Lilia Litviak's Short Life Of Courage

Many young men and woman sacrificed and gave of themselves to protect their homelands during WWII

. Young Lilia Litviak was one such woman. Her story is one of talent and intense drive. As a woman aviator, Lilia was something of a rarity. The fact that there were very few female fighter pilots during this period of time is something that is already known. Given that by the time the war broke out Lilia had already been training pilots for some years with 45 students under her belt simply makes her all the more impressive. It was clear from a very young age that Lilia was obsessed with flying. She joined a flight club and had taken her first solo flight by the time she was fifteen. She also went through military flight school during her teenage years. When the war broke out Lilia presented herself at a recruiting station but was turned down because of her lack of in-flight hours. She was told that she needed 1,000 hours in order to enlist. She presented herself at another recruiting station, wrote down "1,000" under flight hours, and was accepted into the service and sent off to boot camp. Boot camp was an intense, brief period, after which Lilia was soon to be seen in the skies in a Yak-1.

Flying in a Yak-1 against German bombers certainly didn't grant a fighter pilot any advantages. Lilia, however, took almost no time at all to begin showing herself to be a truly exemplary pilot. On her second outing she got her first kill and then proceeded to bring down her second victory - a decorated German fighter pilot ace. He was taken prisoner and demanded to see the pilot who had brought him down. Upon coming face to face with Lilia he was certain that a mean joke was being played on him until she described turn by turn how she had taken him down. Another of Lilia's well known victories was when she broke through a line of planes guarding an observation balloon, bringing that down and saving her comrades on the ground a great deal of trouble. At the age of 21, after flying 66 missions with 12 solo victories and several assisted victories, Lilia went out on a mission and never returned. It was presumed that she died after being taken down by a German bomber but it was also unknown whether or not she might have survived and been taken by the Germans. Some years after her death she was finally awarded the highest of honors: Hero of the Soviet Union.

by: temp002

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