It all started during the Second World War.
“I didn’t target a man who I knew. I shot at an enemy plane that went down. That’s all,” said Horst Rippert, a fighter pilot in the Luftwaffe, Germany’s air force. At the time, Rippert was out on a routine mission in southern France. He spotted a plane below him. Rippert was flying a Messerschmitt Me-109 over the Mediterranean near Toulon.