Wolfgang von Richthofen s World War II years

"Red Baron Manfred von Richthofen was a distant cousin of Luftwaffe Field Marshal Wolfram von Richthofen of World War II. Frida von Richthofen, wife of the English writer David Herbert Lawrence, was a distant cousin of the Red Baron. Although their common ancestor dates back to 1661, the fame of the Red Baron during the war also influenced Frida somewhat in England.

Frida's sister, Elise von Richthofen, was Germany's first female social scientist.

The Red Baron's younger brother, Lotta von Richthofen, was also an ace pilot, shooting down 40 planes. He belonged to the 11th Fighter Squadron with his brother and died in a plane crash in 1922.

The Red Baron's grandnephew, Dr. Hermann von Richthofen, was Germany's ambassador to the United Kingdom from 1989 to 1993.

But Richthofen never went to war again. During a health check-up, doctors found that he had brain cancer and that it was impossible to undergo surgery**, which is an incurable disease that had reached an advanced stage and had only a few months to live. After the results of the medical examination, it became clear that Richthofen was no longer capable of any heavy military command work, so the High Command left him in Italy to continue his idle post as commander of the 2nd Air Force.

On October 28, 1944, the 2nd Air Force was downgraded to the Southern Command of the Air Force under the command of General Pohl, given that the Luftwaffe in Italy had nothing to do. Richthofen officially retired from the reserve and went home to recuperate, in fact, he was just waiting for death. He lived to the end of the war, but did not go to court.

On July 12, 1945, Air Marshal Richthofen died in Austria.

The 2nd Wing of the Wehrmacht Air Force and the 71st Wing of the Federal Luftwaffe were named after him. It is worth mentioning that the first wing commander of the 71st Wing was Erich Hartmann, an unprecedented ace who set a record of 352 crashes in World War II. On 9 September, the Allies landed in Salerno at the tip of the Italian peninsula, and Richthofen fought another battle, this time with 300 planes against 4,000 Allied planes.

Despite the failure of the Mediterranean operation, Richthofen did not lose Hitler's trust and was ready to move to the Western Front to deal with the impending Allied landing. Throughout the war, Hitler valued three air generals: Kesselring, Richthofen, and Grim.

Field Marshal Kesselring was the commander-in-chief of the Southern Front, and the Italian battlefield could not be separated from him, and Graim was the pillar of the air force on the Eastern Front after Richthofen's transfer in 1943 until the final stage of the war, and became the last field marshal of the German army at the end of April 45, succeeding Goering as commander-in-chief of the air force. In 1944, it became clear that the Eastern Front could not do without him. And what about Richthofen?

He had been the commander of almost all key Luftwaffe theaters since the time of the Spanish Civil War, and was now idle in Italy when there were no troops available. And in 1944, the German High Command was most concerned about when and where the Allies would land in Western Europe. As a result, the main force of the 2nd Air Force in Italy, the 2nd Air Army, was transferred to France, and Hitler was ready to transfer Richthofen to the Western Front as well, again acting as "Mr. Key".