# Battle of France dedicated thread



## delcyros (Oct 5, 2007)

Why not discuss the Battle of France in 1940?
What do we actually know about the battle of France, which airplanes were avaiable at both sides and how were those units tactically utilized? The Spitfire made her combat debut over France and the Hurricane, albeit heavily pressed did her best to stop the Luftwaffe in combination with french and belgic airforces. Why did they failed?
The Luftwaffe lost over 1386 planes, 410 french fighter pilots were KIA, the RAF lost 67 Spitfires and 386 Hurricanes but what about the detailed loss breakdowns and how do they match with kill claims?


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## Kurfürst (Oct 5, 2007)

Does anybody have detailed breakdown of the French air force strenght? Meaning how many Dewos, Hawks, or Breguets(sp?) they had at the start of the campaign in France? Things like that.

On the related site, no opportunity is to be missed to make a little advertisement for my site, hehe ! 

French tactical trials pitting the Dewo vs. the 109E, one of the big mysteries of the war, which one is better? Answer in the link, only for you, only now !   

Kurfürst - CEAM : Rapport sur l'avion Messerschmidt 109


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## comiso90 (Oct 5, 2007)

I didnt know the Luft lost that many aircraft... I'd like to know what percentage was ground fire.


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## delcyros (Oct 6, 2007)

The initial condition for the battle of France may have been in favour of the allies:
-a large terretory to cover for the Luftwaffe fighter force (some playces beyond range initally)
-more modern fighter and AAA opposition than in Poland
-the allies had half a year undisturbed time to deploy their forces (ground air) in France
-numerical advantage of the combined french, belgic, netherlandic and british air forces.
French airforces strength breakdown for august, 16th, 1939:
total number of planes: 7.450
premilitary training planes: 800
fighter / bomber trainer/trasnports: 2.691
regular military planes: 3.959
-755 in depots or in repair
-262 in colonies out of France

-military forces in France at sept. 20th, 1939: 1.610 modern planes operational and deployed 
-military forces in France at may, 10th, 1940: 1.558 modern planes operational (260 bombers (Amiot 354 and Lióre et Oliver 451), 580 recon (Potez 63, Mureaux 115) in 8 units, 718 fighters (MS 405/06, Curtiss Hawk 75, Bl 151/2, Dewotine 520) grouped in 23 units with 6 squadrons each and a total of 23 planes)) -the mass of the bomber forces were still obsolete types, not included here but the fighter and recon (fighter bomber) types had already transited into a more modern state since august 16th, 1939.

-moment of surprise questionable against France (state of war since sept. ´39, Armeé de l´Air mobilized since august 16th, 1939)
-heavy utilization of the air transportation forces once the ground attack runs
-even heavier utilization of the bomber forces in order to make the ground attack run through the dug in defenses
-AAA units were planned to support ground operations, not to be used primarely as AA installations
-there was a single wave of preemptive measures against airfields for the attack day (20 minutes before assoult) in order to allow greater support for ground forces thereafter while minimizing the loss of surprise. If this air attack fails partially, things will turn out badly for the aggressors.
The preemptive attack on airfields covered these places:
Netherlands: Texel, de Kooy, Schiphol, Soesterburg, Valkenburg, Ypenburg, Wallhafen, Bergen, Gilze-Rijen
Belgium: Antwerpen, Ghent, Brussles, Tirlemont, Bierset, Nivelles, Gosseliers and Wevelgem
France: Thionville, Metz, Nancy, S. Dizier, Mourmelon, Reims, Sézanne, Romilly, Amiens, Rouen and Le Brouget.

The french fighter forces flew from may 10th to may 16th a total of 2000 combat sorties and claimed 273 Luftwaffe planes shot down.


One of the more interesting side aspects is a proposal of the french to destroy russian oilfields in the event of a war with Germany (as it was correctly seen that they were dependent on this oil). The plan (RIP) proposed the utilization of 9 bomber squadrons, which should in within 10-45 days attack a total of 122 russian oil fields (67 at Baku, 43 at Grosny and 12 at Bitumi). A comparable plan was initiated by the UK (MA 6) and was scheduled for late june/ early jule 1940.

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## Soundbreaker Welch? (Oct 6, 2007)

Rommel. 

He was a big factor.

But I also didn't realize that many German planes were lost. 

Thats the spirit!


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## Glider (Oct 6, 2007)

I think I am right in saying that the one single day, when the Germans lost the most aircraft in the entire war, happened during the Battle for France.

Please don't ask me when, its something a read a long time ago and could easily be wrong.


