First Enemy Contact and the Importance of Teamwork

Heroes Remember

First Enemy Contact and the Importance of Teamwork

Transcript

Tell me, Mr. Sager, the first time that you came into contact with enemy, enemy airplanes, do you remember your reaction? Ah yes, I suppose I did. You know, Neil, the most nervous, worrying time I wonder if you would understand this. You would have a briefing about where you were going to go, as a wing, for example, in your squadron, and the role you were going to play and whether you were going to be escorting bombers or what you were going to do. And then there was always a period of a half an hour when you were waiting, you went to your aircraft, you talked with your air, ground crew to see that everything was in order. That waiting period was the time when, was very tough on the nerves and you wanted to get off right away but the, the longer you had to wait for deferred then, but once you got into the air you were occupied all, of course, all the time, that disappeared. My first encounter was, I was, I was flying fairly close to the squadron leader and, who was it at the time, and he turned and we were attacked from the rear and he did a, he called a break and I was, with my number two, turned into him, into, he did a complete circle or two and straightened out and got the leader or the tailman of the Germans, by the time we got close they had disappeared. So my first encounter was completely unsuccessful. Can I tell you a little something that I did learn? When you, when the young people think about Spitfires and they think about the aces and they think about what was the Canadian ace? Buzz Beurling. Buzz Beurling, and others, and yet I came to realize that while individual marksmen, this isn't a run to belittle marksmen. While it was excellent to have good shooters, good marksmen, the most important thing in a fighter squadron was the sense of team work you could develop because every single member of a flying unit had a role to play and if he didn't it may be that he would know that he would never probably get in, contact himself, never have a chance to shoot his guns. But the number twos were protecting their leader, you were all looking for the enemy, you all had to be able to maintain your position whatever it was and you, so that the, the role of every single pilot was most important. It's unfortunate, in a way, that DFC's, Distinguished Flying Crosses, were given to fighter pilots really on the basis of the number of aircraft they shot down, the minimum would be three, three or four. Whereas some of my, I became a flight commander on, three times and so I came to appreciate the people, the pilots who flew with me. Some of these other pilots who didn't shoot down, and didn't get a DFC, they had, I always felt had as much a, as much a, they should be, it should have been, we should have found some way to reward them because they, they had, some of them, knowing that they were good marksmen, they had to perform the, knowing that their chances of being shot down themselves were higher than the good marksmen, yet they performed, they carried out their jobs supremely well. They were the, I always felt, the most courageous of the lot. I had a couple of, 2 or 3 chaps who, when I had my own squadron, who were my flight commanders, and neither, none of those three, four, got a DFC, but they were superb leaders, and they showed tremendous courage even in the height of battle.

Description

Mr. Sager describes his first encounter with the enemy. Remembering this experience leads Mr. Sager to explain the valuable role of all the pilots in a squadron working as a unit and team.

Arthur Hazelton Sager

Mr. Sager was born in Hazelton, BC, where his father was working as a medical missionary. He was the eldest boy in his family, growing up with two brothers and four sisters. He and his family were pacifists (against war). Mr Sager quit school at age seventeen and went to work in a gold mine. At the outbreak of war Mr. Sager was living in London, England, working as a professional actor, as well as a reporter and had the opportunity to interview Jews and other people that had fled mainland Europe. The stories he heard from these people led to the changing of his pacifist attitudes. Mr. Sager also had two brothers who served, one in the Royal Canadian Navy and the other in the Royal Canadian Air Force. Mr. Sager joined the RCAF and flew many combat missions over Europe. He had a very successful career earning the Distinguished Flying Cross (DFC) with bars, and his flying record at the end of the war stood at six destroyed, two probable and five damaged. By the end of the war, Mr. Sager was made a commanding office After the war Mr. Sager also had a distinguished career as a private citizen. Among his many jobs, he spent twenty years working for the United Nations as Project Manager for developing countries, as well as a member of the Executive of the Royal Canadian Air Force Association.

Meta Data

Medium:: Video
Owner:: Veterans Affairs Canada
Duration:: 04:47
Person Interviewed:: Arthur Hazelton Sager
War, Conflict or Mission:: Second World War
Location/Theatre:: Europe
Branch:: Air Force
Units/Ship:: 416, 421, 443 Squadron
Rank:: Flight Commander
Occupation:: Pilot

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First Enemy Contact and the Importance of Teamwork

Heroes Remember