# Luftwaffe Strength 40-45



## ctrian (Jun 16, 2010)

A while ago i asked if someone had data for RAF strength during ww2 in this post
http://www.ww2aircraft.net/forum/ww2-general/raf-strength-1939-1945-request-24313.html
unfortunately noone anwsered.Since i have data for the Luftwaffe i decided to post them for anyone interested.Sources are Luftwaffe Data book for 1941-45 and Strategy for Defeat table 3 for 1940 (Note that Murray gives higher figures for 1941.)

Small mistake: Ground Attack for 1940 should be 467 not 477.


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## timor (Jun 17, 2010)

Thank's man. Is interesting what will be the numbers without the bombing offensive.


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## ctrian (Jun 17, 2010)

I thought i should post Murray's data for 1941 since they differ from Price.Source: Strategy for defeat
table 12.Note that Murray gives only number of dive bombers other ground attack are not included.


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## davebender (Jun 17, 2010)

Interesting.

Do we have nunbers for specific aircraft models?
i.e.
?? x Me-109
?? x Fw-190A / D9 (fighter types)
?? x Fw-190F / G (CAS types)
?? x Ju-88A (light bombers)
?? x Ju-88C / G (night fighters)
Etc.


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## alejandro_ (Jun 17, 2010)

Front line aircraft strength:






*Sources and links:*

- The Luftwaffe over Germany, Defense of the Reich, Donald Caldwell and Richard Muller. Greenhill books, 2007.
- Eagle in flames, The fall of the Luftwaffe, E.R Hooton, MPG Books Lmt, 1997.
- AIR 40/1207: The German Air Force: first line strength at three monthly intervals during the European War 1939-1945.
- Historia y tecnología militar


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## ctrian (Jun 17, 2010)

@davebender ,yes i have an excell file with data broken down by type and theater but its several pages long.You can find the data online here but youll have to calculate (or you can buy Price's book):
Luftwaffe Orders Of Battle - The Air Combat Wiki

@alexandro ,i also have 40/1207 but its better not to mix different authors or studies look at the difference of Murray and Price.


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## timshatz (Jun 17, 2010)

It would be interesting to see the aircraft levels for the allies v Germany at the same time. Specifically, western allies as that is where most of the strength was positioned.


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## ctrian (Jun 17, 2010)

You can find data for USAAF here: 
Air Force Historical Research Agency - Timelines check the statistical digest


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## timshatz (Jun 17, 2010)

By May 1944, the US alone had a 3 to 1 advantage over ALL Luftwaffe fighters, not just the ones they faced. That is huge.


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## ctrian (Jun 17, 2010)

If you add RAF and Soviet frontline combat aircraft the difference in mid 44 is more than 5 to 1.Add the german lack of fuel and you can understand why its a hopeless situation.


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## Milosh (Jun 17, 2010)

ctrian said:


> @davebender ,yes i have an excell file with data broken down by type and theater but its several pages long.You can find the data online here but youll have to calculate (or you can buy Price's book):
> Luftwaffe Orders Of Battle - The Air Combat Wiki



Looks like the Wiki is from this link, Luftwaffe Orders of Battle


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## ctrian (Jun 18, 2010)

That link still has the same data as the book , totals are for serviceable aircraft not on hand,so either way you have to work through the data yourself.


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## Hop (Jun 18, 2010)

RAF strength in squadrons May 1944:

SE Fighters
Spitfire - 1,824
Mustang - 237
Typhoon - 385
Tempest - 35
Hurricane - 577 (mostly Middle East and SE Asia)
Kittyhawk - 72
Total - 3,130

TE Fighters
Mosquito - 362
Beaufighter - 451
Total - 813

Heavy Bombers
Lancaster - 815
Halifax - 543
Stirling - 92
Liberator - 66
Total - 1,516

Medium Bombers
Wellington - 168
Mitchell - 3
Total - 171

Light Bombers
Mosquito - 253
Boston - 63
Mitchell - 73
Baltimore - 136
Marauder - 40
Vengeance - 93
Total - 658

Photo recce
Spitfire - 106
Mosquito - 51
Total - 157

Observation (short range recce?)
Auster - 205

General Recce (Coastal?)
Albacore - 16
Fortress - 20
Halifax - 26
Liberator - 130
Wellington - 268
Ventura - 46
Beaufort - 27
Hudson - 27
Total - 560

Flying Boats
Catalina - 106
Sunderland - 110
Total - 216

Transports 
Albermarle - 107
Halifax - 63
Stirling - 96
Total - 266

These figures are just for front line aircraft, they exclude the substantial reserves the RAF kept. As an example of just how extensive those reserves could be, in Sept 1943 the RAF had 962 Spitfires in front line squadron strength in the UK. However they had 86 Spitfire XIIs, 820 Spitfire IXs, 389 Spitfire VIIIs, 40 Spitfire VIIs, 58 Spitfire VIs and 1,842 Spitfire Vs in the UK. 262 Mustangs were in front line squadron strength, but 542 on hand in the UK.


