LUFTWAFFE EXPERTEN Claims vs. Kills

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Just in case you missed the point:

1) We did NOT lose a higher percentage of bombers in 1944 / 1945, it was lower. We lost at a rate of less than 1/4 of the 1939 rate in 1944.
2) The top three German aces scored most, if not all, of their kills against the Soviet Union, not the western powers. So comparing them to the sutiation in the west is pointless.
3) The loss rates in 1943 were half of what they were in 1939.
4) Yes, we lost more bombers in 1944 in absolute number but, with 100,000 more sorties the Germans had more than twice the opportunity for kills and shot down MUCH less than in years before on a loss per sortie basis. If they hadn't ... with that many more sorties, they would have ceased to be an effective force.

I didn't post anything at all about the strain on US resources or will to persevere since it wan't part of the discussion. Why bring it up? I also didnt state anything about Obamacare either as it also wasn't part of the discussion. My reply was to Udet, whom I did not know wasn't around anymore. Now I do, so I won't answer anymore of his quoted posts.

From the title of the thread, the Luftwaffe Experten were very good pilots that, as a group, were insufficient to stop the tide of loss that overtook them. They flew and fought well, to the end but weren't the only pilots to fly and fight well. They DID lose the war, so SOMEBODY ELSE also flew and fought well. It is no slap to the Luftwaffe to admit the other side also fought well. As I see it, all countries did a credible job commensurate with their resources to wage war.

Someone had to win or else we'd still be fighting. Glad we're not or my good friend Romatic Technofreak wouldn't be visiting tomorrow on his way home to Germany.

Cheers.
 
The air war against the Soviet Union has always appeared to be a bit of a dark side of the Moon affair to me; they don't let on much (if at all) in terms of what really happened. And post war they really got their nose out of joint for quite some time. From what I can gather, we can only rely on the Luftwaffe/German accounts of the conflict over Russia, as no-one else is saying much. No offense intended to Russian members of this forum, but the Soviet era powers that be are about as warm and fuzzy as the North Koreans when it comes to sharing data or knowledge. While I have read numerous times that the Luftwaffe pilots "generally" considered the Soviets inferior in terms of pilot and aircraft quality, compared to the RAF and USAAF, I've rarely seen well documented accounts. A German pilot shot down over England was generally treated well, and vice versa, but it does not appear that the Russians held the same mutual affection. Whichever way you look at it, the eastern offensive was horrific.
 
Hi Pattern14,

You can get one person's account of it here:

Air Aces Homepage

Mr. Magnus at least has a place to start for the Soviet Union. How much is correct and / or verifiable is unclear to me. His files show just shy of 66,000 claims for the Luftwaffe. My files show about 68,000 ... but I have no way to vet the list, so it is just claims.

Mr. Magnus also has a list for Japan as well as all the other nations. Again, I could not say how accurate it is one way or the other, but it gives me a place to start.

Good luck with this effort. I have been working on it in my free time for more than 20 years. I have good files, but no way to verify them as factual or not, so they are just for my consumption at this point. No sense in starting an argument for no reason.
 
Thanks for that GregP. The ETO gets the bulk of the limelight, for want of a better term. I guess we all tend to think Spitfire/Bf 109, B17/FW190, P47 etc, when we talk WW2 aircraft, while Macchi's and Yaks don't attract the same glamorous attention. I suspect it may be something to do with being some what romanticised by Hollywood and numerous books, although I am probably over simplifying matters. Never seen too many action films where the Italian Air force or the skies over the Ukraine were centre stage. At least back then you knew that blokes like Douglas Bader were on the good side, and the bad guys were the Nazi's. Todays enemies hide in the shadows.
 

There are several very detailed USAF post-war studies on the Eastern Front air war available for public download. These are generally from the German PoV, as much of the information is derived from the post-war interviews of interned Luftwaffe personnel or from Germans who continued to serve in the German air force during the Cold War.

There is also Bergstrom et al's 'Black Cross, Red Star' series which is an excellent account of the theatre, although it is now out of print and very difficult find for less than $200 per volume, of the three-volume set.

Progressively, as the Russian national archives have been opened to Westerners and more post-war Soviet accounts are translated, the Russian side of the story is being re-told in the West. Curiously, the Il-2 video game/simulation also triggered some of the momentum that it responsible for Russian war-time documentation being made available and translated into English.
 
thanks for that info as well! My youngest son plays the Il-2 games on his computer as well, but the Russian planes always seem to come off second best.
 
FalkeEins said:
.. he re-did the entire series for Ian Allan in the UK, all four volumes still available at sensible prices
Click to expand...
And thanks for that as well. I'll look them up. In my Smith and Creek 4 vol series on the Me 262, I can only find two references to Me 262's being downed by Russian pilots, with the second one claiming the life of the Russian pilot as well. The Me 262 was desperately needed on the Russian front, but simply did not have anywhere near the sufficient numbers or trained pilots to make the slightest difference. Interestingly enough, the only "original" Me 262 still surviving, "Black X", is in the Australian War Memorial in Canberra, and was used on the eastern front. Their is some evidence of combat as there is a bullet hole in it, but I don't know much more about it than that. Be good to take a trip and see it one day.
 