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## delcyros (Oct 6, 2007)

Since it has been mentioned here several times, I have found a breakdown of Luftwaffe losses for the whole campaign, total (in breackages: send to repairs):

close recon: 124 (66)
long range recon: 87 (47)
sea planes: 37 (6)
Bf-109: 250 (126)
Bf-110: 121 (50)
Ju-87: 123 (43)
Hs-123: 5 (14)
Ju-52 and othe transportation planes: 140 (74)
Fi-167 and other couriers: 33 (32)
Ju-88, Do-17, Do-15, He-111: 477 (214)
other planes: 4 (2)

Note that these losses were due to all causes, including non combat related causes: exceeding their nominal service lifetime, landing accidents, ground accidents, starting accidents, mid air collision, engine or mechanical malfunction, fuel exhoustion, navigational and other pilot errors. It does also include combat related losses, just like: aerial combat, AAA, destroyed by ground / air attack, written off due to damage after landing.

It appears that about 1401 Luftwaffe planes were lost in the 42 days campaign due to all reasons, out of which probably no less than ~800 and no more than ~1000 Luftwaffe planes were lost to combat related causes - which is in general agreement with the number of aviators KIA (1272, including non pilot aircrews) and MIA (580, including non pilot aircrews). It appears that 672 planes were returned to Germany for repairs (probably only little less than this figure as in several documented cases a plane was returned twice). The big winner of the battle of France is the Bf-110, which had the lowest loss rate per combat sortie and the best kill-loss rate of the campaign. The low loss rate of the Ju-87 is surprising, compared with the heavy utilization of this plane in the campaign. The heavy loss rate of Ju-52 air transportation forces is relative to operations in the Netherlands. The dutch airforce consisted of 144 combat aircraft, which flew 332 combat sorties, achieveing several kills and loosing 110 of it´s combat planes in within few days (the belgic air forces flew even fewer, just 77 combat sorties and lost 83 of their 179 planes due to air combat and bombings). The help of the RAF bomber and fighter command was less effective than hoped for in this region. Plans of the Luftwaffe, carried out against Ypenburg, Ockenburg, and Valkenburg to seize these important fields ended in fiasco. They were captured with substantial losses of transport planes and paratroopers only to be retaken by two dutch reserve infantery divisions. This operation cost 125 Ju-52 destroyed ( a further 47 beeing damaged), representing the largest loss part of the operation.

The RAF lost in France 944 planes in the field (all causes), out of which 67 were Spitfires and 386 were Hurricanes.

I have no idea how the loss breakdowns for the allied side is - anyone has something?

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## trackend (Oct 6, 2007)

The Curtiss (P-36) 75 Hawk although out of date still possessed attributes that enabled the French air force who had roughly 300 to take on the 109 "I would be happy to get into a turning scenario at low level with a BF109E" _Steve Grey Fighter Collection Pilot_
The claimed kills for the French flown Hawk was over 200 and 70+ probables


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## Glider (Oct 6, 2007)

delcyros said:


> Since it has been mentioned here several times, I have found a breakdown of Luftwaffe losses for the whole campaign, total (in breackages: send to repairs):
> 
> close recon: 124 (66)
> long range recon: 87 (47)
> ...



Good info and thank you for it. 
I have one question and that is the number of Spitfires lost. Its always been my belief that apart from a handful of PR machines, they didn't operate over France until the fighting around Dunkirk. Can you tell me if this is right?


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## Hop (Oct 6, 2007)

> close recon: 124 (66)
> long range recon: 87 (47)
> sea planes: 37 (6)
> Bf-109: 250 (126)
> ...



Williamson Murray in strategy for defeat gives German losses _on operations_ as:

Type - enemy action - other causes

Close Recce - 67 - 5
LR Recce - 68 - 18 
SE Fighters - 169 - 66
TE Fighters - 90 - 16
Bombers - 438 - 53
Dive Bombers - 89 - 24
Transport - 188 - 18
Coastal - 20 - 16
Totals - 1,129 - 216

Those are just on operations. Another 83 aircraft were destroyed not on operations.



> It appears that about 1401 Luftwaffe planes were lost in the 42 days campaign due to all reasons, out of which probably no less than ~800 and no more than ~1000 Luftwaffe planes were lost to combat related causes



According to Murray it's 1,129 lost to enemy action, and I suspect some of those attributed to "other causes" on operations were also lost to enemy action.

Denis Richards in the official history of the RAF gives Luftwaffe losses of 1,284 aircraft to enemy action.



> The RAF lost in France 944 planes in the field (all causes), out of which 67 were Spitfires and 386 were Hurricanes.
> 
> I have no idea how the loss breakdowns for the allied side is - anyone has something?



According to Richards RAF losses were 959 aircraft in total, of which 477 were fighters. He breaks losses down by command, but not by type:

"Every operational command at home and in France suffered heavily: the A.A.S.F. lost 229, the Component 279, Fighter Command 219, Bomber Command 166, Coastal Command 66."



> I think I am right in saying that the one single day, when the Germans lost the most aircraft in the entire war, happened during the Battle for France.
> 
> Please don't ask me when, its something a read a long time ago and could easily be wrong.



