German Navy

From Scramble - The Aviation Magazine

German Navy

Description
Motto	Yourmotto
Established	1957
Scramble website	Scramble's OrBat page
Scramble individual a/c	Scramble database

History

The German Navy aircraft marking

The current status of the Federal Republic Armed Forces (Bundeswehr) was influenced by two major historic events; WW II and the reunification of East and West Germany in 1990. The Federal Republic of Germany (Bundesrepublik Deutschland) was constituted May 23rd 1949. Later Germany was allowed an army with a personnel strength of 500.000. On 9 may 1955 the Federal Republic became a NATO-member.

The Marineflieger was founded in 1957. The navy used the Sea Hawk and several types of helicopters in the very beginning. During the sixties the Starfighter was also introduced into this air arm and continued flying until the mid-eighties. The F-104 Starfighter was replaced by the Tornado and two Marinefliegergeschwader (1 and 2) flew the Tornado. Both units have been disbanded and fighter operations within the navy stopped during 2005. Today the Atlantic (replacing the HU-16 Albatross) forms the fixed wing part of the Marineflieger. The Atlantic is to be replaced by former Royal Netherlands Navy P-3C CUP Orions from 2006. The first of eight Orions was handed over on 28 February 2006. The Sea King and Sea Lynx helicopters are currently used for SAR- and ASW-operations. The future will also see the introduction of the NH90 (Air Force, Navy and Army).

In the beginning, a code system was used indicating the wing and squadron the aircraft belonged to, but new serials (20+01 etc.) were allocated by the release of 'Herausgabe der algemeinen Versorgungsweisung' Nr M5, dated november 13, 1967. This serial system in covered more in depth in this article

In autumn 1949 the German Democratic Republic (Deutsche Demokratische Republik) was formed. The reunification of East and West Germany on 3 October 1990 meant that the GDR ceased to exist. Of the hundreds of a/c from the Nationale Volksarmee (NVA) only the MiG-29s and some of the transport a/c and helicopters were incorporated into the Luftwaffe. The Marineflieger operated the Mi-14 for a short while.