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## Kurfürst (Jun 18, 2010)

Luftwaffe strenght by unit type and aircraft type, between March 1942 - December 1944, complied from monthly unit strenght reports at ww2.dk by our member HoHun (great job!)

Note that due to the second graph is counting aircraft type, one type is not neccesarily only a "bomber" or a "fighter". For example there were substantial amount of Ju 88s in nightfighter units, or Fw 190s in ground attack units; 109s were not confined to fighter roles but were employed in close recce units as well.


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## Kurfürst (Jun 18, 2010)

Hop said:


> These figures are just for front line aircraft, they exclude the substantial reserves the RAF kept.



This is a bit misleading, since the RAF persued a rather different approach with its Squadrons which as I believe were consisted of 12 "flying" aircraft and 8 reserve aircraft that would not fly missions. So in a way in this figures of yours there are indeed passive/reserve aircraft included.


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## ctrian (Jun 18, 2010)

Good work Hop , @everyone iv made a few mistakes in the original table im working on a new one with zero errors.Note that the site i linked to also has ommisions and errors.


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## davebender (Jun 18, 2010)

> Light Bombers
> Mosquito - 253


Does this include all the Mosquitos assigned to Path finder missions?


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## alejandro_ (Jun 18, 2010)

> If you add RAF and *Soviet *frontline combat aircraft the difference in mid 44 is more than 5 to 1.Add the german lack of fuel and you can understand why its a hopeless situation.



Soviet front line aircraft can be found in the link below for different periods of the war. Its in Spanish but can be easily translated using google translator.

http://www.rkka.es/Estadisticas/VVS_stat/03/03_00_index.htm

January 1945, total aircraft: 13.936+1.211!
http://www.rkka.es/Estadisticas/VVS_stat/03/03_08.htm


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## ctrian (Jun 18, 2010)

or you can go to axis history forum:
Axis History Forum • View topic - Soviet Fronts strengths: Overview


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## Juha (Jun 18, 2010)

Hello Hop 
great work, but I wonder where are the Dakotas? There should have been over 100 in May 44, even in early May, 40 arriving for RAF in May 44 and 174 being in sqns on 5th June 44.

Hello Kurfürst
Great graphs! Thans a lot!

On the active/reserve a/c in RAF sqns. The number of a/c participating sorties depended on time and on type of sqn. But if you are talking on fighter sqns, even if full combat formation consisted of 12 fighters, if a sqn flew more than one full strength sweep a day it usually used more than 12 a/c in combat missions during the day, at least during summer 44. For ex when 331 Sqn flew 33 combat sorties on 25 Jul 44, 16 of its fighters used, of which 7 flew twice and 5 trice. It seems that on busy days in summer 44 14-16 different Spits of 331 were used in combat ops on certain day. I didn’t bother to check how many was weekly utilised.

Juha


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## Hop (Jun 18, 2010)

Juha, my mistake. Transport Command doesn't seem to be included at all, I believe the figures I gave for transports are troop carriers of 38 Group.

The figures show 204 Dakota delivered to the RAF in the year to 3 September 1943, and another 792 in the year to Sept 1944. I have no idea how many were with squadrons, though.

As to reserve aircraft in squadrons, it's true that 1,824 Spitfires in squadrons means less than that would be capable of flying at any one time, but then again that's true of the Luftwaffe figures as well.

But the point I was trying to make about reserves is the RAF had additional aircraft in storage, over and above the aircraft with squadrons.

Here are the figures for April 1945. The first figure is the number of aircraft in front line squadrons in the UK and Northern Europe, the second is the total number of aircraft on hand in those areas:

SE Fighters
Spitfire - 804 (2,557 (VIII, IX, XIV and XVI only)
Typhoon - 332 (1,234)
Tempest - 131 (468 )
Mustang - 302 (782 (III IV only))

As you can see, the RAF typically had several times as many aircraft "on hand", compared to the "front line squadron" strength.


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## tomo pauk (Jun 18, 2010)

Just to say thanks to fellas for their effort


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## ctrian (Jun 18, 2010)

Like i said the first table had some mistakes this one should be error free.


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## Juha (Jun 20, 2010)

Hello Hop
Thanks for clarification.

To clarify my RAF Dakota numbers, those were those in GB only.

