Junkers Ju87G-1 Stuka
Image by hugh llewelyn
My model of the Junkers Ju87G-1 Stuka of Hauptmann Hans-Ulrich Rudel, Kommandeur of III/St.G2 ‘Immelmann’ at the Battle of Kursk, July 1943. The G-1 was a specialised anti-tank conversion of the D-5 dive bomber and had 2x37mm Flak 18 cannon under the wings, making the aircraft very unwieldy but lethal against tanks and other vehicles. Rudel had the incredible score of 1 battleship, 1 cruiser and 70 landing craft sunk; 519 tanks, 800+ vehicles and 150 artillary emplacements destroyed and even 11 aircraft shot down, all on the Eastern Front. Almost all his missions were in Ju87 dive bombers or anti-tank aircraft although at the end of the war he was flying Fw190D-9 fighter bombers. The Stuka is in the standard RLM65/70/71 camouflage in a sharply defined splinter scheme i.e: undersurfaces RLM65 Light Blue, upper surfaces RLM70 Black Green and RLM71 Dark Green, carried right down the fuselage sides. Rudel survived the war and escaped to Argentina where he led a neo-Nazi party, eventually returning to West Germany.