Nazi Germany's Last Jet Fighter - Argentina 1950

[Music] just five years after the total defeat of Nazi Germany a new jet took to the skies the result of design work started in the war the work of one of Hitler's favorite aircraft designers but this incredible achievement did not occur in West Germany or even in Europe rather the jet had been built in a nation that had actually encouraged Nazis to make new lives for themselves safe from war crimes investigations that country was Argentina Argentina under the rule of President Juan Peron had even established agents in post-war Italy and Austria to help facilitate the illegal movements of thousands of Nazi war crime suspects to the South American nation actively courting all sorts of former SS and Nazi Party administrators scientists and technicians in fact following Germany's defeat in May 1945 countries were scrambling to snatch the Third Reich's best brains for their own national interests for example the United States covertly brought 765 former Nazi scientists to America to build ballistic missiles and later space rockets for NASA ignoring the fact that 85% of them had been SS officers and many like Ferno von Braun directly complicit in the use of slave labor to build the v2 rockets the bombarded London towards the end of the war for example the v2 program resulted in the deaths of 20,000 slave workers her concentration camps where they will work to death executed or died of disease and starvation manufacturing the missiles those responsible became honored and lauded members of the US scientific community and never were tried for their crimes the Soviet Union and Britain also did the same all happy to ignore inconvenient pasts in order to help them to win the new Cold War if you want more detail on Nazi war criminals fleeing Europe check out my new series ratlines on war stories with mark Feltham link in the description box below the Argentine leader Juan Peron was a realist and knowing that many Nazi fugitives preferred not to work for the Allies fearful of imprisonment or death once they had outlived their usefulness he enacted a plan to recruit tens of thousands of specialists from among Nazis in hiding Argentina already had large German communities the country was attractive for men who wish to start again in a non-extradition regime all sorts of unsavory characters made it to Argentina via the ratlines that ran through Germany into Austria and Italy and thence to South America ss obersturmfuhrer Adolf Eichmann the administrative head of the Holocaust arrived in Argentina in 1950 ss-hauptsturmführer dr. Yusuf Mengele the infamous outwits doctor arrived safely the year before followed by ss-hauptsturmführer Franz Stangl the former Commandant of sabe boy and Treblinka kemp's and former ss-hauptsturmführer Klaus Barbie the infamous Gestapo chief nicknamed the butcher of Lyon of more use to perón's military was the arrival in Argentina of two important aircraft designers the first was French amiodarone teen arrived in May 1946 one of the pioneers of the French aircraft industry he had blackened his copybook by working for the collaborationist Vichy regime after the Germans defeat of France manufacturing aircraft used by the Germans after the liberation of France in 1944 doan team fled to fascist Spain fearing persecution for his wartime collaboration from there he moved to Argentina and developed South America's first jet-powered aircraft the pull key one he was right to fear returning to France for a 1948 he was sentenced in absentia to 20 years forced labour the other greater prize for Peron was Kurt tunk one of Germany's preeminent wartime aircraft designers before and during the war tank had designed some iconic aircraft in 1936 he created the oval of 200 condor an airliner a maritime patrol aircraft and also used as Hitler's personal plane perhaps his most famous design was the oval 190 one of the most used single seed fighters in Luftwaffe service over 20,000 were built it was alongside the Messerschmitt 109 the backbone of Germany's fighter defences from the Allied bombing campaign tank would go on to create the fog of of ta 152 a high-altitude interceptor designed to shoot down Allied bombers which flew ever higher tank knew his value and though not in any way a war crime suspect he was determined to continue designing military aircraft somewhere Britain and machinist China both tried to tempt him to work for them along with the Soviet Union but Janina made a better offer and tank went to work had its aeronautical institute in cordoba using the cover name pedro Matisse many of tanks fokker both designers went with him to argentina tank took with him his design library including plans for a late war jet-powered fighter that had never been built the of off ta 183 desperate for cheap jet fighters to try and hold the allied bomber offensive several german aircraft companies had submitted designs for the emergency fighter program a few of which were actually built for example the Heinkel 162 fox Yeager or people's fight her kurt tank designed the fw ta 183 hook urban or hunchback designed to succeed the expensive Messerschmitt 262 and all piston engine fighters like the focke-wulf 190 in front-line service two designs of the aircraft existed one with a tall t-shaped tail and the other with a more standard tail plane the wings were swept back at 40 degrees amer mounted mid fuselage due to critical material shortages the aircraft's fuselage and wings internal structures were largely wooden and covered in plywood the prototypes were to be powered by the Yonkers uomo 0:04 B turbojet that also powered the Messerschmitt 262 the pilot sat in a pressurized cockpit with a bubble canopy for excellent vision and it was armed with four MK 108 30-millimeter cannons arranged around the air intake top speed was planned to be a thousand kilometers an hour at 7,000 meters or 23,000 feet fokker wolf stated in February 1945 that it could produce 300 aircraft per month and a total of 16 