Hans-Ulrich Rudel (2 July 1916 – 18 December 1982) was a German ground-attack pilot during World War II and a post-war neo-Nazi activist.
The most decorated German pilot of the war and the only recipient of the Knight's Cross with Golden Oak Leaves, Swords, and Diamonds, Rudel knocked out 519 tanks, one battleship, one cruiser, 70 landing craft and 150 artillery emplacements. He claimed nine aerial victories and the destruction of more than 800 vehicles. He flew 2,530 ground-attack missions exclusively on the Eastern Front, usually flying the Junkers Ju 87 "Stuka" dive bomber.
Rudel surrendered to US forces in 1945 and emigrated to Argentina. An unrepentant Nazi, he helped fugitives escape to Latin America and the Middle East, and sheltered Josef Mengele, the former SS doctor at Auschwitz. He worked as an arms dealer to several right-wing regimes in South America, for which he was placed under observation by the US Central Intelligence Agency.
In the West German federal election of 1953, Rudel was the top candidate for the far-right German Reich Party but was not elected. After the 1955 Argentinian military coup d'etat that deposed constitutional president Juan Perón, Rudel moved to Paraguay, where he acted as a foreign representative for several German companies.
Rudel was born on 2 July 1916, in Konradswaldau, in Lower Silesia, Prussia. He was the third child of Lutheran minister Johannes Rudel. As a boy, Rudel was a keen sportsman and attended the humanities-oriented Gymnasium in Lauban. He joined the Hitler Youth in 1933. After graduating with Abitur in 1936, he participated in the compulsory Reich Labour Service (RAD). Following the labour service, Rudel joined the Luftwaffe in the same year and began his military career as an air reconnaissance pilot. Rudel was not a member of the Nazi Party. However, he did join the Allgemeine SS with membership number 206,953.
German forces invaded Poland in 1939 starting World War II in Europe. As an air observer, Rudel flew on long-range reconnaissance missions over Poland. During 1940, he served as a regimental adjutant for the 43rd Aviators Training Regiment, based at Vienna.
In early 1941, he underwent training as a Stuka pilot. He was posted to 1 Staffel Sturzkampfgeschwader 2 (StG 2), which was moved to occupied Poland in preparation for Operation Barbarossa, the invasion of the Soviet Union, in June 1941.
On 21 September 1941, Rudel took part in an attack on the Soviet battleship Marat of the Baltic Fleet. Marat sank at her moorings on 23 September 1941 after being hit by two bombs, one a 1,000-kilogram (2,200 lb) bomb near the forward superstructure. It caused the explosion of the forward magazine which demolished the superstructure and the forward part of the hull. 326 men were killed. The ship gradually settled to the bottom in 11 meters (36 ft) of water. Her sinking is commonly credited to Rudel alone, but Rudel dropped only one of the bombs that sank her. Rudel's unit then took part in Operation Typhoon, Army Group Center's attempt to capture Moscow, the Soviet capital.
Rudel's gunner from October 1941 was Erwin Hentschel, who served with Rudel for the next two and a half years, both men earning the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross during that period. Hentschel completed 1,400 sorties with Rudel.
In early 1942, Rudel got married while home on leave. Later in the year, he took part in the Battle of Stalingrad. From May 1941 to January 1942, Rudel flew 500 missions. In February 1943, Rudel flew his 1,000th combat mission, which made him into a national hero.
He then participated in experiments using the Ju 87 G in the anti-tank role. He took part in anti-tank operations against the Soviet Kerch–Eltigen Operation. Footage from an onboard gun camera was used in Die Deutsche Wochenschau, a Reich Ministry of Propaganda newsreel. In April 1943, Rudel was awarded the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves, receiving the Oak Leaves from Hitler personally in Berlin.
Rudel and the same anti-tank unit participated in the Battle of Kursk. On the first day of the German offensive, 5 July, he flew a Ju-87G, the first time one had seen action. It was a stuka equipped as an anti-tank aircraft by having two 37 mm (1.46 in) Bordkanone BK 3,7 cannons mounted in under-wing gun pods. The concept was Rudel's idea and proved very successful. On 12 July 1943 he claimed 12 Soviet tanks in one day. Ferdinand Schörner, a senior German general, commented "Rudel alone replaces a whole division". The fighting was intense and Rudel was fortunate to survive, as the slow moving stukas were vulnerable and suffered a high casualty rate. In October 1943, Rudel was credited with the destruction of his 100th tank and was awarded the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves and Swords (one of only 160 awarded) on 25 November.
