Messerschmitt Me 262
German jet fighter-bomber A2a and interceptor A1a

Messerschmitt Me 262
Type: German jet fighter, interceptor, fighter-bomber and night-fighter.
History: In the Messerschmitt Me 262 the German aircraft industry created a potentially war-winning aircraft which could have restored to the Luftwaffe command of the skies over Germany. Compared with Allied fighters of its day, including the first RAF jet fighter Meteor I, which entered service at the same time, it was much faster and packed a much heavier punch.
Radar-equipped night fighter versions and sub-types designed to stand off from large bomber formations and blast them out of the sky were also developments against which the Allies had no answer.
Yet for years the programme was held back by official disinterest, and by the personal insistence of Hitler that the world-beating jet fighter should be used only as a fighter-bomber to shatter the Allied invasion of 1944 (for which it was too late and not enough numbers were available).

Messerschmitt Me 262 A2a fighter-bomber of I./KG51.

It was in the autumn of 1938 that Messerschmitt was asked to study the design of a jet fighter, and the resulting Messerschmitt Me 262 was remarkably unerring. First flown on a piston engine in the nose, it then flew on its twin turbojets and finally, in July 1943, the fifth development aircraft flew with a nosewheel.
Despite numerous snags, production aircraft were being delivered in July 1944, but not before the beginning of 1945 in great numbers. Only 513 had been accepted by the Luftwaffe by the end of 1944, from the original 1,000 fighter-bombers which should have been in action in time of the Allied invasion in the summer !
But the Me 262's fighting and flying qualities were excellent, and a pre-series batch of 23 A-0s was accepted in the spring of 1944. These were allocated to the Erprobrungsstelle (Experiment unit) at Rechlin and the conversion unit EKdo 262, the latter unit becoming the first to fire jet fighter guns in anger (on 25 July 1944 shot down of a Mosquito reconaissance-bomber over Munich, which was until then nearly save from interceptions).
The two principal basic production versions to become operational were the Messerschmitt Me 262 A1a Schwalbe (swallow) interceptor and the Messerschmitt Me 262 A2a Sturmvogel (stormbird) fighter-bomber.

Starting the Jumo 004B engines of an Me 262 A1a of the Commando Nowotny in late October 1944.

But the German axial engines were unreliable and casualties due to engine failure, fires or break-up were heavy. The MK 108 gun was also prone to jam, and the landing gear to collapse.

Yet the Me 262 was a beautiful machine to handle and, while Allied jets like the US Shooting Star or British Vampire, either never reached squadrons or never engaged enemy aircraft, the 100 or so Me 262s that flew on operations and had fuel available destroyed far more than 100 Allied bombers and fighters.
Their destruction of Allied bombers and fighters was greater than one for one, and JV44, the top-scoring Me 262 interceptor unit, achieved some 50 'kills' in little more than a month's operations before WW2 ended.
In air-to-air combat the Me 262 never engaged Allied jets, but conversely, a number of Me262s were destroyed by Mustang, Spitfire, Tempest and Thunderbolt piston-engined fighters, especially during take-off or landing.

Even remarkable, by end of WW2 total deliveries of this formidable aircraft reached 1.433, but propably less then a quarter of these saw front-line service.

An abandoned Me 262 A2a jet fighter-bomber, found by the US Army in a wood near Frankfurt in the spring of 1945.

3d model Messerschmitt Me 262 A1a

This 3d model is a current element of the WW2 game WW2 Total. The data for production, movement and combat of the Axis and Allies units are here !

Two-seat Me 262 B-1a night fighter.