The airplane that did the most to turn the tide of the war.

[parsifal]

In fact the majority of losses were due to reasons other than being shot down, for both sides. landing accidents, structural failures, navigational errors, the list is almost endless. So of course a side with more numbers is going to suffer a higher attrition rate.

In air to air combat, Germany continued to display superiority over the VVS until the very end. However, from a very early point this was realised by VVS and it ceased to be a priority for them to defeat, or even attempt to defeat the LW by gaining air superiority by means of air combat. Novikov issued orders to that effect from April'42 and they were never rescinded. Shooting down German a/c was a "nice to have" bonus that VVS would avail themselves, if the opportunity presented itself but it was not something the VVS went after as a priority. for them, the priority was influencing the ground battle and ensuring ones own strike aircraft were able to survive long enough to carry out that function. Once a breakthrough had been achieved on the ground, German losses to their by now exhausted and usually grounded aircraft would go through the roof as their frontline airfields were overrun and the aircraft trapped on those airfields destroyed, often by own forces. these write offs of non operational aircraft could often not appear on LW loss returns, as often such aircraft were awaiting return to depots for major overhauls and repairs, and often were removed from the LW effectives lists whilst in that condition. Moreover LW supply problems and an overall shortage of spares led to abnormally low operational rates close to the front, usually below 40% of total strengths. When the airfields these non-operational aircraft were overrun, they of course became losses, though often not reported as such.

 

[Schweik]

Based on that same site I linked upthread, in 1941 the Soviet air forces consisted of ~4,400 (mostly very obsolete!) aircraft yet they took 10,300 losses. 234% operational losses in other words. By 1943 with a deployed total of 16,000 aircraft assigned to active combat units that had reduced to 67%. That is a big change.

The Luftwaffe in Russia in 1941 had ~3,000 aircraft and took 2,800 losses. 93% losses. By 1943 that ratio has increased to 146%, also a big change.

 

[Schweik]

In fact the majority of losses were due to reasons other than being shot down, for both sides. landing accidents, structural failures, navigational errors, the list is almost endless. So of course a side with more numbers is going to suffer a higher attrition rate.

In air to air combat, Germany continued to display superiority over the VVS until the very end. However, from a very early point this was realised by VVS and it ceased to be a priority for them to defeat, or even attempt to defeat the LW by gaining air superiority by means of air combat. Novikov issued orders to that effect from April'42 and they were never rescinded. Shooting down German a/c was a "nice to have" bonus that VVS would avail themselves, if the opportunity presented itself but it was not something the VVS went after as a priority. for them, the priority was influencing the ground battle and ensuring ones own strike aircraft were able to survive long enough to carry out that function. Once a breakthrough had been achieved on the ground, German losses to their by now exhausted and usually grounded aircraft would go through the roof as their frontline airfields were overrun and the aircraft trapped on those airfields destroyed, often by own forces. these write offs of non operational aircraft could often not appear on LW loss returns, as often such aircraft were awaiting return to depots for major overhauls and repairs, and often were removed from the LW effectives lists whilst in that condition. Moreover LW supply problems and an overall shortage of spares led to abnormally low operational rates close to the front, usually below 40% of total strengths. When the airfields these non-operational aircraft were overrun, they of course became losses, though often not reported as such.

While I generally agree with all this - in fact the first part of what you wrote is almost a paraphrase of what I already noted upthread, the 'ignoring' the Luftwaffe strategy only went so far and in fact did change during the war. Just as it did with the DAF by the way.

One of the changes in Tactics both in the DAF and by the VVS at about the same time (third and fourth quarter of 1942), was to direct raids against German airfields, and specifically fighter airfields in some cases. On the Russian Front this was done with Sturmoviks and Pe-2s as well as fighters, and according to the Soviets themselves was a major success.

They did also make the effort (and attacking German airfields was sometimes part of that effort) to achieve local air superiority where and when it was deemed necessary, such as over the Kuban but also in many other key battles. At other times the general strategy was as you stated - basically to do their best to simply drive German fighters away from the Sturmoviks and bombers rather than to shoot them down. The Luftwaffe played into this as they tended to concentrate on the easiest targets at least some of the time (though not always).

