Service début Fokker E.5/15, the last of the pre-production series, is believed to have been first flown in action by Kurt Wintgens of FFA6. On 1and 4July 1915, he reported combats with French Morane-SaulnierL (Parasols), well over the French lines. By 15July, Wintgens had moved to FFA48 and scored his first confirmed victory, another MoraneL. Parschau had received the new E.1/15 (Fokker factory serial 191), the initial example of the five Fokker
M.5K/MG service test examples for the line of aircraft, when the A.16/15 (green machine), he had flown since the beginning of the war, was returned to the Fokker Flugzeugbau factory in
Schwerin–Gorries for development. By the end of July 1915, about fifteen were operational with various units, including the five M.5K/MGs and about ten early production E.I airframes. M.5K/MG prototype airframe E.3/15, the first delivered to FFA62, was armed with a
Parabellum MG14 gun, synchronised by the unreliable first version of the Fokker gear. At first, E.3/15 was jointly allocated to him and Immelmann when their "official" duties permitted, allowing them to master the type's difficult handling characteristics and to practice shooting at ground targets. Immelmann was soon allocated a very early production Fokker E.I, E.13/15, one of the first armed with the
lMG 08 (a lightened version of the MG08
Spandau) machine-gun, using the more reliable production version of the Fokker gear.
The Scourge begins The Fokker Scourge is usually considered by the British to have begun on 1August, when
B.E.2cs of
2 Squadron Royal Flying Corps (RFC) bombed the base of FFA62 at waking the German pilots, including Boelcke (most likely, still with E 3/15) and Immelmann (flying E 13/15), who were quickly into the air after the raiders. By late October, towards the end of the
Battle of Loos, more Fokkers (including the similar Pfalz E-type fighters, which were also called Fokkers by Allied airmen) were encountered by RFC pilots and by December, forty Fokkers were in service. In the new fighters, pilots could make long, steep dives, aiming the fixed, synchronised machine-gun by aiming the aircraft. The machine gun was belt-fed, unlike the drum-fed
Lewis guns of their opponents, who had to change drums when in action. The Fokker pilots took to flying high and diving on their quarry, usually out of the sun, firing a long burst and continuing the dive until well out of range. If the British aircraft had not been shot down, the German pilot could climb again and repeat the process. Immelmann invented the
Immelmann turn, a
zoom after the dive, followed by a roll when vertical to face the opposite way, after which he could turn to attack again. The mystique acquired by the Fokker was greater than its material effect and in October, RFC HQ expressed concern at the willingness of pilots to avoid combat. RFC losses were exacerbated by the increase in the number of aircraft at the front, from 85 to 161 between March and September, the hard winter of 1915–1916 and some aggressive flying by the new German "C" type two-seaters. Boelcke and Immelmann continued to score, as did
Hans Joachim Buddecke,
Ernst von Althaus and
Rudolph Berthold from FFA23 and Kurt vonCrailshein of FFA53. The "official" list of claims by Fokker pilots for the second half of 1915 was no more than 28, many of them over French aircraft. Thirteen aeroplanes had been shot down by Immelmann or Boelcke and the rest by seven other Fokker pilots. January 1916 brought thirteen claims, most of them against the French, followed by twenty more in February, the last month of the "scourge" proper. Most of the victories were scored by
aces rather than the newer pilots flying the greater number of Fokkers. Allied casualties had been light by later standards but the loss of air superiority to the Germans, flying a new and supposedly invincible aircraft, caused dismay among the Allied commanders and lowered the morale of Allied airmen. In his memoir
Sagittarius Rising (1936),
Cecil Lewis wrote, On 14 January, RFC HQ issued orders that until better aircraft arrived, long and short-range reconnaissance aircraft must have three escorts flying in close formation. If contact with the escorts was lost, the reconnaissance must be cancelled, as would photographic reconnaissance to any great distance beyond the front line. Sending the B.E.2c into action without an observer armed with a Lewis gun also became less prevalent. The new tactic of concentrating aircraft in time and space had the effect of reducing the number of reconnaissance sorties the RFC could fly. New defensive formations were devised; a
II Wing RFC method was for the reconnaissance aircraft to lead, escorted on each side higher, with another escort behind and above. On 7 February, on a IIWing long-range reconnaissance, the observation pilot flew at ; a German aircraft appeared over
Roulers (Roeselare) and seven more closed in behind the formation. West of
Torhout (Thourout) two Fokkers arrived and attacked at once, one diving on the reconnaissance machine and the other on an escort. Six more German aircraft appeared over
Cortemarck (Kortemark) and formed a procession of fourteen aeroplanes stalking the British formation. None of the German pilots attacked and all the British aircraft returned, only to meet two German aircraft coming back from a bombing raid, which opened fire and mortally wounded the pilot of one of the escorts. The British ascribed their immunity to attack during the 55-minute flight to the rigid formation which the two Fokkers were unable to disrupt. On 7 February, a
12 Squadron B.E.2c., was to be escorted by three B.E.2cs, two F.E.2s and a
Bristol Scout from 12 Squadron and two more F.Es. and four R.E. aeroplanes from
21 Squadron. The flight was cancelled due to bad weather but twelve escorts for one reconnaissance aircraft demonstrated the effect of the Fokkers in reducing the efficiency of RFC operations. British and French reconnaissance flights to get
aerial photographs for intelligence and artillery ranging data had become riskier, in spite of German fighters being forbidden to fly over Allied lines (to keep the synchronisation gear secret). This policy, for various reasons, prevailed for most of the war; the rarity of German fighters appearing behind the Allied lines limited the degree of air superiority they were able to attain.
