Ethics of pilots fighting for the sides in WWII

[csThor]

Actually the Luftwaffe was not much different from the Army or the Navy. In the lower echelons were just as many Nazi-supporters as people who despised the Nazis. And of course there were many soldiers simply had no interest in politics and therefor no opinion beyond the usual crackerbarrel rhetorics (i.e. Hitler saved Germany and removed unemployment ... bla bla bla). The difference was that the higher echelons of the Luftwaffe were a lot more riddled with Nazi supporters than the Navy or the Army.

As for ethics ... Soldiers back then simply had a very limited amount of information available to them. I've read exerpts of Hannes Trautloft's war diary and it soon becomes obvious that even for a Geschwaderkommodore there's little beyond the scope of his role as commanding officer and fighter pilot. He simply has no way of gaining more insights because there are no alternative (and maybe even broader) sources of information available to him. This becomes very obvious in the later stages of the Battle of Britain where he remains extremely confident and expects the launch of the invasion anytime soon.
He also never questions his duty for his country and there's nothing in his diary that is political, although Trautloft was known to be one of those who had no use for the Nazi leadership and despised them for their crudeness and violence. What does that tell you about the ordinary soldier?

Hindsight, which is obviously applied in the question posted by the thread starter, is a marvelous thing, but it's quite clear that most germans remained unaware what kind of criminals they were serving.