 

[Stig1207]

Based on that same site I linked upthread, in 1941 the Soviet air forces consisted of ~4,400 (mostly very obsolete!) aircraft yet they took 10,300 losses. 234% operational losses in other words. By 1943 with a deployed total of 16,000 aircraft assigned to active combat units that had reduced to 67%. That is a big change.

The Luftwaffe in Russia in 1941 had ~3,000 aircraft and took 2,800 losses. 93% losses. By 1943 that ratio has increased to 146%, also a big change.

That site thus not agree with you that the Soviet losses in '43 are a sign of success.

 

[Schweik]

The accuracy of aces and ekspertens claims can vary from the from the reasonabbly accurate to the wildly inaccurate, with the majority probably somewhere in between, imo tending towards the less accurate. This then naturally also applies to the score of the fighter units and their claims to losses ratios.
Without anything more tangible than that, it's difficult to say how well the P-39 performed for the Soviets; better than what the Western Allies did with it, no doubt, but that's not really a difficult record to beat.

While I can't disagree with anything you said categorically, the implication here is that you can take dozens of Soviet Aces who scored say 20 or more victories (and they had a lot of those - for others reading the thread look here for a taste) could theoretically be reduced down to nothing. But somebody shot down 3,000 German aircraft in 1943 and 11,000 in total on the Russian Front during the war. No doubt many of those were lost to winter conditions, accidents and other vagaries of war, but a lot of them were in fact shot down.

Your implication is that the Soviet claims system is so distorted that we can assume that 50 or more Aces with large victory tallies can be effectively reduced to zero actual victories. I don't believe that. It might be 2/3 it might be 1/2, but some percentage of those victories were real. The very fact that most of these guys survived the war tells you something.

In other words, yes of course claims are inflated, but what you are implying stretches beyond the plausible, through the credible and into flat earth territory.

 

[Schweik]

That site thus not agree with you that the Soviet losses in '43 are a sign of success.

You do know who won and who lost WW2, right?

Do you or do you not acknowledge that non combat related operational losses for 16,000 aircraft* flying sorties nearly every day are going to be higher than for 2,000 aircraft flying every day?

*This number of course is just the TO&E, through the course of 1943 it was probably closer to 25,000 aircraft, adding in the losses, who flew on the Soviet side and 5,000 on the Luftwaffe side.

 

[fubar57]

Soviet top Aces of WWII rating

 

[Schweik]

If you look at that list of Soviet Aces just posted by Fubar57 and myself, you certainly do see a lot of P-39s in the top reaches.

I would also add, if the Luftwaffe had suffered the same number of losses as the Soviets in 1943 (11,000) with only 2,000 planes deployed, that would represent a catastrophic 550% loss rate which would be beyond belief. It would mean on average total replacement of every unit 5 times through the year, or roughly every ten weeks. That is truly unsustainable.

As it was, with 146% losses, it was pretty grim for the Luftwaffe that year.

Of course in the next two years they were probably looking back on 1943 like it was the good old days...

 

[Dimlee]

The Soviets had 16,657 of which they lost 11,200. That is a loss rate of roughly 67% of operational aircraft

I don't know the exact breakdown of Soviet losses for the year off hand, but I bet if you drill down into it you'll observe the following:

• A high number are from operational losses - maintenance, accidents etc. probably 30-40% depending on the season.
• Of the remainder i.e. combat losses, a high number are of ground attack aircraft.
• And of the rest, fighter and bomber losses, a high number of those are on ground attack missions.

11,246 losses of VVS in 1943 are only combat losses of only combat aircraft.
I can not find the figure of the losses "total, for all reasons" or "non-combat" in 1943 but there is general assumption that combat losses were from 50% to 65% of total (for all reasons).

In 1943:

VVS RKKA (Army) combat losses by types:
bombers 940
sturmoviks 3,515
fighters 4,642
other 446
Other services, combat losses without breakdown by types:
Long Range 516
PVO 278
Navy 909

VVS RKKA (Army) combat losses by reasons:
Air/air 3,905
AAA 2,234
On the airfields 239
"Did not return from the combat assignment" (exact official wording) 3,122

Source:
"Soviet aviation in Great Patriotic War in numbers"
ВВС в цифрах
ВОЕННАЯ ЛИТЕРАТУРА --[ Военная история ]-- Советская авиация в Великой Отечественной войне 1941-1945 гг. в цифрах
Published in 1962 by VVS HQ. Declassified in 1990s.

