LUFTWAFFE EXPERTEN Claims vs. Kills

Erich said:

RG I think you will find that by sitting down with many US fighter pilots and talk with them about late 44 till wars end you can safely say the vets think the Luftwaffe pilots were all crap. Ego ? maybe, maybe not.

As for the star of Afrika it appears that maybe 25-30 kills can be attributed to other German pilots but ya know none of us were there so that pretty much squelchs it. As for the Allied histories well at least for RAF there are practically none. It has been only the last 5 years after serious digging that RAF night heavy groups/the net: are just coming out with "official" statements to true losses and they were more than what was given during the war and after until now.

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I guess my point is that I think that just about all the high scoring aces of all nations overclaimed by about 2:1.

In general, I think the first 5 kills were very carefully scrutinized except where real propaganda value was immeadiately involved. Beyond that, it was still fairly accurate to between 10-20 kills, but after that to an increasing degree the "Ace's" claims were credited with less and less scrutiny since he became a propaganda and moral tool - a "star" of sorts.

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Lunatic

All Possible. There is a strong conjunction between claims and confirmed kills for top pilots. And there is good evidence that the reason was propaganda. But I think you cannot rate claims to real kills, lets say- 2:1 in general. This is a question, which has to be answered from case to case. And it can be done, since we are talking about individuals with specific combat records.
By the way, thanks Erich, for the hint of Dr. Priens book, it provides some vital informations about the specific times of Marsailles claims.

I do agree that a lot were done for propaganda sources and I do believe that it was done by all pilots. I think a lot more were done out of mistake though. Sometimes it is hard to establish a clear kill for someone when lets say everyone is gunning for it.

Trust me RG I am not argueing the truth that it was done just to what extent by some pilots and by what nations.

delcyros said:

All Possible. There is a strong conjunction between claims and confirmed kills for top pilots. And there is good evidence that the reason was propaganda. But I think you cannot rate claims to real kills, lets say- 2:1 in general. This is a question, which has to be answered from case to case. And it can be done, since we are talking about individuals with specific combat records.
By the way, thanks Erich, for the hint of Dr. Priens book, it provides some vital informations about the specific times of Marsailles claims.

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When talking about any specific pilot that is true. But when talking about all the high scoring aces as a group it is certainly possible to make a generalization such as that as many as half the claims were false.

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Lunatic

RG Lunatic:

Sometimes after reading some of your postings i do think you honor your nickname, especially the Lunatic part.

So German people were convinced New York was being bombed?
That is very great information. I will take that as something you actually meant. Aftermath: i will put into doubt everything you have said when participating in all threads.

As Erich correctly put it, many USAAF veterans will speak fluently on the issue of " how easy" were late war German pilots. They will be glad to appear in some crappy history channel documental, speaking with a big smile on their faces: "You have to understand German pilots in 1944 where totally different from those of 1940 or 1941..."

It appeared more a process of catharsis to me rather than an honest and straight presentation of their experiences.

The big smile on the face of one of those veterans appeared being one of relief even 40 or 45 or 50 years after the termination of world war II.

I wonder if those veterans could ever explain their very high losses in Europe. What kind of stuff would they display in attempting to come up with any rational argument?


They really want to implant the notion the war the USA waged against Japan and Germany had identical patterns.

Absolutely flat and plain illiterate hogwash.

The only identical thing about fighting in both Europe and the Pacific was one: the outcome, total victory.

The path followed to gain victory was not identical though. Fighting Germany in the air was an extremely tough and vicious thing.

Unlike you and your veteran friends i do not care about the opinions of the all of you. Unlike you and your friends, I am not to repeat the same stuff over and over again wondering if it ever might become the truth.

If you continue to believe all this things it is absolutely great for me.

You apparently need some memory refreshing: throughout mid-late 1944 a bunch of "undertrained" kids became experts in digesting USAAF heavy bombers. Sturmbock.

Perhaps the propaganda of your country has never informed you of the big number of psychiatric cases amongst USA aircrews after meeting with the Luftwaffe throughout the "easy" year of 1944.

I will close this posting by reminding of you of some facts:

(i) The first nation to put a jet fighter in operation was Germany -not the USA-,

(ii) The very first jet aces in the history of this planet are guys of the Luftwaffe -meaning not from the USA-.

(iii) Several of those jet aces -Germans, not from the USA- shot down more planes than the bulk of the aces of your country.

Wow

Udet said:

RG Lunatic:

Sometimes after reading some of your postings i do think you honor your nickname, especially the Lunatic part.

So German people were convinced New York was being bombed?
That is very great information. I will take that as something you actually meant. Aftermath: i will put into doubt everything you have said when participating in all threads.

