Erich Hartmann, German colonel and pilot (died 1993)

Erich Alfred Hartmann was a German fighter pilot during World War II and the most successful fighter ace in the history of aerial warfare. He flew 1,404 combat missions and participated in aerial combat on 825 separate occasions. He was credited with shooting down a total of 352 Allied aircraft: 345 Soviet and 7 American while serving with the Luftwaffe. During his career, Hartmann was forced to crash-land his fighter 16 times after either mechanical failure or damage received from parts of enemy aircraft he had shot down; he was never shot down by direct enemy action.