The brawl; hands in his pockets, hair always untangled, long and deep were dug on the wide cheeks. The rebel; lonely and perpetually absorbed, chewing open-mouthed an American gum, with sky-blue eyes.
George Beurling, the 'Falcone Maltese', is not much appreciated in our area, and it is not difficult to understand why: in July of 1942, when the island of Malta was besieged by the Axis, knocked down 24 opponents in 14 days .. 9 of which were brave pilots of the Regia Aeronautica. He did not make too many scruples, not even to pose smiling with the drift of a Macchi 202 that exhibited the emblem of the Savoy as a trophy, but then as the Germans say "Krieg ist Krieg".
Born in Verdun, Canada, as a child, George had only one aspiration: to fly, and did everything to cultivate his dream.
"For as long as I can remember, the taking off of planes and their soaring in the sky have always been the beginning and the end of my thoughts. My only ambition." - confessed in an interview.
To go to school to watch the small planes flying over the airfield near the town was his favorite pastime along with reading books on the boards of the First World War to learn the tactics. In the afternoon, he would lock himself in his room to build airplane models to sell to put aside the money with which he would pay for his flight lessons.
To anyone who gave him more than a moment of his attention, the little Beurling began to tell the tactics of the great knights of the air who had made history in the skies of France, and for this he became the laughing stock of the country. The children of the school teased him, followed him to the house to annoy him. This helped to make his childhood unhappy and very lonely. His wolf character was forged around a singular passion in peacetime.
He became a pilot, but Beurling did not want to be a civilian pilot, he considered it boring and repetitive. As soon as he obtained the patent, he stole a car to escape to America with the hope of being hired in theAmerican Volunteer Group, which sent pilots in Manchura and Burma to fight the Japanese under the table. He obtained only a month in prison and forced expatriation that brought him straight back home. He then turned his attention to wanting to fight the communists. As soon as he learned that the Russians were invading Finland, George barely eighteen ran to the Finnish embassy in Montreal to find out if a volunteer pilot could make him comfortable; they were so crazy to give him the approval, but only on condition that his parents gave him permission. Obviously they did not give it, and George lost another war, resigning himself to enlist in peace in the Royal Canadian Air Force, where from the first moment did not arouse the sympathy of anyone.
The situation in Europe had heated up when the RAF, committed to sending the first fighters into France invaded by Nazi Germany, was in desperate need of pilots in view of the inevitable. Determined to reach the aerial duels he had craved since he was a child, he embarked on an ammunition ship challenging the German U-boats who undisturbed half of the convoys headed for the old continent and reached England to enlist.
Reaching Glasgow he was catapulted into the RAF recruiting office, but once he showed his enormous talent in flying a technicality prevented him from enlisting: George had not brought his birth certificate with him. He only had to cross the Atlantic twice on ships attacked by the Germans like rats in a barrel and, miraculously unharmed after a torpedo hit the ship he was traveling on, return to the same recruiting office with the damned certificate. This time no one could stop him from taking the first step towards becoming a fighter pilot.
The Battle of England was lost, but assigned to the training camp in Hawarden, in September of the 1941, it immediately entered the thanks of the British ace James Ginger Lacey (30 felling on Hurricane, including theHeinkel 111 that was about to hit Buckingham Palace). In Hawarden he concentrated most of his time in the shooting studio, in the estimation of distances, in the ballistics of the bullets and in their curved trajectory: now in his subconscious flight and shooting were like breath, a man breathes during every action of his life , yet he does not care ... it's an unconscious automatism.
Assigned to the 403 ° Squadron, stationed in Essex, led on Spitfire the first escort missions with bombers flying over the Channel, but without ever meeting the enemy. He was unable to fire a single shot. Transferred to the 41st Squadron, on May 1941, 190 he finally had his baptism of fire over Calais. Attacked from behind by a formation of five Focke-Wulf XNUMXs, he pulled straight into the sun, let the attack speed opponent overtake him by pulling just behind the bar and just black lasagna entered the collimation cross and detonated it in a ball of fire.
Two days later it was the turn of another Fw 190. As the last arrived, Beurling was entrusted with the role of 'weaver' in the formation: the last of a formation of 5 devices divided into two groups, therefore the first to fall under the shots from an enemy formation. The abandonment of training immediately caused him problems with superiors who detested him and accused him of being a totally unconscious person inadequate to 'team play'. But George, convinced that he had a perpetually full tank of reason, didn't give a damn about the punishments inflicted on him by his superiors, and as soon as he saw that things were going badly in England, he volunteered for a vacancy overseas.