Their highest single losses in the BoF were on the 10th May, when they lost, according to Brian Cull in 12 Days in May:

56 He111
22 Do17Z
16 Ju88
10 Ju87
13 Bf109
2 Bf110
3 Do17P
2 Do215
3 Hs126
4 He59
22 Fi156
155 Ju 52



> -military forces in France at may, 10th, 1940: 1.558 modern planes operational (260 bombers (Amiot 354 and Lióre et Oliver 451), 580 recon (Potez 63, Mureaux 115) in 8 units, 718 fighters (MS 405/06, Curtiss Hawk 75, Bl 151/2, Dewotine 520) grouped in 23 units with 6 squadrons each and a total of 23 planes)) -the mass of the bomber forces were still obsolete types, not included here but the fighter and recon (fighter bomber) types had already transited into a more modern state since august 16th, 1939.



I think the French Air Force was more impressive on paper than in practice. Cull notes that of their 28 Fighter groups:

16 had the obsolete Ms406, of which 8 were re-equipping with the Dewotine D520
4 had Hawk 75s
8 had Bloch 151 and 152s

Because many were stationed overseas or in the south, only 11 groups were actually available to face the Germans.

Murray sums up the difficulties of the French AF:

"The French air force, unfortunately, was
in great disarray as it was transitioning to a newer generation of aircraft (as had the
Luftwaffe in 1937-38 and the RAF in 1938-39 with similar results) . The French
were, in fact, having considerable difficulty in equipping squadrons with new
aircraft as well as maintaining operational ready rates. In early 1940, some French
squadrons ran in-commission rates of barely 40 percent, and the pressure of
operations only compounded their difficulties"


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## delcyros (Oct 7, 2007)

> I have one question and that is the number of Spitfires lost. Its always been my belief that apart from a handful of PR machines, they didn't operate over France until the fighting around Dunkirk. Can you tell me if this is right?



The Spitfire´s to operate over the continent were mainly phot recon high altitude planes (the first beeing lost to a Bf-109 goes back to oct. 1939). But there also were several evaluation fighterplanes to be stationed in France as appearently three of them fell into german hands more or less intactly which showed no photo equipment. I have been unable to find out details of the units in question but continue to search, Glider.

hop, thank You for sharing W. Murray´s and Richards breakdowns!

My breakdown is directly derived from the quartely Luftwaffe reports of the Generalluftzeugmeister. It does not seperate combat from non combat related causes. 

From french sources it is pretty clear that at no time more than 262 planes were stationed out of France, the main body of the french airforce was stationed in France and indeed participated in actions. A problem was logistical support. There were more than 2000 reserve planes stored in french depots (various types) but spare parts were hardly avaiable.
The french aerial industry indeed did a hell of a job to increase their modern wwarplanes output. They produced a total of 4.360 modern planes to may 1940, which is surprisingly more than the Luftwaffe fielded for Case Yellow (3272). France did fail to deploy these planes to combat service, whoever knows why. Preperations going back to 1938 when french firms were given large volume contracts in order to spread mass production capabilities. The often blamed french parlament even set contracts to the US , ordering DB-7, Mohawks and Pratt Whitney engines in masses. By may 1940, the output had reached 619 combat aircraft per month produced in France and 170 additional produced in the US on french orders. Therefore, France not only was outproducing Germany with modern combat planes in this period (622 per month) but was the number 1 producer in the world. Add Britain increased output (392 combat planes per month), and France Britain were outproducing Germany 2 to 1. This raises a number of important question. The numerical superiority, referred to by many authors is cast in doubt with french records. Loosing a defensive air war over own terretory is a serious issue, requiring an explenation beyond "the luftwaffe was superior". I suspect political and leadership issues. 

A good site for the french order of the battle at may 10th is:

Armée de l'Air Order of Battle, 10th May 1940

The allied deployed strength on the north eastern front at may 10th included (only modern planes counted):
fighters: 780 - the fighters used on the northeastern front were exclusively produced in thepreceeding 18 months. The most effective of these fighters were the Curtiss Hawk. It could hold itselfe against Bf-109 and Bf-110 in combat (loss to kill ratio: 1 to 7.9) but couldn´t deny the Luftwaffe bombers french airspace, nor could it provide effective escorts for french bombers against the faster Luftwaffe fighters.
bombers: 276 - again only modern types deployed and ready.
recon: 554.

...and at june, 5th, 1940:

Armée de l'Air, June 1940

After a period of fighting, the Luftwaffe was nearing exhoustion. It had lost a serious number of it´s planes with a large number of pilots MIA (captured on enemy terretory). By june 5th, both forces were at parity, fielding approx. 2.400 modern combat planes each. But while the Luftwaffe was running short on aviators and planes, had to operate from captured or improvised airfields, the french airforces enjoied to have conducted less intensive operations previously, therefore having a number of aviators and LOT´s of planes in stock, were falling back on their logistical bases and could use it´s depots to great effect, bringing brand new aircrafts out every day. Britain was a powerful ally in the North, providing cover for Dunkirk and for the first time regained local aerial superiority over the beaches. It was this time, when France COULD HAVE CONTESTED THE LUFTWAFFE but instead France ordered on june, 17th to redraw massive forces to northen Africa. The units flown to North Africa were those regular air force squadrons with the most modern and effective aircraft-all of the squadrons equipped with the Curtiss 75A (10), Dewoitine 520 (10), Amiot 354 ( 8 ), Bloch 174 (18 ), Farman 222 (4), Douglas DB-7 ( 8 ), and Martin 167 (10), plus most of those with the LiorÃ© et Olivier 451 (12 of 18 ).

