"Do you think a German in Ireland would have not chosen to stay rather than die?" ok shooter- no need to shout. I get your point about an East German wanting to stay, but I doubt any Brit would want to stay in Eire considering the local atitude towards them. The majority of RAF pilots were disgusted with the Irish for their attitude to the Nazi's- the fact there was no blackout over Ireland assisted the Luftwaffe bombers with navigation at night, and I have read several accounts of RAF nightfighter and bomber pilots looking at the glow coming from Irish towns with great anger.
And as for " in a dogfight over the Irish Sea, with a damaged aircraft, where are you going to land?"- thats my point- there were no dogfights over the Irish sea- a Bf109E couldnt even reach the Irish sea with its range. During the battle of Britain, 109's, flying from their French channel airfields, had a loiter time of 20 mins over the UK- not even enough time to reach the west coast of Wales, let alone have a dogfight over the Irish sea and still have enough fuel to crash land in Ireland.
Im aware that some Axis aircraft landed by accident in the UK (a very famous Fw190 fell into British hands this way) and the reverse with Allied pilots in France, but the English channel is only 20miles across at its shortest part- crossed in very short order in a 1940's fighter, and with low cloud it would be easy to become disorientated. Now go and have a look at where the French Luftwaffe bases were and how wide the Irish sea is.......
