To the MOD - I'm responding politely to the issues raised directly at me.
I posted what I thought was relevant to the discussion - which at that time was about MC.202s. I thought the number of Bf 109s was also relevant.
After transcribing the Luftwaffe TO&E, once you brought it up I certainly did acknowledge that I left that information out of that post on the subject, and I explained why:
- I do not think that the number of Me 110s was relevant,
- I had already mentioned those same 110s a couple of times previously and
- I don't think Me 110s or Do 17s were flying day-time fighter missions in August 1942.
- I wasn't making any kind of point about Luftwaffe serviceability rates at that time, we were talking about the MC.202 and the Regia Aeronautica.
Yes this was intentional, no I was not hiding anything, I am well aware that many other people have that same book which is why I give page references and / or dates when I quote data from it so you can look it up for yourselves. In some cases I have also taken photos and uploaded them so people who don't have it can see I'm not making anything up.
Very similarly, when I partially transcribed excerpts about the Italian fighter strength in the MTO, I did not transcribe anything about the SM.79 or SM.82 or Ca 314 strength. I did include CR.42 numbers to be thorough, eventually I left those off too because they were relegated to flying bomber missions and were phased out at some point in 1942.
Leaving out the Me 110 contingent from that list was quite intentional. Very much like the Osprey book which I transcribed in post 796 above - the Osprey author only showed the Bf 109 strength because that is what that book is about. Whatever I'm going to transcribe from a book in the midst of a conversation is going to be relevant to that conversation - I'm not going to transcribe the whole book.
You may think there is something sinister in leaving out what I believe were night fighters / maritime patrol aircraft - the Me 110 and Do 17 units stationed on Crete, in the discussion about fighters faced by P-40s in North Africa and the MTO, but I don't agree. Just because you are certain that you are correct doesn't mean that I see it the same way.
We all have the right to have and share our own opinions.
We do not have the right to force anyone else to agree with our opinions.
Sometimes people look at the same data and draw radically different conclusions.
For example that British Fw 190 test that Ivan linked. We each drew quite different conclusions from the same report.
I don't think we will ever see eye to eye on it and we both just have to live with that. Others can draw their own conclusions.
I believe the same applies here.