----------------------------------------------------------------
Obviously the kill claims does not match loss lists very well (altough acceptable). At the end of hostilities, the allied kill claims concsist of:
dutch: ???
belgic CR 42: 5 (claimed)
other belgic: ???
polish in C714 fighters: 17 (claimed) - 5 pilots KIA
other polish: ???
czech: ???
Spitfire: ???
Hurricane: 299 claimed
MS 406: 269 confirmed, ca. 80 probable - 
Hawk 75: 220 confirmed, 81 probable - 33 pilots KIA
D 520: 114 confirmed, 39 probable (claimed 175) - 44 pilots KIA
Bloch 150/51/52: 83 confirmed, ca. 50 probable (claimed 156) -59 pilots KIA
other french forces: ??? -a total of 404 fighter pilots KIA
AAA: ???
--------------------------------------------------------
losses belgic fighter forces: ?
losses dutch fighter forces: ?
losses polish fighter forces: ?
losses czech fighter forces: ?
losses french fighter forces: 508
losses french air forces total: 892
losses UK fighter forces operating from continental europe: 227
losses UK fighter forces operating from southeastern england: 219
losses british fighter forces total: 446
losses british air forces total: 1029
losses german fighters: 371
losses german airforces total: 1401 (this figure varies. It goes up to 1469 and low to 1129 in Murrays book)

Major L. F. Ellis, The War in France and Flanders (London: Her Majesty's Stationery Office, 1953), pp. 98, 309, 312, 372-73; Robert Jackson, Air War over France (London: Ian Allen, 1974), pp. 76-78, 136-37; Fridenson and Lecuir, pp. 184-85, 189, 198; Chapman, pp. 160-61, 225, 290; Gunsburg, pp. 111-12, 268; Shirer, pp. 700, 766, 767, 783; General Maurice Gamelin, Servir (Paris: Plon, 1946), vol. 1, p. 282; William Green, Warplanes of the Second World War, vol. 2, Fighters (Garden City, New York: Doubleday, 1961), p. 61.





regards, 
delc

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## delcyros (Oct 7, 2007)

Sidestep:

During the battle of France 18 dutch Koolhoven FK.58 were used by exiled Polish pilots as interceptors to defend Salon-de-Provence near Marseille (mostly against italien intruders). An interesting plane, like a Fokker but with retractable gears. Note the (removable) gunpods!

Source:
Koolhoven Aeroplanes Foundation


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## delcyros (Oct 7, 2007)

Strength of the belgic airforces at may 10th, 1940:

15 Gladiator MK I,
11 Hurricane MK I,
18 Fairy Battle,
92 Fairy Fox,
29 Renard R 31,
24 Fiat CR 42,
3 Moraine 236,
3 Stampe SV 5

Unlike the smaller dutch airforces, the belgic airforces were mostly inactive or underutitlizing it´s strength.


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## comiso90 (Oct 7, 2007)

cool battle of France footage... Allied aerial victories


funny propaganda... gotta watch!


_View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ez3eFt6THKM_

.


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## Soundbreaker Welch? (Oct 9, 2007)

Double post......duuuuuuh.....

Put something useful:
Guaderian





and Rommel


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## Soundbreaker Welch? (Oct 9, 2007)

I like those old the armed forces movies.

Thanks for the figures of that day for the Luftwaffe. They lost a LOT.


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## delcyros (Oct 9, 2007)

*THE FRENCH "SPITFIRE"*

I have always been impressed by the elegance of later french airplanes. How they moved from ugly 20´s style planes overnight to beauties like the D520 or this one, the Arsenal VG 33.

It was designed from scratch in 1938/39 and promising estimates immediately put an order by the french airforce of 220 planes only to be raised to 1000 later that year. Despite having a comparably small 860 hp engine, the first prototype VG 33 clocked a top speed of 558 Km/h (347 mp/h) at 4.500m. Armed with a single 20mm gun and four 7,5mm LMG and equipped with the novelty of a bubble blown canopy, the plane must have been considered innovative. Only two planes eventually saw action against the Luftwaffe in the Groupe de Chasse I/55, stationed at Bordeaux during the closing weeks of the Battle of France. Approximately 160 further VG 33 were awaiting completition (lacking engines) and some 130 additional were at different stages of construction at the end of hostilities.
Other prototypes included the VG 39 with a 1280 hp engine, achieving 655 Km/h early in 1940 despite an increased armement of 1 20mm and 6 7.5mm LMG.

source: Arsenal VG-33 - Wikipedia


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## mkloby (Oct 10, 2007)

delcyros said:


> I have always been impressed by the elegance of later french airplanes. How they moved from ugly 20´s style planes overnight to beauties like the D520 or this one, the Arsenal VG 33.



