Why Female Fighters Are Refer To As "Night Witches During World War II"

Why Women Fighters Are Refer To As Night Witches During World War II

Did you know... 'Night Witches' was the name used to refer to female Russian bombers during World War II who used to regularly attack German lines and were all but lost to history, until recently.

The women of the 588th Night Bomber Regiment of the Soviet Air Forces — better known as the Night Witches — had no radar, no machine guns, no radios, and no parachutes. All they had onboard was a map, a compass, rulers, stopwatches, flashlights, and pencils.

They flew the oldest, noisiest, most rickety planes you could think of. They were in such a state that there were regularly times when the engines would break down and cut out halfway through their missions, so they would have to climb out onto the wings MID-FLIGHT to restart the propellers.

In addition, the planes were so noisy that in order to stop Germans from hearing them flying over and starting up their anti-aircraft guns, they would climb up to a certain height, coast down to German positions to drop their bombs and then have to restart their engines in mid-air to beat a hasty retreat.

Their leader, Nadezhda Popova flew 852 missions and was never captured. In fact, the Night Witches were so feared by the Nazis that the German military responded to their threat by automatically issuing a prestigious Iron Cross medal to any German who was able to shoot one of the Night Witches down.

And who says women weren't a part of history?!

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