The Night Witches were an all-female night bomber regiment of the Soviet Air Forces during World War II. The regiment was formed in 1941 at the urging of Marina Raskova and made up of over 800 women pilots who conducted over 24,000 bombing missions between 1941-1945. Flying obsolete Polikarpov Po-2 biplanes, the Night Witches were able to cause trouble for German forces due to their ability to fly low-altitude missions under the cover of darkness, dropping their payloads by hand and returning safely despite facing heavy anti-aircraft fire. Their success led the Germans to fear them as "Nachthexen," or Night Witches.

1. Night Witches Russian Combat Pilots of WWII We simply couldn’t grasp that the Soviet airmen that caused us the greatest trouble were in fact women. These women feared nothing. They came night after night in their very slow biplanes, and for some periods they wouldn’t give us any sleep at all. -- Commander Hauptmann Johannes Steinhoff

2. Night Witches from the 588th Night Bomber Regiment

4. Pilot’s From the 586th Women’s Fighter Regiment

8. Examples of the effects of night bombing