[1] From February to June 1939, he was in Spain as part of the Condor Legion, serving with 3./Jagdgruppe 88, and was awarded the Spanienkreuz in Bronze mit Schwerten.

He also served as Staffelkapitän of 3./JFS 5 where, among others, he trained future aces Hans-Joachim Marseille, Walter Nowotny and Hans Strelow.

The Russian pilots suffered from poor training, obsolete tactics and desperate missions, and as the Wehrmacht raced across the Ukraine, Sochatzy's unit was constantly on the move to keep up with the advance.

In fact, Sochatzy was one of the fastest scorers in the first month of the invasion - scoring an incredible 35 victories to the end of July, and second on to the 44 of Walter Oesau.

His luck ran out on 3 August flying his Bf 109 F-2 (Werknummer 8217), when he was shot down engaging an Il-2 ground-attack bomber, possibly after colliding with an I-16 over Kiev.

He was finally released, and repatriated to Austria in 1949 [5][3] Following World War II, Sochatzy rejoined the Austrian Air Force and served in it until 1976, retiring with the rank of Oberst ('Colonel').