OT; FLIEGERFAUST (?)

thanks KARL!

the girlfriend's daddy had died  from acrrued illness and old  wounds
before i ever met him-he was only in his early 50s, i think.

from what her brother told me, POP had been assigned to a unit in France
prior to D-Day. he had been sent there	after  he recovered from serious
a  wound gotten fighting the  Russians.  he was in his mid 20s, i think,
and had been in DAS HEERE before the war began.

anyway, he had apparentlly seen the shitstorm up close and personal, he
had (i am looing at a photo of his field gray tunic now) a number of
badges on the left chest,  one that looked kinda like a USN submarine
badge (but he was not a seaman) worn above the rest, what i know was
called a KNIGHT"S CROSS, an IRON CROSS 2/c ribbon,  3 cloth badges on
his right arm  that were rectangular boxes wiprofiled tank inside. on
the left sleeve were  2 silver	V-shaped chevrons  and a diamond on a
dark background. 
he was an infantryman, supposedly.

(maybe a corporal of some type?)

anyway, he also wore a smock over this, that i also saw,  which was an
ugly-tan w/green-brown jagged shapes on one side, and a grayish white
color  the other. 
. i think there was some odd looking leafy bars in cloth on the left
sleeve of this smock.

typical looking battered brown and black leather gear, including a
holster for a P38, and	machinepistol ammo pouches. some
big canvas bags that i guessed were apparently used to carry  ammo for
the RL (did not look lie BUNDESWEHR breadbags, these were bigger).

the launcher,  as i recall it,	must have been a "B" model of this
thing; i am petty sure there  were more than 6 barrels. the paint was
flaking off from wear, but it was painted an ugly gray green.

he supposed lugged thiis thing around from Normandy, in the Lorraine,
and then all the way to HANAU. he supposedly shot down a JABO with it,
sharing credit with another RL soldier.

supposedly the last time he used it was a week or so before he got back
to the	farm, when he used it to shoot up some American half tracks and
jeeps  that blundered into a roadblock his unit was manning.

i need to ask my UK buddy, but,  think he saw  a 9 barrel  RL in
Normandy, and in Berlin.

i had never  even heard of this weapon till i saw the one outside of
HANAU, and i ws not sure it really was an AA weapon-i always thought it
was  some kind of light vehicle and anti-personnel weapon, till my UK
buddy told me what these were.

last time i saw this was way back in 1966.