Juha


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## Freebird (Jul 21, 2010)

ctrian said:


> A while ago i asked if someone had data for RAF strength during ww2 in this post
> http://www.ww2aircraft.net/forum/ww2-general/raf-strength-1939-1945-request-24313.html
> unfortunately noone anwsered.Since i have data for the Luftwaffe i decided to post them for anyone interested.Sources are Luftwaffe Data book for 1941-45 and Strategy for Defeat table 3 for 1940 (Note that Murray gives higher figures for 1941.)
> 
> Small mistake: Ground Attack for 1940 should be 467 not 477.



Super!
Thanks for posting this data, it's been most helpful

I found this table of LW strength Jun 1941 at Assault on the Balkans and the Soviet Union
Does anyone have a table of LW combat losses in Barbarossa during 1941?


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## michaelmaltby (Jul 21, 2010)

The German figures demonstrate more than anything else that the country was not on a war economy in 1940 - let alone 1941 - when Hitler was about to take on the Soviets. Then you look at American industrial production  - doubling itself year over year. Absolutely staggering.


MM


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## ctrian (Jul 22, 2010)

freebird said:


> Super!
> Thanks for posting this data, it's been most helpful
> 
> I found this table of LW strength Jun 1941 at Assault on the Balkans and the Soviet Union
> Does anyone have a table of LW combat losses in Barbarossa during 1941?



i think the number is 2700 combat losses.Look at axis histoy forum ,member RichTO has posted luftwaffe 
combat losses per year and theater



michaelmaltby said:


> The German figures demonstrate more than anything else that the country was not on a war economy in 1940 - let alone 1941 - when Hitler was about to take on the Soviets. Then you look at American industrial production  - doubling itself year over year. Absolutely staggering.
> 
> 
> MM



Friend this has been debunked over and over and over again.Check 'Wages of Destruction' by Tooze.


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## michaelmaltby (Jul 22, 2010)

Ctrian - exactly *what* has been "debunked" over and over again ...? Germany's industrial war footing in 1940 or America's "staggering" industrial capacity 

MM


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## ctrian (Jul 22, 2010)

michaelmaltby said:


> Ctrian - exactly *what* has been "debunked" over and over again ...? Germany's industrial war footing in 1940 or America's "staggering" industrial capacity
> 
> MM



You said the country was not on a war economy ,that is simply not true.As for the US completely different case one country had abundant natural recources the other had crap.Like i said before check the book or
'The economics of ww2' Cambridge press.


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## michaelmaltby (Jul 27, 2010)

".. The German figures demonstrate more than anything else that the country was not on a *war economy *in 1940 - let alone 1941 ."

ctrian - you suggested I read AdamTooze (Wages of Destruction) . I am - started at Chapter 20. From what I've read - including scholarly reviews - I don't think I am wrong in my interpretation of the aircraft production numbers (1940 - 1942).

In 1940 Germany was in the peak of its *REARMENMENT* economy - Tooze says so himself. It began in the mid-30's and is *not *synonomous with a war footing economy.

In 1942 - when the spin-up comes - slave labour is a more significant 'input' - and continues moreso as the war moves to '44 and '45.

My point was before and still is - in 1940 German civilians had reason to feel a little smug about themselves because they were fighting "successfully" and living improving lives. Guns AND Butter. (Tooze makes it clear that a lot of that BUTTER was mythology - Nazis manufactured mythology - that made Germans feel good about themselves). And the butter may not have been domestic - but Danish , a dividend of war so-to-speak.

By 1942 - the SS-Party-Corporate-Industrial technocracy triad had added the slave component. Germany went from a REARMAMENT economy to SLAVE LABOUR economy. That was their war-footing.


So - "dedunked" or not - I stand by my original observation . But Tooze is an eye-opener. Thanks for the reference.

Chairs,

MM
Proud Canadian


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## ctrian (Jul 27, 2010)

michaelmaltby said:


> ".. The German figures demonstrate more than anything else that the country was not on a *war economy *in 1940 - let alone 1941 ."
> 
> ctrian - you suggested I read AdamTooze (Wages of Destruction) . I am - started at Chapter 20. From what I've read - including scholarly reviews - I don't think I am wrong in my interpretation of the aircraft production numbers (1940 - 1942).
> 
> ...



Im glad u like the book.The german economy was on a war footing since the mid 30's.Any increase in one sector could only come by taking resources(workers,raw material) from somewhere else.As for the aircraft production in 44 look at the weight not the numbers, 1 bf109 isnt the same as 1 Ju88.Id also suggest u read the book from the beginning if u have the time.


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## michaelmaltby (Jul 27, 2010)

"... also suggest u read the book from the beginning if u have the time." 

I am. But Tooze himself suggests in the forward to read Chapter 20 *first* if you want to understand the ending - and I do  so I took him at his word.

"... The german economy was on a war footing since the mid 30's." If you're on a war footing in peacetime, what footing do you move to in wartime ...? (I don't question the aggressive nature of the German "reconstruction" program - but nobody was dropping bombs).

MM


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