I agree with you.


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## comiso90 (Oct 11, 2007)

Soundbreaker Welch? said:


> Double post......duuuuuuh.....
> 
> Put something useful:



where is the double post?


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## plan_D (Oct 11, 2007)

Excellent idea for a thread. I've mostly got information on the ground war from a German perspective (Panzer Leader - Heinz Guderian, Panzer Battles - Maj. Gen. von Mellenthin), but I've also got 2 Group history and it's safe to say they had an extremely rough time during the Battle of France.


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## Marshall_Stack (Oct 11, 2007)

Any more stories on the French Hawks? I tried Google but didn't find much except that they held their own.


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## delcyros (Oct 11, 2007)

The Hawk 75 is in reputation for achieving the western allies first aerial dogfight victory on sept. 8th, 1939. An intruder flight of five Hawk 75-1 from Groupe de Chasse II/4 claimed two Bf-109. Altough these appear as model -E in literature, the official loss list note the loss of two -109D1. The Hawk-75-1 is certainly superior to the 109d.

Edmond Marin La Meslée from Groupe de Chasse I/5 is the most successful allied pilot of the period to june 1940, he exclusively flew the Hawk 75-2. His first aerial victory over a german Do-17 was on january, 18th, 1940, then still under the wings of his mentor Captn. Accard, who recognized La Meslées potential. In only five days in may 1940 he downed nine german planes, including three Ju-87B in a single sortie.
At the end of hostilities, La Meslée was appointed commander of Groupe de Chasse I/5, he made 101 combat sorties, beeing the first allied triple ace with 15 confirmed and 5 unconfrmed aerial victories.

11.01.40 (2) Do 17 Longwy [54]
12.05.40 (1) Ju 87 Bouillon *
12.05.40 (1) Ju 87 Pouru St-Rémy [08]
12.05.40 (1) Ju 87 Ste-Cécile 
13.05.40 (1) Bf 109 Stonne [08]
15.05.40 (7) Hs 126 Vendresse [08]
16.05.40 (9) Do 215 Rethel [08]
18.05.40 (3) He 111 Rethel [08]
18.05.40 (5) He 111 Ponsart [51]
18.05.40 (5) He 111 Laon [02]
19.05.40 (2) He 111 Hesse [55]
24.05.40 (1) Hs 126 St-Loup-Terrier [08]
25.05.40 (4) Hs 126 Boult-aux-Bois [08]
26.05.40 (9) He 111 Tannay [08]
03.06.40 (4) Hs 126 Sommauthe [08]
10.06.40 (5) Ju 88 Chatillon sur Bar [08]*


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## Soundbreaker Welch? (Oct 11, 2007)

> Arsenal VG 33.



Is that B W picture of an Arsenal VG 33? It reminds me of a Macchi.

Comiso, if you look, I have two posts in a row, so I thought I woud put some Grinning German Generals to cover it up.


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## comiso90 (Oct 11, 2007)

Soundbreaker Welch? said:


> Is that B W picture of an Arsenal VG 33? It reminds me of a Macchi.
> 
> Comiso, if you look, I have two posts in a row, so I thought I woud put some Grinning German Generals to cover it up.



ahhh..

I thought u were referring to my post of the Battle of France video...

.


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## Civettone (Oct 11, 2007)

delcyros said:


> It was designed from scratch in 1938/39


The VG-33 wasn't exactly designed from scratch. It was directly derived from the VG-30 of 1936.



> Other prototypes included the VG 39 with a 1280 hp engine, achieving 655 Km/h early in 1940 despite an increased armement of 1 20mm and 6 7.5mm LMG.


Not only was the VG-39 a promising fighter, it was one of the most beautiful fighters ever designed. Judge for yourself:


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## delcyros (Oct 11, 2007)

An particularely interesting preliminary read of BoF can be found here:

THE FRENCH AIR FORCE

enjoi!


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## HoHun (Oct 11, 2007)

Hi Delcyros,

>THE FRENCH AIR FORCE

"The French Air Force In 1940 - Was It Defeated by the Luftwaffe or by Politics?"

Interesting summary, thanks!

Here is a thread with a slightly controversial discussion of the topic which might be described (preliminarily) as:

The French Air Force In 1940 - Was It Defeated At All?"

Board Message

I think Yves made some interesting points over there and was a bit disappointed the discussion ended so quickly ...

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)


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## Hop (Oct 12, 2007)

What I've read, from Yves and other sources, is that the French air force was re-equipping with modern fighters rather quickly. 

I think that was a large part of the problem.

