A Luftwaffe Eurofighter honors the most famous German aviator and his plane

Three years after West Germany founded its air force (the Luftwaffe), its first squadron of fighter aircraft was created.

The history of the Red Baron, the most famous fighter pilot of all time
A spectacular video of an Alpha Scramble with Eurofighter aircraft from Spain and Germany

That squadron is Jagdgeschwader 71 (JG 71), founded on 6 June 1959 and initially equipped with 50 Canadair F-86 Mk.6 fighters, the Canadian version of the U.S. F-86 Sabre fighter. The squadron was initially based at Ahlhorn in Lower Saxony. On April 21, 1961, the 43rd anniversary of the death of Manfred von Richthofen, the famous "Red Baron" (the greatest German ace of the First World War, with 80 victories), the then President of West Germany, Heinrich Lübke, granted this unit the honorary title of "Richthofen", in memory of the most famous German aviator in history. JG 71 was then flying Lockheed F-104 Starfighters.

JG 71 "Richthofen" was the last Luftwaffe squadron to fly the F-4F Phantom II fighter, a German version of the F-4E that could not fire AIM-7 Sparrow medium-range air-to-air missiles and had a shorter range. JG 71 received its first Eurofighters in 2010, completing the retirement of its last F-4Fs in 2013. JG 71 has long had a tradition of decorating some of its aircraft with references to the Red Baron. A few weeks ago, JATO-Aviation Videos published a video showing the livery worn by the Eurofighter 31+07, piloted by Colonel Andersen, in homage to the red aviator and to the best known of his aircraft, the Fokker Dr.I triplane:

You can see some screenshots from this video here. Here we see the front of the Eurofighter 31+07 with the JG 71 emblem, consisting of the letter R (Richthofen's initials) and a four-pointed star representing NATO:

Here we see the port side of the aircraft. On the drift we can see an illustration of the Red Baron's Fokker Dr.I.

And here we see the starboard side. Also visible on the fuselage is a second illustration of Manfred von Richthofen's Fokker Dr. I bearing the Iron Cross, an emblem used in the Middle Ages by the Teutonic Order, founded in the Holy Land by German knights, and which still identifies Luftwaffe aircraft today.

The commemorative decorations of the Luftwaffe Eurofighters are spectacular and would deserve to be displayed in an art exhibition. In 2023, I already showed you here the one they wore in the first flight of the German Air Force over Israel, a spectacular decoration that combined the flags of Germany and Israel to commemorate the 75th anniversary of the founding of the State of Israel.