For these happy pilots, triumph or defeat gains equally the cheers of those who die beyond glory of any sort.

Raymond Joubert, Morton, Bredon, 1916. Welcome to the Battle of Redone podcast episode seven.

Dogfights over death ground.

First, a big shout out to listener J.K., who has fully recovered from his surgery, or at least I

think he has, because he's now right back on the mat like nothing ever happened.

Glad to see you back, buddy. All right, last episode,

I said I'd cover what had been happening in the air since the start of the Battle of Verdun.

So, here we go. Now, a project like this is an excellent way to really learn the whole breath

of a subject because in order for you to make your best effort at subject matter expertise,

you need to study all the available angles, stories, and sub-stories that are part of it.

And you may get lucky and discover a fascinating story within the story,

something that will take your breath away.

The Air War Over Verdun is that fascinating story.

This was a time of transition and developing tactics

involving larger air units, but throughout the battle, the man-to-man dog fights that we know of

World War I that took place in the skies over the poisoned death ground of the battlefield at Verdun,

enthralled the men on the ground.

World War I fighter pilots really were a type of hybrid early 20th century night and rock star.

Individual fighters whose worth was proved by a lot of luck and a lot of

skill. The best rifleman on the ground could be blown to bits by an unseeing, unthinking artillery

shell that just had his name on it. But the pilot had much more control over his own destiny. In the skies, his

skills, his training, and his experience could see him out of even the toughest fights. His

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