 

[Dimlee]

Novikov issued orders to that effect from April'42 and they were never rescinded. Shooting down German a/c was a "nice to have" bonus that VVS would avail themselves, if the opportunity presented itself but it was not something the VVS went after as a priority. for them, the priority was influencing the ground battle and ensuring ones own strike aircraft were able to survive long enough to carry out that function

Yes...and no.
From 1943 and on certain VVS units were assigned exclusively with the task of "free hunting". 9th GIAP began to do that in May 1943. Alexander Pokryshkin was one of the most famous proponents and practitioners.

 

[Schweik]

11,246 losses of VVS in 1943 are only combat losses of only combat aircraft.
I can not find the figure of the losses "total, for all reasons" or "non-combat" in 1943 but there is general assumption that combat losses were from 50% to 65% of total (for all reasons).

In 1943:

VVS RKKA (Army) combat losses by types:
bombers 940
sturmoviks 3,515
fighters 4,642
other 446
Other services, combat losses without breakdown by types:
Long Range 516
PVO 278
Navy 909

VVS RKKA (Army) combat losses by reasons:
Air/air 3,905
AAA 2,234
On the airfields 239
"Did not return from the combat assignment" (exact official wording) 3,122

Source:
"Soviet aviation in Great Patriotic War in numbers"
ВВС в цифрах
ВОЕННАЯ ЛИТЕРАТУРА --[ Военная история ]-- Советская авиация в Великой Отечественной войне 1941-1945 гг. в цифрах
Published in 1962 by VVS HQ. Declassified in 1990s.

Ok fair enough. Some percentage of the ~3,000 FTR were presumably due to non-combat reasons, though no way to tell how many.

The rest fits the pattern I think. Do fighter losses include planes like I-153 flying CAS missions?

 

[nuuumannn]

From what you say, was the much respected Brown talking about Swordfish use ASW from difficult Escort Carriers or use against daylight heavily protected targets like Bismark from a main line Carrier like Ark Royal?

Not specifically. Here's what he says. This first quote is his opening on the Swordfish chapter:

"Had I been unaware, in 1940, that the Fairey Swordfish shipboard torpedo bomber was still very much a part of the Royal Navy's first-line aircraft inventory, I feel sure my reaction on first encountering this unlovely example of aeronautical archaism early in that year would have been one of sheer disbelief that the Fleet Air Arm could have actually been endeavouring to fight a war with so anachronistic a piece of hardware!"

His closing statement from the same chapter:

"I would not detract from the great actions in which the Swordfish participated, nor especially from the gallant aircrew who fought these actions, but the hard fact is that these aircrew should never have been exposed to such danger in equipment so ancient in concept and I cannot believe that a more technologically advanced aircraft could not have done as well or even better."

 

[nuuumannn]

The treasury was springing for a host of competing programs. Perhaps too many and spreading development teams too thin. It may not have sunk in that retracting landing gear, high speed monoplanes with flaps (of different sorts) and other moving parts (bomb bay doors, etc) took just a few more hours to design than a fixed gear biplane with few other moving parts (sarcasm)

I would certainly agree with this. The sheer number of new specifications for new aircraft types that emerged in the second half of the 30s was almost like the British were attempting to play catch-up, but the slow pace of industry forced into new advances in technology and materials meant things took much longer than anticipated. I also would like to use this number of new specifications for military hardware as an example of how the British heeded the warnings about Hitler's Germany despite Chamberlain's Peace-in-our-time. When the Hurricane was ordered for example, the order for 600 examples was the largest single order for an aeroplane type in British aviation history to that date.

Nevertheless, the gestation period for newer more modern types was lengthy. Almost every aspect of operating these aircraft required changing, from maintenance to ground and air training and logistics. Airfields needed construction and or modification, access by road and rail was required; there was much to do. The fact that this happened before the outbreak of WW2 did help put Britain into a war footing that, although her armed forces was lumbered with obsolescent types and tactics by September 1939, meant that she was better prepared than perhaps she might have been had this effort not transpired.

