Messerschmitt Bf 109 in Action

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Issued on 15 February 1934, the request by the new Reichsluftfahrtsministerium (RLM/Air Ministry) for a single-seat daytime air combat fighter with a top speed of 400 km/h, brought a new lease of life to the financially strapped Bayerische Flugzeugwerke AG (BFW). BFW began work on the plane, its first military aircraft, that December, and in May 1935 the Bf 109 V1 prototype took to the air - 10 months before the flight of the first Spitfire - launching the career of an iconic fighter plane whose numerous versions would serve the Reich until the end of the Second World War.