One thing I think any sane person would agree upon: there were most certainly psychiatric casualties among the German forces: Heer, Luftwaffe, Kriegsmarine, even SS. They may not have been reported as such, but they most certainly existed. Whether they were recognized is a separate question. Whether they were medically treated or just punished is a third.
 

What do you mean by original?
 
I think he means retaining some of its original paint. There are several war time Me 262s extant today. The nearest to me is W.Nr. 112372 at Cosford which was captured at Fassberg along with the one now in Canberra. Cosford's is definitely not wearing original paint!
I dragged SWMBO all the way to Canberra a couple of years ago (it wasn't exactly on our route!) specifically to see the aircraft in the AWM. The Me 262 has been stripped back to reveal substantially the original RLM paint but also the scheme applied after the war by the Air Ministry.
Cheers
Steve.
 
Paul Allen has an original Me 262 in his collection, and it runs. It was the one we had at the Planes of Fame until Paul wanted it badly enough.

It does not have original paint but I have never seen anyone try to say that repainting a 70 year old airplane makes it un-original. That's silly.

I understand he might have plans to fly it with the original engines. Can't say for sure, but would love to see even a fast taxi run.
 
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GregP said:
I have never seen anyone try to say that repainting a 70 year old airplane makes it un-original.
Click to expand...

Except for someone in this thread
I agree it doesn't make the aeroplane "unoriginal" but original paint, considered of no consequence until recently, is now considered important. The Me 262 and Bf 109 in Canberra are amongst very few WW2 Luftwaffe aircraft in the world wearing any original paint. The Bf 109 is unique and important for that.
Many of these aircraft were initially repainted soon after the victorious allies acquired them and later attempts to return them to something like their original appearance were often less than brilliant. Most of the examples of original colours applied to aircraft come from artefacts rather than complete air frames.
Cheers
Steve
 
In the British Classic Car and Bike world things have changed in the last few years it is now considered to be very important to try and preserve original paint, badges and decals. Until recently any restoration involved the vapour blaster and a trip to a paint shop for a complete better than new paint job. Now that would be frowned on and called over restored and preserved original paint jobs win concours in shows. A friend has an unrestored 1930 Scott Squirrel TT replica and he has been told that if he restores the paint a contract will be taken out on him.
 
I'd do it anyway if it were mine. It isn't.

Original paint is, by now, nowhere NEAR the original color, so what you're looking at today is NOT as it was orginally, color-wise. It retains the otiginal brush strokes or tape edges, perhaps, but all military wartime paint fades after this amount of time. Perhaps if it had been painted with high-quality oil paint, maybe not. But aircraft paint? It is faded.

Someone has their head up a wrong, dark place.
 

Where have you heard that it is the only original Me 262? There are several originals throughout the world. The one you are talking about, is the only one that obtains its original paint job. That does not make the other not original though.

Complete Original Me 262s:

Me 262A, W.Nr.500071 White 3, III./JG 7 (Deutsches Museum in Munich, Germany)
Me 262 A-1a W.Nr.501232 Yellow 5, 3./KG(J)6 (USAF Museum in Dayton, Ohio, USA)
Me 262 A-1a/U3 W.Nr.500453 (This is the one that GregP is talking about)
Me 262 A-1a W.Nr.500491 Yellow 7, II./JG 7 (National Air and Space Museum, Washington DC, USA)
Me 262 A-2a W.Nr.112372 (RAF Museum Hendon, London, England)
Me 262 A-2a W.Nr.500200 Black X 9K+XK, 2 Staffel./KG 51 (Australian War Memorial, Canberra, Australia)
Me 262 B-1a/U1, W.Nr.110305 Red 8 (South African National Museum of Military History, Johannesburg, South Africa)
Me 262 B-1a, W.Nr.110639 White 35 (National Museum of Naval Aviation, Pensacola, Florida, USA)
 
First aces from the Luftwaffe as opposed to the US? Shocking. After all, the Germans had a multi-year head start in both WW1 and WW2.

Which air force had the best chance for the last ace in the ETO? Oh, wait. The USAAF, RAF, and Soviet Air Forces may not have had enough German aircraft to shoot down to get the last ace.
 
GregP said:
Someone has their head up a wrong, dark place.
Click to expand...

A matter of opinion!
This is great and not the only one. There are plenty on static displays.



But I was prepared to drive several hundred miles out of my way to see this.



And that is unique. It is the only Bf 109 in the world still to wear almost all its war time paint.....I said paint, not colour. The colours may not be as they were when first applied but there is a lot to be learnt from them. The demarcations between the colours, how they were applied etc can all be established by examining this example. All of this is lost on a shiny restoration, no matter how well it is done. Some are not well done at all.

Cheers

Steve
 
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The Me 262 in Canberra is conserved and preserved, rather than restored. That's the difference between it and the others. It shows signs of its British tenure including its Air Min number as well (AM 81). AWM's preservation, rather than restoration of these aircraft makes them quite special.
 
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