Embarking in a light heart only seven days later he became aware of his destination. It was the Malta Fortress Island: an outpost under siege amid the Axis dominions that controlled all the coasts of the Mediterranean. Malta was unattainable for any type of allied ship, and the only way to get supplies, including planes to reinforce the garrison that held the island strenuously, was 'airborne'. This is why all pilots and drivers Spitfire Mk.Vc (equipped with the particular tropical filter) with that destination venereal launched by the HMS aircraft carrier Eagle (photo) as soon as the limit of 600 miles away from the island is reached (Operation Pedestal). The Spitfire destined for Malta were not planes prepared for takeoff from the bridge of an aircraft carrier, and only take them into the air was an undertaking: the takeoff had to be carried out in full throttle, with the aircraft artificially inclined, and the brake pulled awaiting the command of take off. Ignore the communication of the Germans trying to give the false pilots orders in English, with the intent to take them off course and drop them offshore, Beurling and most of the pilots managed to reach the island under an explosive welcome for kind granting the Axis bombers that destroyed most of the Spitfire sent from England during landing or taxiing. It was the 9 June of the 1942.
Beurling had been assigned to the 249 ° Squadron stationed at Takali's base, a hell of sand and heat, where the few shacks that served as a dormitory, mess and command stood out among the pitches partially defended by ancient stone walls and bags of sand that welcomed the Spitfire in perennial alert.
The days were spent in the shade of the wing of the fixtures that become incandescent around midday, waiting for an order Scramble to prevent the Ju88 and SM79 from razing the little that remained on the island. Notice of 1 minute and a few clothes on, sometimes a pair of shorts and no shirt under the life jacket.
The July 6 Beurling came into the action. Breaking down a Macchi 200 'Lightning' in one day, heavily damaging a CANT Z.1007 'Alcione' bomber and knocking down a BF-109 G-6 earned the title of 'ace'. At the controls of different Spitfire (the BR173 / TD, BR170 / C-25, BR301 / UF-S, EP706 / TL), 'Screwball' Beuriling, the nickname they had given him in the squadron after he had surprised him to kill flies inveighing against him with a certain vehemence, he continued to get successes throughout the month.
The 14 July, despite being targeted by a plane that pointed straight into the tail, broke down its first Reggiane Re.2001. The 27 July beat down the Macchi Mc.202 "Folgore" of Italian fighter ace Furio Niclot Doglio, his wingman Faliero Gelli and in a second sortie 2 BF-109: for this he was awarded the DFC, Distinguished Flying Cross.
"The Eyeties ('Italians' in slang, ed) are relatively easy to break down, they are extremely brave, they have to be acknowledged - much more than Jerries ('Germans' in slang ed) - but their tactics are not good. Sthey are good, but they perform in loop and other useless acrobatics when they are in trouble. "- explained Beurling.
Beurling's tactics focused on his natural talent as a pilot; maneuvered his Spitfire with an innate simplicity up to 250 yards from the desired goal, not the easiest one, the one at the end of the formation, or the one that was commanded to him: he aimed at what he wanted to 'hunt'; he unhooked from the formation, broke into the enemy ranks and opened fire with his own Hispanic from 20mm aiming at the oxygen tanks or the fuel tank of the adversary.
His ability in the "deflection shot", the deflection shot, which consists in firing a burst at an 'imaginary' point in the sky where it is expected to be the target aircraft in the 'next' evasive maneuver, always leading to its short bursts from 2 seconds. To train his reflexes, the 'Unscrewed', he spent time loafing around the Takali airfield hunting for lizards. As soon as he found one he was at a distance to simulate the size of a German fighter in flight, he took out his .38 caliber and with a single blow he blew it up in the air. As for evasive tactics, when he had queued adversaries starting to worry him, Beurling wore his own Spifire stalled by suddenly pulling the bar to itself. This sudden maneuver led him Spit to fall down by screwing down, often displacing the attacker who could not follow him.
But Beurling was not invincible. During his stay on the island of Malta he was shot down four times. The 14 October of the '42, during its last sortie in the skies of the Mediterranean, was shot down by the Obfw Riker of the 4 / JG53 or by the Karl von Lieres of the 2 / JG27 during a dogfight south of Zonqor Point. Seriously injured at the heel he launched after a furious descent of 18.000 feet, when by now the impact with water was imminent. He was soon recovered from a lifeboat that surprised him to float in his 'Mae West' in a state of shock, desperately searching for the bible his mother had given him, and which he always carried with him.
Due to his serious injuries he was evacuated from Malta with other wounded pilots but the Liberator on which they were traveling due to the severe weather. Realizing the impending impact through noises and leaps that his 'ass' by now knew by heart, opened the door a few moments before the crash and along with two other survivors threw himself into the sea, swimming to the shore and saving the other time skin. Following this umpteenth incident, he spent a lot of time in the hospital and was repatriated to dozens of interviews and long tours to sell "war coupons".
