A Higher Call: An Incredible True Story of Combat and Chivalry in the War-Torn Skies of World War II

The Introduction opens with the 20 December 1943 encounter between a damaged American B-17 and a German Bf-109, an incident the author calls “one of the most remarkable stories in the history of warfare” (vii). Makos then traces the personal journey that led him to tell the story. Fascinated by World War II since childhood, Makos launched a small aviation newsletter that grew into a magazine dedicated to recording veterans’ memories. A hometown tragedy—the 1996 crash of TWA Flight 800 that claimed 16 of his classmates—deepened his sense of life’s fragility and further fueled his mission. Makos admits he once viewed German airmen only as villains until he first interviewed Franz Stigler, the Luftwaffe ace who famously spared Brown’s crew. A week with Stigler challenged Makos’s stereotypes. The author spent the next eight years investigating the story to understand how honor and empathy can transcend war.

In March 1946, former Luftwaffe ace Franz Stigler trudges through the bomb-scarred Bavarian city of Straubing searching for day labor at a brick mill. Now 30 and gaunt, he wears patched civilian clothes and calf-high flying boots—the only footwear he owns. Allied food lines, homeless crowds, and American patrols underscore Germany’s post-war devastation; many civilians regard ex-soldiers like Stigler with contempt.