It takes time to convert from one type to another, not just (or even) for the pilots, but the ground crews, support staff, etc. I wonder what the spares situation was like, for example. As Murray said:



> "The French air force, unfortunately, was
> in great disarray as it was transitioning to a newer generation of aircraft (as had the
> Luftwaffe in 1937-38 and the RAF in 1938-39 with similar results) . The French
> were, in fact, having considerable difficulty in equipping squadrons with new
> ...



I wonder if the French would have done better fighting with their older aircraft, rather than trying to switch to newer types during the battle?

As to the Hs 404, whilst the RAF really liked the cannon, they had to do some redesign work to get it reliable, as did the US.


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## Kurfürst (Oct 12, 2007)

It would be fairer to say the RAF had issues making a working license copy of the cannon, which hardly can be blamed on the original Hispano which worked just fine in the solid engine installations it was designed for in the French air force. Only when the RAF attempted to (mis)use this rather big, gas-operated gun into the flimsy wings of the RAF`s s-e fighter the problems started. Nevertheless, British Hispanos worked well on the testing benches, even if less so in actual aircraft installations. This suggest the problem was with the installations and gun platforms themselves, rather than the gun. Simply to put, the Hispano was ill-suited for wing installations, but the British simply did not have any suitable aero engine that could mount a cannon, nor they had any domestic cannon design suiting their own concepts - experience with development of small-caliber guns in Britain seems to be rather limited for some reason, and they relied heavily of licensed foreign designs.

The US problems seem to be different, as Tony pointed out, for some rather silly administrative reasons, US quality control for the 20mm cannons simply 'sucked big time'.

As for Murray, he has wonderful set of data, and some very poor and often flawed analysis poured on the top of it.


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## Glider (Oct 12, 2007)

Kurfürst said:


> It would be fairer to say the RAF had issues making a working license copy of the cannon, which hardly can be blamed on the original Hispano which worked just fine in the solid engine installations it was designed for in the French air force. Only when the RAF attempted to (mis)use this rather big, gas-operated gun into the flimsy wings of the RAF`s s-e fighter the problems started. Nevertheless, British Hispanos worked well on the testing benches, even if less so in actual aircraft installations. This suggest the problem was with the installations and gun platforms themselves, rather than the gun. Simply to put, the Hispano was ill-suited for wing installations, but the British simply did not have any suitable aero engine that could mount a cannon, nor they had any domestic cannon design suiting their own concepts - experience with development of small-caliber guns in Britain seems to be rather limited for some reason, and they relied heavily of licensed foreign designs.
> 
> The US problems seem to be different, as Tony pointed out, for some rather silly administrative reasons, US quality control for the 20mm cannons simply 'sucked big time'.
> 
> As for Murray, he has wonderful set of data, and some very poor and often flawed analysis poured on the top of it.



I am afraid that I have to disagree with some parts of this posting. There is no doubt that the British had difficulty getting the 20mm to work in the wings of the aircraft but that was down to a number of reasons. 
A major one was mounting the gun on its side in the first Spitfire 1B. As a result its hardly a suprise that the feed didn't work once the aircraft had done a few manoeuvers stressing the ammo feed system in a way it was never designed for.
A second one was that the gun did need some modifications to make it reliable mainly around the breach. Soft firing was a major cause of jams and the British dealt with this by reducing the size of the chamber.
Thirdly the US guns were beautifully made, but didn't include any changes to the original French design making them very unreliable.

In 'Guns of the Royal Air Force 1939-1945' by G.F. Wallace - who was there - there is an account of British tests of the British and US Hispanos which took place early in 1942. The British were unhappy with initial supplies of the American-made guns: "there were frequent misfeeds and lightly struck cap stoppages, and the life of several small components was very short" so a comparative test between one British and three American guns was set up. The intention was to fire 5,000 rounds from each gun without replacing any components. "The British gun fired the full programme but the performance of the American guns was so bad that in each case the trial had to be abandoned before the 5,000 rounds had been fired." The British gun experienced 19 stoppages in firing 5,012 rounds. The American guns experienced 67 stoppages out of 4,092, 97 out of 3,705 and 94 out of 2,610 respectively. Incidentally, Wallace states that the US guns were "beautifully made and better finished than our own" and expressed surprise that although lightly struck caps were a major source of stoppages, even more frequent were mis-feeds


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## AL Schlageter (Oct 12, 2007)

Kurfürst said:


> As for Murray, he has wonderful set of data, and some very poor and often flawed analysis poured on the top of it.


I just started reading the book now, so can you give examples of sections I should be leary of.

Weren't some of the German cannons based on Swiss designs.


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## HoHun (Oct 12, 2007)

Hi Hop,

>What I've read, from Yves and other sources, is that the French air force was re-equipping with modern fighters rather quickly. 

>I think that was a large part of the problem.

Hm, from Kirkland's article, the sortie ratios of the Armée de l'Air were so low that I'd not expect any problems with the transition to a newer type.

In fact, from Kirkland's article I'd say that an insufficient number of pilots was the main problem of the Armée de l'Air. Unfortunately, he fails to quantify the pilot strength and gives only a very weak explanation for it. 