"This work is so boring, that if they ask me to do it again, I will send them to hell, or I will ask at least a commission on the bonds I sell".
Having regained the suitability to fly in the spring of the 1943, after having married in the meantime, George decides to return to Europe to fight the Germans. Re-admitted to the 403 ° Squadron, equipped with Spitfire Mk.IX, shows from the first moment of having lost the hair, but not the vice. The head squadron said that his was the classic behavior of the insecure boy who would show off 'every stupid thing happens to pull'.
The air war in the skies of the 1944 Europe was very different from that to which Beurling was accustomed to Malta: huge formations of allied airplanes in continuous air superiority left little room for his bravado. Nevertheless, on more than one occasion, George, sighted by the solitary Fw 190, released himself from his position of weaver, chased them and knocked them down without anyone noticing, returning to training and telling the story only once back to the base.
Tied to be a liar, it was taken seriously only after the development of the wing camera film that had taken down the killing in one of these 'occasions'. This obviously did not please the superiors. A modern analysis would probably have found in him a 'post-traumatic stress disorder' due to the harsh privations and the constant tension he had undergone during the siege of Malta. The loss of many comrades, including his best friend, the French-Canadian pilot Jean Paradis, had further hardened him. His already hard and solitary character had further deteriorated.
Reached the share of 31 victories, best Canadian hunting ace of all time, he was turned away from the operational missions for his perpetual insubordinate conduct, and for the total inadequacy to the game of 'team'. He asked several times to be enabled and transferred to a squadron equipped with the new P-51D Mustang but, because of his naive and inaudible character, en route with his superiors, he was always rejected.
"If he ended up on a Mustang, he would be able to get to Berlin to find a German fighter to pull down, he would certainly end up getting killed," his superiors agreed.
Downgraded to training flights on small two-seater Tiger Moth, following repeated warnings obtained for his reckless acrobatics less than 150 meters from the ground, he was forced to leave with honor.
Back in Canada he tried unsuccessfully to get into USAF with the only desire to return to Europe to work on a Mustang. But now there was no need for pilots. The war in Europe soon came to an end, with an insane disappointment of Beurling, for whom the only 'game' he had ended up with, but above all, wanted to play. Her war marriage with Diana W. Gardner had already resulted in divorce, the family did not want to know anything about him. Completely unable to readjust to life in peacetime, he ended up begging for alms at the corners of Verdun: scraping meals in exchange for stories, and taking advantage of his reputation for 'pulling a living' someone would say.
When in the 1947 he learned from his old comrade in arms, Moshe Cohen, that the baby Israeli Air Force He was looking for expert pilots to fight the Middle East in the Arab-Israeli war. He did not have to repeat it twice, he signed and again crossed the Atlantic: direction Europe, and from there Israel would finally entrust him with the P-51 Mustang that he desired so much.
The 20 May 1948, Rome's Roman airport, George 'Buzz' Beurling, twenty-six years old with 4.000 flight hours, a DFC pinned on his chest and 31 confirmed victories, is at the controls of Norduuyn Norseman (photo) that would take him to new at war. As soon as the cart detaches from the runway, an engine goes up in flames, the plane swerves, George tries desperately to bring it down; the plane goes into a spin and ends off the track in a giant and glowing fireball. His remains, and those of Leonard Cohen, are unrecognizable.
No one can confirm it, but the first thought is the hypothesis of sabotage: the Palestinians could not afford an opponent like the Maltese Falcon. Falcone he was killed on the ground, where he was weaker.
George Beurling had 9 landings of emergency, and the tenth was fatal. The day after the news, he took the front page of the Montreal Gazette. In Rome he received an imposing military funeral with all the honors owed to such an illustrious adversary, but his family did not take part in it, nor did his ex-wife participate in it.
Of that insecure and bragging young man, of that lonely boy, thirsty for blood and adrenaline, there was nothing but a pile of ash that nobody wanted, and that for two and a half years nobody claims; a heap of ash crammed neatly in the deposit of the Verano cemetery in Rome.
It will later be buried in the non-Catholic cemetery, which in the shadow of the Pyramid of Cestius is home to poets and artists, such as Keats, his inseparable friend Shelly and a certain Gramsci. His mortal remains lie there until 9 November 1950, when they are brought to Israel to receive military honors again and be buried under the white and heavenly cloth in which stands the star of David.
In the cemetery of Zahal, at the foot of Mount Carmel, the סרן (capt.) George Frederik Beurling rests today: that courageous indomitable braggart who in life had not been able to give himself peace.
"I hate this century with all my heart." A man can die of thirst in it, "he had pointed out as a boy on a read and rereaded book that a melancholy pilot had written. That other driver was called Antoine de Saint-Exupery.
(photo: Department of National Defense, Canada / Royal Navy / web)
