Howdy Kelly St. Clair and Phil Pugliese,
>From: "Kelly St. Clair" <xxxxxx@efn.org>
>To: "TML" <xxxxxx@simplelists.com>
>Sent: Friday, April 8, 2016 1:20:57 PM
>Subject: Re: [TML] Off-topic but fascinating historically...
>>On 4/8/2016 11:19 AM, Phil Pugliese (via tml list) wrote:
>>> Here's something I never knew;
>>>
>>> Selected by Churchill to command 8th Army in 1942, in place of the sacked Auchinleck, 'Strafer' Gott was >>>targeted by German intelligence as he flew to Cairo to take up his new post. Six ME109s intercepted his >>>aircraft and, after shooting it down, deliberately obliterated the crash scene killing Gott in the process. As a >>>result Montgomery was given his chance to command and the rest is history.
>>>
>>> (excerpted from a book review)
>Reminds me a lot of the hit put out on Admiral Yamamoto:
>https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Vengeance
The German pilots, in my opinion, had an less difficult task of intercepting their target than the pilots going after Yamamoto.
I vaguely recall something about how Montgomery was not the first choice to take command of the 8th Army, I did not know that the first choice was assassinated. Of course Montgomery proved to be up to the task, unlike Yamamoto's successor.