WWII: Wasn’t General Steinhoff under the impression that Hitler was a little crazy after meeting him near Stalingrad?

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Rall: Yes, this is the next point. This was before the collapse of Stalingrad and before El Alamein. This was the apex of his war. From that point on we went backward. It was too optimistic. Well then, nine months later I had to come back again to receive my Swords from Hitler. By that time we had lost the Sixth Army and Stalingrad, as well as El Alamein and the front in North Africa. You know, we had a hell of a time with the submarine war, and this was now a very different Hitler. He was no longer talking about tangible facts. He was talking about, “I see the deep valley. I see the strip on the horizon,” and it was all nonsense. He was speaking about magical figures of manpower and production, a fantasyland. We saw this man as no longer certain, and as infirm. The third time I saw Hitler was when I was summoned to receive my documentation for my Oak Leaves and Swords. It was engraved, gilded and beautifully made with a lovely skirt, frame and so on.

WWII: Do you still have these certificates?

Rall: No, they were stolen in Vienna, most likely by the Russians. There are some of them still available, but not mine. I gave them to my wife and told her to keep them safe and place them in the bunker in the city of Vienna. When we came back a couple of years later, they were gone and nothing was left. At that time there were only 16 or so (who had been so honored), with names such as Adolf Galland, Helmut Lent, Walter Nowotny, as they were all still alive at that time. Lent and Nowotny died before the war ended. Walter Oesau, Dietrich Pelz, Heinz Bar and I were present when Hitler handed these over. Then we had lunch with him, and as usual he started to talk. The main subject of his speech was the pending Allied invasion. This was January 1944. Everybody expected the invasion all along the Channel coast, wondering when it was coming and how they were coming and so on. At that time he developed his ideas, and you could see that Hitler was hopping around, very uncertain. Also, you know, one thing that was very typical of him was his stating how the British were always having problems with their opposition parties, the Labor Party, the labor unions and so on. It was clear to me that this man was a little out of his mind. Hitler did not have a really clear, serious concept of the situation. Whatever their problems, the British come together during war; they are one nation.

WWII: What was your impression of the Messerschmitt Me-262 jet fighter, which you flew?

Rall: Well, it was certainly a new dimension. The first time I sat in it, I was most surprised about the silence. If you are sitting in a standard piston-powered aircraft, you have a hell of a noise in the radio headset, background noise and static and such, which I did not experience in the Me-262. It was absolutely clear. With radio from the ground they controlled the flight. They gave me my orders, such as “Now accelerate your engines, build your rpm.” It was very clear. Totally clear. One other thing was you had to advance the throttles very slowly. If you went forward too fast, you might overheat and set the engines on fire. Also, if you were up to 8,000 rpm, or whatever it was, you released the brakes and you were taxiing. Unlike the Bf-109, which had no front wheel and was a tail dragger, the Me-262 had a tricycle landing gear. It was a new sensation, beautiful visibility. You could go down the runway and see straight forward. This was, however, also a weak moment for the Me-262. The aircraft at this point was a little bit stiff and slow during landing and takeoff, but fine when coming up to speed gradually. It was absolutely superior to the old aircraft.

WWII: So how did you like the armament of the Me-262?

Rall: You know, I never did get to shoot the weapons because when I had about 15 or 20 hours I became commander of the JG-300, which was equipped with Bf-109s. I only made some training flights, but never flew the jet in combat.

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