Why did the Red Baron score more kills than other WW2 pilots?

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Cantankerous
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Why did the Red Baron score more kills than other WW2 pilots?

#1

Post by Cantankerous » 27 Aug 2020, 22:13

I'm known since age 11 that Manfred von Richthofen, the "Red Baron", scored more kills in combat than any other pilot of World War I, including German ones. However, I wanted to ask why the Red Baron scored more air-to-air victories than any other German fighter pilot of WW1, because Ernst Udet scored fewer kills than the Red Baron (62 planes shot down).

OpanaPointer
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Re: Why did the Red Baron score more kills than other WW2 pilots?

#2

Post by OpanaPointer » 27 Aug 2020, 22:45

Somebody had to be No. 1. Consider that most of the kills were against tethered observation balloons. That's not exactly an easy kill because they were heavily defended from the ground. The pilots had to come to them, and they were waiting. So it might be better to say that Richtofen scored a very much higher total under the circumstances.

In other words, he might be an alien.
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