I'd say if we accept the lack of pilots as a major problem, it seems to make sense to give them the best available aircraft material. It's my impression that generally, the improved capabilities of a new type tend to outweigh the lack of familiarity with that new type (ignoring teething troubles, but I'm not aware of any with the newer French aircraft).

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)


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## delcyros (Oct 13, 2007)

Hi Henning,

A tempting and attractive idea but the things I don´t understand so far is that France indeed had the largest bulk of civil aviators in the world and spend more money in civil aviation than any other nation prior to ww2. As France had enough time to retrain it´s aviators in the phoney war, military pilot´s shortages were no unavoidable aspect.

Thanks for Your link but I cannot access the board, perhaps You can copy in Yves arguments?

best regards,
delc


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## HoHun (Oct 13, 2007)

Hi Delcyros,

>Thanks for Your link but I cannot access the board, perhaps You can copy in Yves arguments?

To access the board, you can simply become a member - it's free:

Luftwaffe Experten Message Board (Powered by Invision Power Board)

(Too much stuff to reproduce it here ...)

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)


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## delcyros (Oct 14, 2007)

HoHun said:


> Hi Delcyros,
> 
> >Thanks for Your link but I cannot access the board, perhaps You can copy in Yves arguments?
> 
> ...



I tried but neither of my mail adresses was accepted on this forum.
However, it was worth a try.


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## Kurfürst (Oct 14, 2007)

Glider said:


> I am afraid that I have to disagree with some parts of this posting. There is no doubt that the British had difficulty getting the 20mm to work in the wings of the aircraft but that was down to a number of reasons.
> A major one was mounting the gun on its side in the first Spitfire 1B. As a result its hardly a suprise that the feed didn't work once the aircraft had done a few manoeuvers stressing the ammo feed system in a way it was never designed for.
> A second one was that the gun did need some modifications to make it reliable mainly around the breach. Soft firing was a major cause of jams and the British dealt with this by reducing the size of the chamber.
> Thirdly the US guns were beautifully made, but didn't include any changes to the original French design making them very unreliable.



As I understand, the original french Hispano was designed to be fitted, literally bolted onto the engine block itself. Such mounting ensured a very rigid installation, given the 600kg or so engine. This was not available in the RAF`s wing installations, since wings are very much more flexible and lighter structures, and the Hispano has a very powerful recoil.

I`ve never seen anything to indicate the French had any sort of problems with this gun in this installation, as was claimed by some here, and it also would not make sense why the British would choose a gun to be bought that just didn`t work, there were lots of other guns on the market (Swiss Oerlikons in all sizes for example).. more likely they bought a gun that worked well in the original enviroment it was meant for, and then placed it into an enviroment it wasn`t meant for and then had to fix the problems that arose from those new circumstances.

It has to be remembered that British guns were licensed ones, with plans converted from a metric plans to imperial units, and the US guns were licensed versions of licensed guns. There was also a QC problem due to pure buerocratic reasons, since anything over .50 caliber was to satisfy the much more loose tolerances for _artilerry_ instead of small caliber guns IIRC.

In any case, to me it seem the notion that the Hispano was a poor design that was in need of a 'fix' does not seem to be well-founded to me. Rather, it seems to have been mis-employed and mis-copied.

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## Glider (Oct 14, 2007)

Kurfürst said:


> I`ve never seen anything to indicate the French had any sort of problems with this gun in this installation, as was claimed by some here, and it also would not make sense why the British would choose a gun to be bought that just didn`t work, there were lots of other guns on the market (Swiss Oerlikons in all sizes for example).. more likely they bought a gun that worked well in the original enviroment it was meant for, and then placed it into an enviroment it wasn`t meant for and then had to fix the problems that arose from those new circumstances..


I have to agree that I also do not know of any problems that the french had with the 20mm but the fact remain that the British did make modifications and the USA didn't. In the test mentioned in my earlier posting, the result clearly showed that the USA gun wasn't reliable and the British one was. 



> It has to be remembered that British guns were licensed ones, with plans converted from a metric plans to imperial units, and the US guns were licensed versions of licensed guns.


And what does this prove?



> There was also a QC problem due to pure buerocratic reasons, since anything over .50 caliber was to satisfy the much more loose tolerances for _artilerry_ instead of small caliber guns IIRC..


This has been mentioned a number of times but I am not seen any evidence to support it. In the test I mentioned above, there were a number of reccomendations made as to how to resolve the problem of the USA guns reliability and none of them mentioned the tolerances used in manufacture. They were all design issues. If you wish I can dig out the book and list them, but the point is already clear.
If you can support your statement I am happy to reconsider my position. 



> In any case, to me it seem the notion that the Hispano was a poor design that was in need of a 'fix' does not seem to be well-founded to me. Rather, it seems to have been mis-employed and mis-copied.


How do you come to this conclusion after the clear test results held in the USA? The is no doubt that the British gun with mods worked, and the USA one without them, didn't, how can you just ignore this?


