Delcyros:
While I do get your point very clearly I think you are not putting your stuff together here.
Let´s put the focus where it helps:
(a) The airforce of any nation, can not grow a professionally organized and skilled branch a mere 2 years year after taking the kind of blow the VVS did from June 22, 1941 until virtually early 1943.
See the losses of the VVS during the cauldron at Kursk, July 5th 1943, -the soviet propaganda claims such battle to have been the time when them russians "defeated the Luftwaffe for good"- and you might understand what i am talking about. If losing nearly 400 combat planes to enemy fighter only during the first day of the offensive is not a helpful hint so be it.
With point (a) i am trying to say the soviet version of a "superb" soviet air force in 1944 is a tale. Yup, some capable fighters were being fielded and there were a fistful of excellent red pilots.
However, the bulk of the soviet airmen were undertrained and hastily sent to the fronts where the continue to perish by the thousands in 1944 and 1945.
(b) Soviet propaganda worked hardly processing the news of victory in Stalingrad. That the Werhmacht got defeated in Stalingrad is true; the same did not happen in the air though, where the Luftwaffe inflicted breath taking losses to the VVS. It was the winter that hindered the Luftwaffe fighter and bomber support in the area.
That does not put down at all the effort of the soviet soldiers that ended in the destruction of the 6th army there; they simply took advantage of the foolishness of the German high command and won the battle. A very valid point.
A different thing is to come and say that just like in the ground, your guys in the clouds had managed to "defeat" the Luftwaffe. The VVS never came nowhere near defeating the Luftwaffe in the Stalingrand-Don bend region.
(c) The efforts conducted by General Aleksandr Novikov to reorganize command, training and structure of the VVS have been overinflated.
The Kuban air battles of 1943 are a clear example: the VVS proved uncapable of gaining air superiority over the area; the Luftwaffe simply retreated from the area when the front in southern Ukraine began crumbling.
(d) Losses of combat planes for the VVS -to all causes- in 1945 only (january 1st-may 9) amounter +/- 11,000 machines. Does that tell you something delcyros?
While i do not have any stats at hand, i ve been told the highest casualty rate due to accidents belongs to the soviet comrades.
(e) Now, i introduce you a soviet phrase, common in soldiers of the 1944-45 period:
Enemy number one is in Moscow.
Enemy number two is the VVS.
Enemy number three is the hatred Germany.