Rudel and his squadron flew on the crucial bombing run on Rotterdam, which effectively knocked the Netherlands out of the fight, and allowed it to be overrun. Rudel and his squadron were part of the invasion of the Netherlands, bombing several cities during the five day invasion. With limited resources, the German High Command had kept its Stuka pilots grounded during that battle, knowing that they'd be needed in the West. Rudel was not part of the invasion of Czechoslovakia. The son of a minister, he was a teetotaler, preferring milk to alcohol.

Rudel was a devoted German and Nazi, believing that Adolf Hitler was doing God's work on Earth. During World War II he led many Stuka attacks across Europe. Hans-Ulrich Rudel was a German Luftwaffe Stuka pilot. Hans-Ulrich Rudel in The War That Came Early Josef Mengele, the Auschwitz 'Angel of Death.' A committed and unrepentant Nazi, he founded the Kameradenwerk, a relief organization for Nazi criminals that helped fugitives escape to Latin America and the Middle East. Rudel flew 2530 combat missions and successfully attacked many tanks, trains, ships, and other ground targets, claiming a total of 2000 targets destroyed - including 800 vehicles, 519 tanks, 150 artillery guns, one destroyer, two cruisers, one Soviet battleship, 70 landing craft, four armored trains, several bridges and nine aircraft which he shot down. Rudel was one of only 27 military men to be awarded the Knight's Cross with Oak Leaves, Swords and Diamonds, and the only one to be awarded the Knight's Cross with Golden Oak Leaves, Swords and Diamonds. Rudel is famous for being the most highly decorated German serviceman of the war. Hans-Ulrich Rudel (2 July 1916 – 18 December 1982) was a Stuka dive-bomber pilot during World War II.

Stuka pilot rudel