File:Focke Wulf Fw190A-8 (50107447368).jpg

Focke Wulf Fw190A-8 at the RAF Museum, Cosford, Shropshire, 8 July 2020. The Fw190 was one of the best fighters and ground attack aircraft of WWII. The Fw190A-8 at Cosford is fitted with an ETC501 fuselage rack for a 66gll drop tank or 551lb bomb. However, the aircraft had been withdrawn from normal squadron use and adapted as the controlling aircraft of a Mistel S-3B (Mistletoe) combination whereby it would be attached on struts to an adapted war-weary Junker Ju88 bomber beneath where the nose of the bomber had been replaced with a huge explosive shaped-charge. The cumbersome combination would fly to a position near the target, the Fw190 would aim the crewless Ju88 at the target, release it with explosive bolts and then return to base.

Mistels were first used in 1944 in the Battle of Normandy when there was an attack on the British-held port of Courseulles-sur-Mer. The Luftwaffe claimed to have sunk a British battleship but in fact it was probably the hulked old French battleship Courbet which they attacked. Another plan to attack the British Fleet in Scapa Flow in 1944 was scrapped when, with the sinking of the Tirpitz, the battleships of the Home Fleet left the base, no longer being needed to cover any breakout of the Tirpitz. So was a plan to attack Soviet power stations and arms factories when the speed of the Soviet advance meant available German bases were too far to launch attacks. Instead, they were used against Soviet bridgeheads but not with great success.