Ubiquity of the "victory roll"?

[lonewulf]

I think the Germans tended to 'waggle their wings' whereas the RAF used the roll.

My suspicions is that it this type of activity was generally considered poor form, especially in the RAF where no attempt was made to depict the air war as some kind of blood sport. I also suspect that rolling and waggling was probably regarded as being a bit immature by those guys who actually had a few hours in, and had a more sober view of their future prospects.

When you consider the number of aircrew that wouldn't return from an operation at all and those that did in a distressing state, all shot up or burnt, watching some wanker doing a victory roll over the field would probably go down like a cup of cold sick in many cases.