Udet joined the Imperial German Air Service in April 1915 at the age of 19, and eventually became a notable flying ace of World War I, scoring 62 confirmed victories.

Influential in the adoption of dive-bombing techniques as well as of the Stuka dive bomber, by 1939 Udet had risen to the post of Chief of Procurement and Supply for the Luftwaffe.

The launch of Operation Barbarossa on 22 June 1941, combined with issues with the Luftwaffe's needs for equipment outstripping Germany's production capacity and increasingly poor relations with the Nazi Party, caused Udet to choose suicide on 17 November 1941 by shooting himself in the head.

Through a family friend, Gustav Otto, owner of the aircraft factory he had hung out around in his youth, Udet received private flight training.

Udet received his civilian pilot's license at the end of April 1915 and was immediately accepted by the Imperial German Air Service.

After this structural failure, and a similar incident in which Leutnant Winter and Vizefeldwebel Preiss lost their lives, the Aviatik B was retired from active service.

[citation needed] Later, Udet was court-martialed for losing an aircraft in an incident the flying corps considered a result of bad judgement.

A bomb thrown by hand by the leutnant became stuck in the landing gear, but Udet performed aerobatics and managed to shake it loose.

[1][4] Udet survived the encounter, but from then on learned to attack aggressively and began scoring victories, downing his first French opponent on 18 March 1916.

[6] Udet pulled away, leaving the flaming bomber trailing smoke, only to see the observer fall from the rear seat of the stricken craft.

[citation needed] During his service with Jasta 15, Udet later wrote he had encountered Georges Guynemer, a notable French ace, in single combat at 5,000 m (16,000 ft).

Udet applied for a transfer to Jasta 37, and Gontermann was killed three months later when the upper wing of his new Fokker Dr. 1 tore off as he was flying it for the first time.

By late November, Udet was a triple ace and Jastaführer, modelling his attacks after those of Guynemer, coming in high out of the sun to pick off the rear aircraft in a squadron before the others knew what was happening.

[citation needed] Despite his seemingly frivolous nature, drinking late into the night, and womanizing lifestyle, Udet proved an excellent squadron commander.

[4] Udet's success attracted attention for his skill, earning him an invitation to join the "Flying Circus", Jagdgeschwader 1 (JG 1), an elite unit of German fighter aces under the command of Manfred von Richthofen, popularly known as the Red Baron.

[1] Udet's enthusiasm for Richthofen was unbounded, who demanded total loyalty and dedication from his pilots, immediately cashiering anyone who fell out of line.

[citation needed] Richthofen was killed in April 1918 in France, where Udet was not at the front as he had been sent on leave due to a painful ear infection which he avoided having treated as long as he could.

Notified that he had received the Pour le Mérite, he had one made up in advance so that he could impress her, and painted her name on the side of his Albatros fighters and Fokker D VII.

[citation needed] On 29 June 1918, Udet was one of the early fliers to be saved by parachuting from a disabled aircraft, when he jumped after a clash with a French Breguet.

One stunt only Udet performed was successive loops with the last complete after turning off the engine mid air and landing the aircraft in a sideways glide.

He appeared with Leni Riefenstahl in three films: The White Hell of Pitz Palu (1929), Stürme über dem Mont Blanc (1930), and S.O.S.

[10][11] In the Berlin 1936 Summer Olympics Udet entered the arts competition literature category with his autobiography, Mein Fliegerleben (My Flying Life) (published 1935).

He and another friend from the war, Angermund, started an exhibition flying enterprise in Germany, which was also successful, but Udet remarked, "In time this too begins to get tiresome.

Udet described one incident in Africa in which lions jumped up to claw at the low-flying aircraft, one of them removing a strip of Suchocky's wing surface.

[citation needed] Though not interested in politics, Udet joined the Nazi party in 1933 when Hermann Göring promised to buy him two new U.S.-built Curtiss Hawk II biplanes (export designation of the F11C-2 Goshawk Helldiver).

On 9 June 1936 he had, through his political connections, been named Chief of the Technical Office, T-Amt, (the development wing of the Reich Ministry of Aviation).

[13] Udet had no real interest in this job nor a particular aptitude for it, especially the bureaucracy of it, and the pressure led to him developing an addiction to alcohol, drinking large amounts of brandy and cognac.

[16] When World War II began, his internal conflicts grew more intense as aircraft production requirements were much more than the German industry could supply, given limited access to raw materials such as aluminium.

[citation needed] According to Udet's biography, The Fall of an Eagle, he wrote a suicide note in red pencil that included: "Ingelein, why have you left me?"

Evidence indicates that Udet's unhappy relationship with Göring, Erhard Milch and the Nazi Party in general was the cause of a mental breakdown.