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I didn't say "all" the German people, or that they were "convinced". But, of German soldiers captured in Italy after Anzio, a large number believe NYC was in fact being bombed. These were mostly very young soldiers, not the older vetrans. One must assume the civilian population was being fed the same crap.

And where did I say the German's were "easy" kills in 1944 (or even in 1945)?

As for the rest of it... Udet you have the worst case of vanquished syndrome I think I've ever seen. Face it, Germany fought badly and they lost. They did well when they attacked, but once the nations they sucker punched started punching back Germany never had another significant victory.

Be thankful for it - unless you fancy yourself as a would be Nazi elite, your life is better than it would have been had they won!

Is not necessary to discuss general european air war, or isn´t?
And I think nobody here wants to be a nazi or something ueberhuman.
We do have a very good question here to answer, how much was overclaiming for the top 100 Luftwaffe aces? RG states 2:1 if we count them all together. (I still disagree in generalizations, RG -you can too easily draw wrong conclusions from them, just an opinion) This question can - in case we do a lot of research- be answered over years, do not await an overall agreed solution now.
I still search for better loss lists of RCAAF, RAF and RAAF as well as USAAF (plus minor countrys) in Africa (best would be with specific times). Can anybody help me out? I have the list based on the article, mentioned by RG above, but there are lots of datas missing (some plane simply disappears there, not all reinforcement is listed and times are missing).

Well, I was just stating that 2:1 seems about right for the aces of any country credited with more than about 10-20 kills. Once they got up into the double/triple/quadruple ace catagory they became rock stars of a sort and the normal rules for accrediting claims went out the window in favor of moral and propoganda.

I'm not saying that this number was applicable to every pilot. As individuals they should each be investigated individually. But as a group...

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Lunatic

I don't know what the reallity of this is but I have read sworn statements of pilots flying with Tommy Linch, Bong and Maguire that at least twice the number of aircraft "Claimed" were seen to be Dammaged/probably destroyed (in flames, missing parts, etc) by these pilots. They wern't claimed because the actual crash was not witnessed.

The truth in these matters will never be found.

wmaxt said:

I don't know what the reallity of this is but I have read sworn statements of pilots flying with Tommy Linch, Bong and Maguire that at least twice the number of aircraft "Claimed" were seen to be Dammaged/probably destroyed (in flames, missing parts, etc) by these pilots. They wern't claimed because the actual crash was not witnessed.

The truth in these matters will never be found.

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That was a special situation - two pilots going for the record in a sort of personal contest. I think their kills, at least the last 10 or so each, were probably accurately accredited just because of the nature of that competition. It was a very unusual circumstance.

I do understand your argument, RG, and I would agree in most, since it seems to be logical. Propaganda, claims, some short official confirmations and some long lasting ones, this really indicates some suspect handling. No doubt. Some pilots will have less and some will have more historic kills...
What I want to say is following:
From mid /late 1944 on, the Luftwaffe credited kills very generously -with the regularization that post war investigations will follow to confirm them or not. This doesn´t happen till today (and probably will be a hard matter for a long time). I am looking forward to read about Welters claims in Erichs book. This could underline much of your arguments, since all of his kills are a bit suspect. I do have no problems with downrating the kills if the sources clearly indicate this on an individual. This must happen. I just don´t like generalizations, you will need to prove them on a very good base without too many exceptions and I don´t believe this is possible with our avaiable sources, not for Luftwaffe nor for RAF, USAF, JAF or even the Soviets. Explenations can be generalized but also the subjects? [/b]

Well, it's not like I'm publishing the 2:1 overclaiming figure in a book as fact! Clearly it's just speculation w.r.t. this particular article in this thread.

The point is just that the very high kill figures of even the most reputable Luftwaffe' aces have to be taken with a large grain of salt. But lets face it, even if HALF their kills were false, they still had tremendously more kills than the aces of other nations.

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Lunatic

I still doubt it was 2:1 though. If it be that way then lets just say the British and US aces. They would have only have about 20 to 30 of there confirmed kills be true. And everyone on all sides who scored 20 kills actually only had 10. I doubt it was as high as 2:1. Just my belief.

How about the pilots who actually shot 50 planes out of 50 confirmed claims ? There were actually some of those !

There are even aces who's scores have been increased during the postwar years by looking in Allied or Axis loss records !

Only very few German/U.S. and British aces intentionally overrated their scores, as if it was discovered, they would be given very short shrift by their peer's !

Has anyone in here -ever- believed absolutely no mistakes were made when claiming and confirming air victories -in all sides-?

I find this whole debate entertaining.

Unlike Mr. Lunatic, i do not only see mistakes in the numbers of confirmed kills of a given pilot cutting down his record; i am also convinced many pilots shot down planes who were not claimed, much less confirmed.
On that we might never know the truth.