prototypes were ordered to be built with a first flight scheduled for May 1945 however the folk of all facilities fell to British forces on the 8th of April 1945 before any hooker bands had been completed a few years later and tank was able to resurrect the TA 183 project in Argentina working with many of his original team tank modified the 183 design placing the wings at a shoulder-mounted position this was done to avoid a heavy fuselage spa pass-through structure going around the engine though the change resulted in deep stool problems at high angles of attack tank planned to correct these problems in 1950 the Argentine Air Force used the British Gloster Meteor f4 as its main interceptor but Argentina wanted to produce homegrown jet fighters they had first tried with exiled French designer durin teen who produced the polky one in 1947 the design was not a success Kurt tank would use the rolls-royce Neen two jet engine from the poky design and the folk of of ta 183 design would be modified to accommodate the much larger British engine the fuselage was scaled up the undercarriage from the polky one was also incorporated into Tung snoo aircraft now called the pole key to the t-shaped tail was swept back 50 degrees and the cockpit had a bubble canopy with armor and a bulletproof windscreen armament was planned to be for 20 millimeter cannon staggered in two pairs along each side of the fuselage in order to test the design to unpowered glider versions were built and tested in 1948 to 49 they were constructed by Reimer Horton of the famous Horton brothers who had built the Nazi flying wing late in the war and also fled to Argentina tank flew some of the missions himself various problems were resolved and alterations made the tank faced a problem Argentine lack the up-to-date machinery and tools required to build Jets and each aircraft was essentially hand-built the first powered flying prototype was built in 1950 who first flew on the 27th of June using evolved test pilots he proved a difficult plane to land and had stability problems at speeds above 700 kilometers an hour modifications mostly corrected these problems after several more flights and more modifications tank made a demonstration flight on the 8th of February 1951 before president Perrin government officials foreign diplomats and military attachés and a large crowd of locals [Music] [Music] the proving test flights were a success in the Argentine Air Force ordered 12 aircraft but later in 1951 Argentine Air Force test pilots reported severe vibration at a thousand kilometers an hour tank ordered the prototype grounded that Argentine pilot captain Manuel ignored the instructions and conducted aerobatic maneuvers during a high g-force turn one of the wings came off manawa managed to eject but his parachute only partially deployed and he was killed the cause of the crash was faulty workmanship not the design a third prototype was built incorporating many changes it first flew on the 23rd of September 1952 he was due to be demonstrated before president Peron on the 11th of October but two days beforehand pilot Otto Behrens crashed at low level and was killed her fourth prototype was built in 1953 fitted with cannons and modified to resolve more problems notably the designs deep stall issues it first flew on the 20th of August 1953 the Netherlands and Egypt both expressed interest in purchasing the poky - but eventually decided to buy readily available fighters from elsewhere the Dutch bought the republic f-84f thunderstreak an f-86 G Thunder jet while Egypt went for the Soviet MIG 15 the thing that killed off kurt tanks jet was a severe financial crisis in argentina in 1953 but simply argentina couldn't afford to make the pull key - especially with no overseas orders on the books tanks contract expired in January 1955 and Peron terminated the project however the one remaining pole key to the fourth arm prototype did see combat ironically used alongside meteor F force to attack Parana Strauses during a coup d'etat in September 1955 that force Perrin from office the new government forced tank and many other Germans with third reich connections out of the country tank going to India where he developed the HF 24 merit supersonic fighter the last use of a kurt tank built pokey 2 was in 1956 - in an attempt to make a record flight from cordoba to buenos aires the aircraft overran the runway in Buenos Aires and was damaged beyond repair the aging meteor f4 served on but the Argentine Air Force seemed determined that the pokey 2 should be adopted and the new government allowed orders for 100 a fifth prototype was therefore built in 1959 and flew the same year but by now the fighter was considered obsolete and too politically sensitive because of its connection to Peron and Nazis instead the new Argentine government was wooed by the Americans and received 28 rather tatty secondhand f-86 f40 sabers for a very low price prototype number 5 is today preserved at the Argentine Air Force Museum at air base more on the only example surviving of Nazi Germany's last jet fighter the polky - thanks for watching please subscribe and share you can also visit my new audiobook channel war stories with mark Feltham details below you can help support both of my channels at PayPal and patreon details also in the description box [Music]

Channel: Mark Felton Productions

Views: 2,063,022

Rating: 4.9046173 out of 5

Keywords: Pulqui II, Argentina, Juan Peron, Kurt Tank, FW-190, Rat Lines, Mark Felton Productions

Id: IXo9koa9MbA

Length: 14min 55sec (895 seconds)

Published: Sat May 16 2020

Reddit Comments

[u/[deleted]]

I wouldn't call it Nazi Germany's. Many aircraft developed by the US and USSR post war also used designers / engineers from Germany and built on many of the same concepts, and I wouldn't call those aircraft Nazi Germany's either.

[u/Gonad-Brained-Gimp]

wiki : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FMA_IAe_33_Pulqui_II

[u/nucleophilicattack]

It’s got MiG 17 vibes