Focke - Wulf Ta 154 The Focke - Wulf Ta 154 " Moskito " was a fast two - engine German night fighter aircraft designed by Kurt Tank and produced by Focke - Wulf late in World War II . Only a few were produced and proved to have less impressive performance than the prototypes . Development . Kurt Tank ' s team at Focke - Wulf had been working for some time on a fast attack bomber aircraft called the Ta 211 , so named because it planned to use an uprated Jumo 211R engine . The plane was a high - wing twin - engine design and was built primarily of plywood bonded with a special phenolic resin adhesive called Tego film . The only large - scale use of metal was in the pressurized cockpit . The project ' s designation was changed to " Reichsluftfahrtministerium " ( RLM — Ministry of Aviation ) assignment number 8 - 154 ( hence Ta 154 ) when it became apparent that the most suitable engine for the aircraft was the more powerful Jumo 213 , and that Junkers could not deliver the Jumo 211 - R in time due to technical and production problems . The 154 was also allocated the name " " Moskito " " as a form of recognition of the Royal Air Force s ( RAF ) de Havilland Mosquito . In August 1942 , the RLM asked for designs to meet a need for a dedicated night fighter , and the competition quickly boiled down to the Heinkel He 219 and the Ta 154 . 15 prototypes of each were ordered for further testing . Throughout the contest the RLM generally favored the 219 due to its better visibility and range . They also seemed to be suspicious of the 154 ' s wooden construction . In 1942 , the Messerschmitt Me 210 should have been the only plane considered , but it was suffering significant development problems and was ignored . It was at about this time that the light and very fast de Havilland Mosquito , also made of wood , arrived over Germany . It quickly racked up an impressive record ; in its first 600 bombing missions , only one was shot down , compared to an average of 5 % for RAF medium and heavy bomber s . Erhard Milch personally requested a purpose - built German answer , and selected the 154 . Infighting within German circles started almost immediately , because the RLM and night fighter units still wanted the He 219 . Milch took this personally , and spent the better part of the next two years trying to have the 219 program terminated . Flight tests . Development of the Ta 154 was already well advanced , and the first prototype V1 with Jumo 211F engines . bearing the " Stammkennzeichen " identification code TE + FE , had its maiden flight on July 1 , 1943 . It was followed by V2 with Jumo 211N engines , which was kept at the factory for handling trials . V1 was then sent to Rechlin - Lärz Airfield for fly - off testing against the He 219A and the new Junkers Ju 388 . There the 154 reached almost 700 km / h ( 440 mph ) and easily outflew the other two planes , but those were both fully armed and equipped with radar . The first armed example of the Ta 154 was the V3 prototype , which also was the first to fit the Jumo 211R engines . The added weight of the guns and drag of the 32 - dipole element " Matratze " radar antennas used on its UHF - band FuG 212 Lichtenstein C - 1 radar unit slowed the plane by a full 75 km / h , although it was still somewhat faster than the 219 . The rest of the 15 prototypes were then delivered as A - 0 models , identical to V3 . Some of these also included a raised canopy for better vision to the rear . It quickly became clear that the Jumo 211R would not be available any time soon , if at all . Future production turned to the more powerful Jumo 213A , but this was also suffering from long delays . The 154 program spent most of the next year testing various prototypes , and sent many of the A - 0s to " Erprobungskommando " 154 . During these tests the plane showed an alarming tendency to break its complex lever - action main landing gear , and about half of the V series prototypes were lost this way . By June 1944 , the Jumo 213 was finally arriving in some numbers , and a production run of 154 A - 1s were completed with these engines . Just prior to delivery the only factory making Tego - Film , in Wuppertal , was bombed out by the Royal Air Force , and the plywood glue had to be replaced by one that was not as strong , and was later found to react chemically , apparently in a corrosive manner , with the wood in the Ta 154 ' s structure . In July , several A - 1s crashed with wing failure due to plywood delamination . This same problem also critically affected the Heinkel He 162 " Spatz " , Ernst Heinkel ' s " " Volksjäger " " jet fighter program entry . Tank halted production in August , and the RLM eventually cancelled the entire project in September ( Milch had been removed by then ) . At that time about 50 production aircraft had been completed , and a number of the A - 0 pre - production planes were later modified to the production standard . An unknown number of the planes served with Nachtjagdgeschwader 3 , and a few were later used as training aircraft for jet pilots . " Mistel / Pulkzerstorer " variants . The designation A - 2 / U3 was given to six A - 0s converted into Mistel composite aircraft . At least three " Pulkzerstorer " ( Formation Destroyer ) schemes were mooted for the 154 . The only one of the three that was actually brought to operational readiness was a system whereby the entire forward fuselage ahead of the fuel tanks was filled with Amatol high explosive . A new and extremely small cockpit for the pilot was added to the airframe directly ahead of the tail - fin . From this cramped cabin , the pilot would fly the ' Bomb Moskito ' into an Allied bomber formation , arm the onboard charges and quickly bail out . A timer would then detonate the explosives a few seconds later . It was hoped that this flying bomb system would tear large holes in the Anglo - American bomber streams at little cost to the Luftwaffe in terms of pilot casualties . A small number of 154 airframes were converted to this system , but it was never used in combat . It is possible , but not certain , that the Moskitos converted to Mistel use mentioned above were in fact these planes and not intended for the former parasite fighter role at all . The loss of much of the relevant documentation in the chaos of the war ' s end means that absolute facts in the matter may be forever elusive .