third-highest scoring German pilot on the Western front with 112 victories, recalled: "The P-38 fighter (and the B-24) were easy to burn. Once in Africa, we were six, and met eight P-38s and shot down seven. One sees a great distance in Africa and our observers and flak people called in sightings and we could get altitude first and they were low and slow." General der Jagdflieger Adolf Galland was unimpressed with the P-38, declaring "it had similar shortcomings in combat to our Bf 110, our fighters were clearly superior to it." Heinz Bäer said that P-38s "were not difficult at all. They were easy to outmaneuver and were generally a sure kill". On 12 June 1943, a P-38G, while flying a special mission between Gibraltar and Malta, or perhaps, just after strafing the radar station of Capo Pula, landed on the airfield of Capoterra (Cagliari), in Sardinia, from navigation error due to a compass failure. Regia Aeronautica chief test pilot Colonnello (Lieutenant Colonel) Angelo Tondi flew the captured aircraft to Guidonia airfield, where the P-38G was evaluated. On 11 August 1943, Tondi took off to intercept a formation of about 50 bombers, returning from the bombing of Terni (Umbria). Tondi attacked B-17G Bonny Sue, 42–30307, that fell off the shore of Torvaianica, near Rome, while six airmen parachuted out. According to US sources, he also damaged three more bombers on that occasion. On 4 September, the 301st BG reported the loss of B-17 "The Lady Evelyn," 42–30344, downed by "an enemy P-38". War missions for that plane were limited, as the Italian petrol was too corrosive for the Lockheed's tanks. Other Lightnings were eventually acquired by Italy for postwar service. In a particular case when faced by more agile fighters at low altitudes in a constricted valley, Lightnings suffered heavy losses. On the morning of 10 June 1944, 96 P-38Js of the 1st and 82nd Fighter Groups took off from Italy for Ploiești, the third-most heavily defended target in Europe, after Berlin and Vienna. Instead of bombing from high altitude as had been tried by the Fifteenth Air Force, USAAF planning had determined that a dive-bombing surprise attack, beginning at about with bomb release at or below , performed by 46 82nd Fighter Group P-38s, each carrying one bomb, would yield more accurate results. All of 1st Fighter Group and a few aircraft in 82nd Fighter Group were to