End of the Scourge ,
Guardian of Verdun The scourge waned during the
Battle of Verdun (21February20December 1916). The Germans tried to impose an air barrage () which concealed much of the German preparation for the offensive from French aerial reconnaissance. During March and April increasing numbers of the new French
Nieuport 11 fighters were sent to Verdun. Organised in specialist fighter squadrons () the Nieuports could operate in formations larger than the singletons or pairs normally flown by the Fokkers, quickly regaining air superiority for the . British F.E.2b pusher aircraft had been arriving in France from late 1915 and in the New Year began to replace the older F.B.5s. The pilot and observer had a good view forwards from their cockpits and the observer could also fire backwards over the tail.
20 Squadron, the first squadron equipped with the F.E., arrived in France on 23January 1916, for long-range reconnaissance and escort flying. The new aircraft lacked the speed to pursue the Fokkers and had limited manoeuvrability but the F.E.s became formidable opponents, particularly when flying in formation. The
Airco DH.2, a single-seat fighter, began to arrive at the front in February 1916. This aircraft had a modest performance but its superior manoeuvrability gave it an advantage over the , especially once the Lewis gun was fixed to point in the direction of flight. On 8 February,
24 Squadron (Major
Lanoe Hawker) arrived with D.H.2s and began patrols north of the Somme; another six D.H.2 squadrons followed. On 25 April, two of the D.H. pilots were attacked and found that they could out-manoeuvre the Fokkers; a few days later, without opening fire, a D.H. pilot caused a Fokker to crash onto a roof at Bapaume. The Nieuports proved even more effective when the first Nieuport 16s in British service were issued to
1 and
11 Squadrons in April. By March 1916, despite frequent encounters with Fokkers and the success of aces, the scourge was almost over. The bogey of the Fokker as a fighter was finally laid in April, when an E.III landed by mistake at a British aerodrome. The captured aircraft was found not to have the superior performance it had been credited with. The first British aircraft with a synchronisation gear was a Bristol Scout, which arrived on 25 March 1916 and on 24 May the first
Sopwith 1½ Strutter aircraft were flown to France by a flight of
70 Squadron.
End of the The effect of the new Allied types, especially the Nieuport, was of considerable concern to the Fokker pilots; some even took to flying captured examples. was sufficiently desperate to order German firms to build Nieuport copies, of which the
Euler D.I and the
Siemens-Schuckert D.I were built in small numbers. New D type single-seat, biplane fighters, particularly the
Fokker D.II and
Halberstadt D.II, had been under test since late 1915 and the replacement of the monoplanes with these types began by mid-1916. In February 1916, Friedrich Stempel began to assemble (KEK, single-seat battle units). The KEK were units mostly of two to four fighters, equipped with and other types which had served with FFA units during the winter of 1915–1916. By July 1916, KEK had been formed at
Vaux,
Avillers,
Jametz and
Cunel near Verdun as well as other places on the Western Front, as (aerial guard service) units, consisting only of fighters. In late May, German air activity on the British front decreased markedly, while the commander of the new , (Colonel)
Hermann von der Lieth-Thomsen, reorganised the German air service. The fighters of the KEK were concentrated into fighter squadrons () the first of which,
Jagdstaffel 2 () went into action on the Somme on 17 September. By this time, the last of the , long outmoded as front line fighters, had been retired. ==Aftermath==