 

[Stig1207]

You do know who won and who lost WW2, right?

I do actually, but thoughtful of you to ask.

I would also add, if the Luftwaffe had suffered the same number of losses as the Soviets in 1943 (11,000) with only 2,000 planes deployed, that would represent a catastrophic 550% loss rate which would be beyond belief. It would mean on average total replacement of every unit 5 times through the year, or roughly every ten weeks. That is truly unsustainable.

11000 is a higher number than 3000, do you agree? As can be seen from Dimlee's reply, the number of Soviet aircraft lost in air-air combat 1943 is in the region of 30-35%, which seems to me is a relatively normal proportion of total combat losses.

 

[Stig1207]

While I can't disagree with anything you said categorically, the implication here is that you can take dozens of Soviet Aces who scored say 20 or more victories (and they had a lot of those - for others reading the thread look here for a taste) could theoretically be reduced down to nothing. But somebody shot down 3,000 German aircraft in 1943 and 11,000 in total on the Russian Front during the war. No doubt many of those were lost to winter conditions, accidents and other vagaries of war, but a lot of them were in fact shot down.

Your implication is that the Soviet claims system is so distorted that we can assume that 50 or more Aces with large victory tallies can be effectively reduced to zero actual victories. I don't believe that. It might be 2/3 it might be 1/2, but some percentage of those victories were real. The very fact that most of these guys survived the war tells you something.

In other words, yes of course claims are inflated, but what you are implying stretches beyond the plausible, through the credible and into flat earth territory.

I did in fact write aces and eksperten so my comment applies in general, to aces of all airforces. Just as most IAP's, GIAP's, FG's, Sqd's, JG's, LeLv's and so on all probably have a high claims to losses ratio.

None of that really tells us a lot of how successful a given ace, or unit or a specific fighter was other than perhaps as a 'ballpark' indication.

 

[Dimlee]

Ok fair enough. Some percentage of the ~3,000 FTR were presumably due to non-combat reasons, though no way to tell how many.

The rest fits the pattern I think. Do fighter losses include planes like I-153 flying CAS missions?

Most probably they do. In that document "Sturmovik" category included only Il-2 and Il-10.
R-5s, R-10s were included into "reconnaisance" or "others".

 

[bbear]

I just want to clarify my contribution.

From 1st principles: Until shown otherwise all elements o] air power or air activity contribute EQUALLY to any given outcome.
That is any airframe manufactured, any operation, deployment, sortie, command decision or other category member contributes EQUALLY to the Axis defeat. AXis ad Ally alike.

Overlolrd, Barbarossa, Eclipse : the same
Spitfire P51 IL2,, Ju 87, Me 262, Boulton Paul Defiant: the same
Operation Chastise, 1st and 2nd Schweinfurt Raid, Bodenplatte : the same
Jubilee, Market Garden, Varsity, : the same
Taking of Warsaw, Antwerp, attempt on Stalingrad : the same

To me, that's the only rational start point

 

[Reluctant Poster]

The British had a real problem bringing aircraft from the "requirement" stage to the production/service use stage.

The requirement/specification for the Albacore was issued in 1936. It took until Dec 1938 to get a prototype into the air and until March of 1940 to start delivering production examples to a service squadron. It didn't serve on a carrier deck until Nov 1940.

The Fairey Barracuda was built to specification S.24/37 which was issued in 1937 but the first Barracuda prototype didn't fly until Dec 1940. It was this specification that the Supermarine 322 was built to satisfy.

The treasury was springing for a host of competing programs. Perhaps too many and spreading development teams too thin. It may not have sunk in that retracting landing gear, high speed monoplanes with flaps (of different sorts) and other moving parts (bomb bay doors, etc) took just a few more hours to design than a fixed gear biplane with few other moving parts (sarcasm)

I would note as far as the Navy goes, most other major navies were in the same situation. The 1939 US Navy had a very high percentage of old ships, their 8 in gun cruisers excepted. , the French also had a fair portion of scrap yard escapees. In some cases the sailors on French or Italian "modern" ships might have been better off on WW I leftovers.