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## Hop (Oct 14, 2007)

> I`ve never seen anything to indicate the French had any sort of problems with this gun in this installation, as was claimed by some here, and it also would not make sense why the British would choose a gun to be bought that just didn`t work, there were lots of other guns on the market (Swiss Oerlikons in all sizes for example).. more likely they bought a gun that worked well in the original enviroment it was meant for, and then placed it into an enviroment it wasn`t meant for and then had to fix the problems that arose from those new circumstances.



The British of course bought the Hispano before it was in use with the French air force. After having expressed an interest in 1936, the first gun was received from France in January 1937, and two more in March. At that point an order was placed, and work begun on a factory in the UK to make them.

As to French experience, I am not aware of anyone commenting on it. The claim on the LEMB was that the Finns found it unreliable in their MS406s.



> It has to be remembered that British guns were licensed ones, with plans converted from a metric plans to imperial units, and the US guns were licensed versions of licensed guns.



No, the US licensed the guns direct from the French. They bought a batch from France, then the engineering drawings and information, and a licence to produce them in the US. In fact they ignored British advice on their experiences getting the gun to work, in particular that the chamber should be shortened to reduce the number of failed strikes on the primer.


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## delcyros (Oct 15, 2007)

Regarding whether or not RAF Spitfires participated the Battle of Britain, I found this comment:

_At the outbreak of the Second World War, the Mk I's were the mainstay of Fighter Command along with the Hurricane. When air support was needed in Norway and in France, Fighter Command sent only one squadron to Norway *and ten to France.* _

The Supermarine Spitfire

Only 67 RAF Spitfires were lost in action. Had those exclusively been Spitfires operating from southeastern England (to Dunkirk), this would have been to high a loss rate for my beloved Spit. 
The numbers lost seems more reasonable if the RAF deployed ten Spitfire squadrons on the continent. Still don´t know which units they were.

regards,
delc


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## Glider (Oct 15, 2007)

delcyros said:


> Regarding whether or not RAF Spitfires participated the Battle of Britain, I found this comment:
> 
> _At the outbreak of the Second World War, the Mk I's were the mainstay of Fighter Command along with the Hurricane. When air support was needed in Norway and in France, Fighter Command sent only one squadron to Norway *and ten to France.* _
> 
> ...



This has to be a mistake. No spits were sent to Norway but they did send one of Hurricanes. Also I am sure that ten squadrons of Spits in France would have been noticed.

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## delcyros (Oct 16, 2007)

I am not entirely sure regarding Norway but I only know of Hurricanes, too.
These were a number of squadrons (indeed enough planes to keep the CV HMS ARK ROYAL and HMS GLORIOUS busy for a week to bring them back during operation Alphabet to the UK). 
Altough as far as HMS GLORIOUS is concerned, only RAF Hurricanes and RAF Gladiators were shipped...


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## Kurfürst (Oct 16, 2007)

delcyros said:


> Regarding whether or not RAF Spitfires participated the Battle of *Britain*, I found this comment:
> 
> regards,
> delc



I am quite sure they did... you mean the BoF, right? 8) 

Obviously there must have been some Spits in France, since the Germans captured at least one and tested it against their own planes.

I believe they first entered combat against enemy aircraft over Dunkerque - but they did shot down RAF aircraft much earlier in a friendly fire incidedent in 1939!  .


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## Hop (Oct 16, 2007)

Spitfires weren't based in France in 1940, but from the 23rd May they carried out sorties over France. According to Cull in 12 Days in May, the first combat was between 54 and 92 squadron and I/JG27, over Calais. 1 Spitfire was lost for 5 aircraft from JG27. Later the same day 92 squadron engaged 110s from ZG26 and ZG76, 2 aircraft were lost from each side.


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## maxs75 (Oct 16, 2007)

Spitfires weren't allowed to be based outside UK till early 1942 when the first went to Malta. The 10 squadrons in France and 1 in Norway were Hurricane squadrons. 
In Norway only No. 263 (Gladiators) and No. 46 (Hurricanes) were sent aboard Glorious in april and May 1940.

Anyway, No. 212 squadron had some recce Spitfires, and was based in France in 1940.
The other fighter squadrons were No. 85, 87, 607, 615, 3, 79, 504, 1, 73, 501.
No. 607 and 615 had a mix of Hurricane and Gladiators, other were Hurricane squadrons.

Max


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## delcyros (Oct 16, 2007)

Thanks for clarification, max75 and Hop.

Than it´s going to be a not very imaginative combat record with 67 Spitfire lost (mostly over Dunkirk), esspeccially as none was destroyed preventing them from falling into german hands (all operating from France) and bombing / strafing of the airfields doesn´t play a role either. german AAA over Dunkirk wasn´t intensively deployed, also. 
Therefore a number has been lost to accidents, fuel exhoustion, pilot error but the majority must have been lost in aerial combat over Dunkirk.


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