Rudel was appointed Gruppenkommandeur of III. Gruppe on 22 February 1944. On 20 March, Rudel performed a forced landing behind Soviet lines and he and Erwin Hentschel, his longtime gunner, made their way to the German lines. The men attempted to swim across the Dniester River but Hentschel drowned in the attempt. Upon his return, Ernst Gadermann, previously the troop doctor of III. Gruppe, joined Rudel as his new radio operator and air gunner. Rudel was awarded the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves, Swords and Diamonds (one of only 27 awarded) on 29 March 1944, the tenth member of the Wehrmacht to receive this award. The presentation was made by Hitler personally.
Rudel was promoted to Oberstleutnant on 1 September 1944, and appointed leader of SG 2, replacing Stepp, on 1 October 1944. On 22 December 1944, Rudel completed his 2,400th combat mission, and the next day, he reported his 463rd tank destroyed. On 29 December 1944, Rudel was promoted to Oberst (colonel), and was awarded the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Golden Oak Leaves, Swords, and Diamonds, the only person to receive this decoration. This award, intended as one of 12 to be given as a post-war victory award for Nazi Germany, was presented to him by Hitler on 1 January 1945, four months before Nazi Germany was defeated.
On 8 February 1945, Rudel was badly wounded in the right foot, and landed inside German lines as his radio operator shouted flight instructions. Rudel's leg was amputated below the knee. He returned to flying on 25 March 1945. He claimed 26 more tanks destroyed by the end of the war. Over the course of the war he claims to have destroyed 519 Soviet tanks, flying 2,530 missions. There is no primary source confirming his claims. On 19 April 1945, the day before Hitler's final birthday, Rudel met with Hitler in the Führerbunker at the Reich Chancellery in Berlin. On 8 May 1945, Rudel fled westward from an airfield near Prague, landing in US controlled territory, and turned himself in. The Americans refused to hand him over to the Soviet Union.
Continued National Socialist activities
While Rudel was interned, his family fled from the advancing Red Army and found refuge with Gadermann's parents in Wuppertal. Rudel was released in April 1946 and went into private business. In 1948, he emigrated to Argentina via the ratlines, travelling via the Austrian Zillertal to Italy. In Rome, with the help of South Tyrolean smugglers, and aided by the Austrian bishop Alois Hudal, he bought himself a fake Red Cross passport with the cover name "Emilio Meier", and took a flight from Rome to Buenos Aires, where he arrived on 8 June 1948. Rudel authored books on the war, supporting the regime and attacking the Oberkommando der Wehrmacht for "failing Hitler".
After Rudel moved to Argentina, he became a close friend and confidant of the President of Argentina Juan Perón, and Paraguay's dictator Alfredo Stroessner. In Argentina, he founded the "Kameradenwerk" (lit. "comrades' agency"), a relief organization for Nazi war criminals. Prominent members of the "Kameradenwerk" included SS officer Ludwig Lienhardt, whose extradition from Sweden had been demanded by the Soviet Union on war crime charges, Kurt Christmann, a member of the Gestapo sentenced to 10 years for war crimes committed at Krasnodar, Austrian war criminal Fridolin Guth, and the German spy in Chile, August Siebrecht. The group maintained close contact with other internationally wanted fascists, such as Ante Pavelić and Carlo Scorza. In addition to these war criminals that fled to Argentina, the "Kameradenwerk" also assisted Nazi criminals imprisoned in Europe, including Rudolf Hess and Karl Dönitz, with food parcels from Argentina and sometimes by paying their legal fees. In Argentina, Rudel became acquainted with notorious Nazi concentration camp doctor and war criminal Josef Mengele. Rudel, together with Willem Sassen, a former Waffen-SS and war correspondent for the Wehrmacht, who initially worked as Rudel's driver, helped to relocate Mengele to Brazil by introducing him to Nazi supporter Wolfgang Gerhard. In 1957, Rudel and Mengele together travelled to Chile to meet with Walter Rauff, the inventor of the mobile gas chamber.