Institutional
Starfighter crisis: the Luftwaffe chief is dismissed
August 25, 1966
Amid the crisis over F-104G crashes in West Germany, Defence Minister Kai-Uwe von Hassel dismissed, at his own request, Luftwaffe chief Werner Panitzki, who had called the purchase a 'purely political decision'. His successor, Johannes Steinhoff, received full powers in autumn 1966 to reorganise the service.