekhistory (📸 Wikimedia Commons) ✈️ The site had humble beginnings as Home Defence Flight Station Brattleby, which was opened in 1916 and used to spot German Zeppelins flying over to bomb British military targets and cites during the First
World War. Starting out as a Searchlight Defence Unit, it expanded...

Most of us know about the Hitler Youths who fought Allied soldiers during the collapse of the Third Reich. But have you heard about the young Luftwaffe Flakhelfer ('flak assistant') boys who served on anti-aircraft guns from 1943? Here's a thread...🧵

(© Wikimedia Commons) Between February 1943 and the end of the war, around 200,000 teenage boys served as Luftwaffenhelfer (‘Luftwaffe assistants’) & Marinehelfer (‘Kriegsmarine [navy] assistants’). Many were 15, 16 & 17 years old; as such, they often fit in their war duty alongside their homework.

I was once viciously attacked for daring to suggest that Churchill was a master politician who instinctively knew when & how to deflect blame - to the point that my words were twisted, my credentials were questioned, & my arguments were taken out of context. That doesn't mean- That I think he never took responsibility, that he wasn't 100% committed when it mattered, and that he sacrificed his mind, body & soul to galvanise this nation, vitally guiding it through Britain's darkest hour. People always want to read into what is not there, because-

You likely know about 'Spitfire Snobbery' among downed Luftwaffe pilots: their insistence that they'd been shot down by a Spitfire. But here's a thread on why the Luftwaffe took a dim view on the Hawker Hurricane, & how they were arguably too harsh on it...

(©Neil HipkissArt)) One of the 1st times that the Germans saw the Hurricane fly was at a peacetime international air show – the little-known 2nd Brussels International Air Salon, which took place from 8 – 23 July 1939 at the Palais du Centenaire (I wrote an article on this: )raf.mod.uk/what-we-do/our…

Going through my USA archival haul from earlier this year & realised I never shared all my pictures of
@airandspace's collection! One of the most surreal moments was seeing the original Boeing B-29 Superfortress 'Enola Gay', which dropped the atomic bomb 'Little Boy' on Hiroshima The stencilling on the nose is still original. This B-29 was initially neglected in outdoor storage during the 1950s & 1960s. Restoration work began in the 1980s & took nearly two decades to complete, totalling 300,000 man hours - many of which were carried out by volunteers.

Inspired by @militaryhistori & @prior_robin's excellent article on military history, I believe we can only get new people interested if we do not solely cater to those with a niche interest. On that score, here's a user-friendly introduction to the Battle of Britain. 1/ So, what was the Battle of Britain? Well, in British circles, it is the name given to the Luftwaffe’s protracted aerial campaign - concentrated over southern England - to secure air superiority over the Royal Air Force's Fighter Command from 10 July until 31 October 1940. 2/

My PhD thesis delved into the political influence of the Weimar Republic on Luftwaffe receptivity to the Nazi takeover. Günther Rall wrote that "we accepted the activities of the National Socialists as ugly side effects of a policy that had so far kept all its lofty promises"

https://twitter.com/jeff_hawn/status/1669252040801808385

Rall added that "Germany had 37 parties, which was a horrible thing...you cannot run a country with 37 parties." The Me 262 pilot Dieter Kehrberg complained that "there was just no air left to breathe" after the Versailles restrictions & reparations set in Weimar Germany