I would note again ( I have already made this argument in another thread) that in 1936-37 the British had no carriers with both the speed and flight deck lengths of the American carriers and in fact had 3 carriers that weren't much bigger than WW II escort carriers (and topped out at about 25kts) so asking for a superzoomy monoplane torpedo bomber might mean that 3 out your 7 carriers couldn't use it. Stall speed of the Albacore is given as 54mph ?
Peace time landing and take-off requirements being a bit different than war time. Please note the US had lost almost 30 Douglas Devastators out of 129 built from first issue until Dec 1941 in peace time accidents.

I don't think that all British firms had problems. As examples deHaviland and Avro seemed to do as well as any American company. Unfortunately the Fleet Arm Arm didn't get the A Team.

Fairey also had management issues and was reorganized mid war. To quote the Ministry of Air Production: "Nothing has held up the production of the Barracuda and Firefly except inefficient management." In addition the Fleet Air Arm received lower priority during the battle of Britain which did have an impact on production of new types.

The other thing that people tend to forget is that the USN was still taking delivery of biplanes in 1941. The last biplanes were taken out of carrier service early in 1942 (naturally the Marines kept theirs longer). The USN actually introduced 2 biplane models after the Swordfish entered service, around the same time as the Albacore.
It is fashionable to mock the British and their antiqued aircraft but the reality is that if the US had entered the war in September 1939 the USN would be fielding more biplanes than monoplanes, including all of their fighters as well as their scouts.

 

[Shortround6]

Avro Manchester, requirement issued in May 1936, first flight 25 July 1939, officially entered service Nov 1940. First operation Feb 1941.

Granted the B-24 project may have been speedy even by US standards.
Consolidated was approached by the Army in 1938 about being a 2nd source for B-17s (or so the story goes) but decided they can do better. IN Jan 1939 they pitch their idea to the Army and the army encourages them to proceed (even though no money may have changed hands), Consolidated cobbles together some sort of mock up in less than a month, In feb 1939 the army issues a specification covering the proposal and in March they sign a contract covering one prototype. in the months that follow several additional contracts are placed (essentially off the drawing board) bit the Prototype flies for the first time Dec 29 1939 meeting the letter of the contract by one day.
British take delivery of their first Liberator (no turbos) in March of 1941. With no turbos and no self sealing tanks they are assigned to long range transport work. But that is about 2 1/2 years from work starting ( Consolidated thinking they could beat Boeing at the 4 engine bomber game) and planes entering limited service vs 4 1/2 years for the Avro Manchester.

as for the US navy you are part right. The Navy did have about 100 Vought Vindicators in 1939 which were monoplanes the last time I checked.

 

[Reluctant Poster]

Avro Manchester, requirement issued in May 1936, first flight 25 July 1939, officially entered service Nov 1940. First operation Feb 1941.

Granted the B-24 project may have been speedy even by US standards.
Consolidated was approached by the Army in 1938 about being a 2nd source for B-17s (or so the story goes) but decided they can do better. IN Jan 1939 they pitch their idea to the Army and the army encourages them to proceed (even though no money may have changed hands), Consolidated cobbles together some sort of mock up in less than a month, In feb 1939 the army issues a specification covering the proposal and in March they sign a contract covering one prototype. in the months that follow several additional contracts are placed (essentially off the drawing board) bit the Prototype flies for the first time Dec 29 1939 meeting the letter of the contract by one day.
British take delivery of their first Liberator (no turbos) in March of 1941. With no turbos and no self sealing tanks they are assigned to long range transport work. But that is about 2 1/2 years from work starting ( Consolidated thinking they could beat Boeing at the 4 engine bomber game) and planes entering limited service vs 4 1/2 years for the Avro Manchester.

as for the US navy you are part right. The Navy did have about 100 Vought Vindicators in 1939 which were monoplanes the last time I checked.[/QUOTE

Indeed the USN did have Vindicators. I should have clarified that the dive bomber squadrons were equipped with them ( and Northrop BT-1s), while the scouting squadrons were equipped with biplanes. Regardless the biplanes outnumbered the monoplanes.