With Allied bombing raids increasing in 1942, Italy’s High Command launched a competition for Serie 5 (5th series) fighters. Fitted with a German DB.605 engine, the sleek Macchi C.205s proved to be able to blast Spitfires out of the sky after they were introduced in November 1942. The addition of a wing-mounted 20mm in the spring of 1943 enabled the C.205 to take on US heavy bombers as well. Following the Italian Armistice, some C.205s turned their guns on Axis aircraft with success as well, even as Mussolini’s loyalists continued to fly the plane in the colors of the German-backed “Social Republic” in the north. The Germans took advantage of the fighter, temporarily equipping an entire Gruppe of JG77. After the war, modified C.205s went on to serve the Royal Egyptian Air Force during its 1948 war with Israel.