Comrade Captain Aaron "Easter" Whittaker, the People's Collective leading ace, earned his 30th victory Tuesday against his bitter rival, I.S.A. fighter ace Gunter Lutzow, a German fighter pilot on loan to the I.S.A. for flight training and technical advice. Apparently the I.S.A. and People's Collective squadrons clashed in international air space about 50 miles southwest of St. Louis, Missouri.
The battle between the 3rd Rock Island Squadron and the 14th Squadron of the People's Air Militia raged for several minutes, and ended with Lutzow's defeat at Whittaker's hands.
"Lutzow lost track of Easter in the sun," claimed Comrade Hewett Jones, one of Whittaker's two wingmen, "and I guess he picked the wrong plane when his sight cleared, cause he suddenly broke port to climb on my tail. That's when Easter dropped in and shot up [Lutzow's] tail assembly and rear turret." Apparently the damage was severe enough to force Lutzow to bail out. There has been no report on whether Lutzow's gunner escaped the plane.
This marks the second time Whittaker has bested Lutzow in combat. The first time was last October, when the Comrade Captain bested Lutzow in a nose-to-nose contest, followed by a rocket attack. It is also the second time Lutzow has escaped unharmed. Deprived of Lutzow, the remaining I.S.A. Hellhounds disengaged and returned to I.S.A. airspace.
I.S.A. Radio News reports the I.S.A. squadron was conducting routine training in the Fokke-Wulf Hellhound, a German fighter plane recently imported for deployment in the Mississippi River Valley. The trainee flight was suddenly set on by a "horde of Communist planes" while passing near a Collective convoy. I.S.A. Radio News also claims "the Communist zeppelins were carrying arms and bombs to the Spanish Communist faction in the Spanish Civil War."
The People's Voice radio news department claims the I.S.A. Hellhounds conducted a planned attack on a convoy of Collective zeppelins under the protection of the Avatars, the 14th Squadron of the People's Air Militia. The People's Voice says the I.S.A. had discovered that the convoy was carrying "food, medicine, and other relief supplies to the beleaguered Socialist brothers in the Spanish Civil War."