I see Lunatic thinking Erich Hartmann did not shoot down 352 enemy planes but just half -following his 2:1 overclaim logic-. In his mind Erich Hartmann is very likely to have destroyed only 176 enemy planes.

I´d tell i believe Hartmann did not destroy 352, but some 375 enemy planes in combat.

I have detected cases of Jagdgeschwadern in the eastern front claiming a number (high) of destroyed enemy planes which happened to be inferior to losses suffered presented by the soviets for the same area and period of time.


The point would rather be how these people -Lunatic as the flagship- present their aguments: "Luftwaffe experten claims vs. kills: myths and facts."

I detect an entirely different agenda here. The actual goal is not clearly defined from the outset. After reading the posted article it looks more like a poorly disguised attempt to bring up a "thorough discussion" of facts and positions on the issue.

The word "myth" is rather implemented to induce people from the beginning to believe the records of German pilots of World War II are tainted with tales.

Sure propaganda played its role. Curiously some of them fail to detect how similar the propaganda systems of Germany and the USA were during the war, and that there is not substantial difference between one another.

What is it that makes them so sure USAAF aces have confirmed victory scores that would not allow doubts? What if many USAAF aces, say, with 10 confirmed kills, actually shot down only 4, 5 or 6 enemy planes?

An ace with 10 kills in the victorious side... against an ace with 352 kills in the defeated side...It is kind of easy for me to detect their actual intentions when trying to find their "logical-rational" explanations for the deeds of the experten.

I do not fret at all Lunatic. I am not a dictator to tell people what is to be read and what is not. Read and hear as much as you can, even from persons like you.

Excess losses over kills claimes are easily explained - Operational losses (mechanical failure and pilot goofs) often made up a higher % of actual losses than enemy action, and of course there were also those lost to ground fire. Often the cause of Soviet losses would be unknown as it was not uncommon for Soviet pilots not to have (working) radios.

As for Hartman's 352 kills, I suspect the actual number was less than that. But there is no real logical basis for your assertion that his actual number of kills was even higher - just wishful thinking. I would not presume to say his kill total was half the 352 awarded unless it were possible to compare his kill claims, kill claims of other Luftwaffe' pilots in the same general area, and enemy losses on the dates in question. However, the evidence that Marseille, one of the most respected of Luftwaffe' Experten, was awarded a significant number of false kills implies that this was likely with other high scoring Experten.

The only point I'm trying to make is that the claim that the Luftwaffe' system for awarding kills was more accurate than that of other nations is unsupported by the evidence.

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Lunatic

Either way there is no way that we are ever going to tell what is the truth and what is not. RG knows the truth though so dont argue with him on it. I too believe that Hartmanns kill were more then 352. I do believe that overclaiming did happen. I also believe that in some rare cases underclaiming did happen. But RG's 2:1 ratio is completly obsured. If that were the case then half the aircraft that the allies reported as losses were never actually lost because know one shot them down! Remember RG there were other countries reporting losses too other then the RAF and the USAAF.

If this is what we are striving for here then I will have to say that even for Bong and McGuire only actually shot down half of there kills because they were trying to get over one another. I know exactly what you are going to say that they had a reason only to claim legit kills but I am going to go ahead and say they lied to get the edge on one another. There now I spiced things up and well see RG go crazy and say it can not be true because the allies did no such thing.

DerAdlerIstGelandet said:

Either way there is no way that we are ever going to tell what is the truth and what is not. RG knows the truth though so dont argue with him on it. I too believe that Hartmanns kill were more then 352. I do believe that overclaiming did happen. I also believe that in some rare cases underclaiming did happen. But RG's 2:1 ratio is completly obsured. If that were the case then half the aircraft that the allies reported as losses were never actually lost because know one shot them down! Remember RG there were other countries reporting losses too other then the RAF and the USAAF.

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So you are saying that Hartman was somehow more honest about his claims than Marselles?

DerAdlerIstGelandet said:

If this is what we are striving for here then I will have to say that even for Bong and McGuire only actually shot down half of there kills because they were trying to get over one another. I know exactly what you are going to say that they had a reason only to claim legit kills but I am going to go ahead and say they lied to get the edge on one another. There now I spiced things up and well see RG go crazy and say it can not be true because the allies did no such thing.

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The point about Bong vs. McGuire is that this competition, especially after they passed 30 kills, was very carefully scrutinized. There were only really two pilots involved, so it was not so easy a thing to "cheat", and the consequences of getting caught cheating were extra severe. Before about 30 kills, who knows?

I am saying that Hartmann had no reason to lie just like your allied pilots who supposably did not either.

As for Bong and McGuire I was just making a point. Whether they did or not I do not know nor care because it was done on all sides.