This is a great story - is there a reliable source?

[DavidIsby]

This is a great story. Does anyone know of any reputable source for it?

“In a meeting with Willy Messerschmitt, the head of the Technical Office of the Luftwaffe pointed out that while the speed of the Me 109 was perfectly within requirements, that the Luftwaffe needed was a fighter ‘with the same speed plus greater range and a better rate of climb’.

Willy Messerschmitt, it has been reliably reported, reacted with a flash of temper. ‘What do you want?’ he is said to have shouted, ‘A fast fighter or a barn door’?

… Two years later, these same individuals were forced to run for shelter in Augsburg, which had come under attack by a swarm of Thunderbolt Fighters of the Eigth Fighter Command. At the sight of the powerful fighters strafing deep within enemy terriroty, the official of the Technical Office turned to Willy Messerschmitt with this acid reply:

'Well, there are your barn doors!”

Source: Martin Caidin, Me 109: Willy Messerschmitt’s Peerless Fighter, (New York: Ballantine, 1968), pp. 113-14

[fridgeman]

Im not experienced with his works, but he wrote his book is a Sachbuch/ non fiction/scientific work.
So he should have marked quotes and other information with references.
As he wrote also science fiction novels, and it seems he dit not added any references to this quote,
maybe he made this up to make the book more interesting.

On the other hand Adolf Galland himself wrote the foreword of the book's german edition, and he evem
gratulated the author for his great work. I think he would not have done that for a particially made up work.

[DavidIsby]

Thanks.

Galland also did the introduction to the English-language edition. That I trust. Galland may be self-serving at time and give different versions of events at different times, but he is basically accurate. Quoting Galland is fine.

Caidan, however, would not let fact checking stand in the way of a good story in his non-fiction writing. I would not be surprised if this story is true. However, before I quote it, I would like to know if it appears anywhere else or it is something he heard and is repeating.

So, has anyone heard this story anywhere else?

[Liam]

Could a P47 reach Augsburg?

[tigre]

Hello Liam ; see in the map below....the blue line shows the range of the allied fighters as the time went by in the war...Augsburg was numbered as 65 in the map. If that fact took place after February 1944..it could be possible. Following westward: July 1943-February 1944 and December 1942-July 1943.

Source: Source: Hechos de la Segunda Guerra Mundial. Tomo II. Editorial Cardon. Buenos Aires. Junio 1977.

Cheers. Raúl M .