German overclaims in the East. Hartmann and others...
 

Hi, Everybody!

I would like to add my "five cents" to this protracted discussion on Hartmann. Surely Khazanov's article is week enough to be subjected to harsh critics. But, I actually, don't see any constructive side in the attacks by Jean-Yves Lorant and Hans Ring, since they don't have any reliable information from Soviet side.
First of all, I tried in vain to find out what is more or less tangible list of Hartmann's victories. I have two of them, one from Tony Wood's files, the other from article on Hartmann in REVI magazine, has it's origins, if I'am not mistaken, in Bernd Barbas's research work. Who could explain me what of these two are more trustworthy, as they differ a lot in terms of dates, number and types of shot down planes? How can one compare such a "phantom" with the opposite side's documents if, for example, I take one list for one day when Hartmann claimed four Aircobras and on the other list there were La-5s in quantity of three or there were no claims at all...

Second in this is that one should take each pilot and try to trace his career through all the war with the broad use of Soviet documents. Only then there will be a reliable picture of possible overclaiming or on the contrary the author could prove almost all of the victories by the pilot at issue (as it happened in case with Alfred Grislawski). Unfortunatelly, all German pilots biographies are week when it comes to show what their adversaries come around, exept maybe the recent "Graf-Grislawski" book.

The last, but not least lies in the character of pilot and the fact if he was made a hero by the propaganda. My experience as compilator of German records with Soviet TsAMO material notifies that victories of many "middle ranked" German pilots are vastly concur with loss lists of VVS RKKA. On the contrary, some outstanding successes, especially "one day scores" of "highly-ranked" aces met no evidence in Soviet operational documents. There are lots of examples, completely ungrounded are successes of Lang, Rudorrfer, Nowotny in one day. Special investigation, I think, should be launched on Nowotny's "Great four", signs of many of their victories could not be found in TsAMO and TsVMA. Another aspect here is famous chase for 100th, 150th etc. victory mark. Christer Bergstrom partially hinted on this fact in "G-G" by showing that Graf's 200th victory was virtual. According to documents of 8 VA and 102 IAD PVO, I could draw a coclusion that with the arrival of the mixed bang from III/JG52 to the Stalingrad sector German overclaiming skyrocketed up to three claims to one lost Soviet plane, while it was approximately 1,5 to 1 for the rest of August 1942. The same situation with the 100th victory by Anton Hackl, who claimed Pe-2 on August 3, 1942. Accounts of 2 VA and 15 VA show that no Pe-2s were lost that day...etc.etc.
From the opposite side there is surprising coherence in Gunther Shack's, Hans Beisswenger's or Heinrich Jung's victories...

Regards.

Re: German overclaims in the East. Hartmann and others...
 

Dear Nikita,

Many thanks for your comments about Luftwaffe overclaims in the East. I believe you should use Tony Wood´s listing as base for your further research as they should be the transcription of the original RLM microfilms. However, there is another problem especially with III./JG 52: since approximately March 1943 they apparently did not care very much about the identification of their shot down opponents - almost every claimed Soviet-built fighter was referred to simply as "LaGG" (I guess the intelligence officer of this Gruppe had apparently a very strange sense of humour). For example in the period between March 1943 and August 1944 III./JG 52 claimed approximately 900 "LaGGs", some 250 Airacobras and only some 20 Yaks of various versions. A somewhat funny fact is that they also claimed 21 Spitfires (more Spits than Yaks claimed by an Eastern Front unit during a period of one and half year undoubtedly raises some questions and doubts.....)

All the best,

Ota

Re: German overclaims in the East. Hartmann and others...
 

the allied airmen had a much comfortable task to indentify german planes which they have met in combat .
fighters: most of the time 109 or 190 .

if i take günther ralls claimlist , according to his book, most of his victims were flying La 5 or LaGG3.


one of my fellow countryman said in another forum, günther rall lies about his claims, because in the sector he was flying , there were much more yaks than la5 .
but i guess, for the most airmen ,it was not important to know the accurate ac type.
but we do :) .

Re: German overclaims in the East. Hartmann and others...
 

Hi, Ota!

Yes, this is unclear moment. I, personally, found some cases when "Lagg" could turn to be Aircobra, Yak, or even ground assault Il-2... This is the problem with II/JG52 as well.

Regards!

Re: German overclaims in the East. Hartmann and others...
 

Dear Nikita,

I as one of two authors of Hartmann artical in REVI can say that "our" claim list is copy of Bernd Barbas research.
But today Tony Wood files seems to be much more correct and sometimes different at least till late 1944.
For 1945 the Bernd´s list is still only reliable source.
I would be happy to hear Bernd´s opinion about it.

However there are still many victories missing in Tony Wood files, especially those submitted by Schlachtguppen.

I duly agree with your opinion about strange claims of SOME of the experts. This could be confirmed even by living members of their squadrons. I made this experience personally with JG 54 members.

JG 27 had similar problem at least once (F. Sawallisch Schwarm, see Prien JG 27 book) and it was evaluated by military court.

Slovak squadron in JG 52 had also such problem with two pilots. But also Finnish Air Force seems to have some "skilled" individuals in this way.

IMHO: there was extreme sensitivity inside of german squadrons for correct procedure of claim submittals.

I also read that Hartmann was under suspiction, but Kommodore made very smart step. He took the doubtful pilot and placed him as Hartmann´s wingman. I think that it was Hrabak. Good manager indeed.

Re: German overclaims in the East. Hartmann and others...
 

Thanks a lot Nikita for the info You gave.

Rudorffer’s case is rather well known and I have been long time skeptical on Lang’s Nov 3rd record, it’s timing was so perfect for German propaganda machine. Of course it could have been a pure coincidence, but anyway that kind of coincidences made one suspious. Also Caldwell in his JG 26 War Diary writes that Lang, who he recognises as a great combat leader and a great fighter pilot, tended to exaggerate his claims.


I also think that in the end much depends on the personality of the claimant, his integrity and ability to remain cool and to be able to observe the situation objectively under great stress. The self-confidence, which is an important element to a fighter pilot in a way works against objective assessment of his own actions. And of course very important is the nature of actions. It's much easier to claim accurately against lonely recon a/c than in big fighter vs fighter combats, especially if one's side is the underdog.

Juha

Re: German overclaims in the East. Hartmann and others...
 

Hi, Jan!

Thanks a lot, I will surely rely on TW's files. And in case with 1945, IMHO, nothing could be done yet till we have incomplete victory and loss lits for Luftwaffe.

Yes, I have heard something of this sort. It was Obleser, if I am not mistaken, who questioned Hartmann's tally...

Re: German overclaims in the East. Hartmann and others...
 

>the allied airmen had a much comfortable task to indentify german planes which they have met in combat .
fighters: most of the time 109 or 190 .<
>Yes, this is unclear moment. I, personally, found some cases when "Lagg" could turn to be Aircobra, Yak, or even ground assault Il-2... This is the problem with II/JG52 as well.<

look at all those 100s of He100 & 113 that are in various Allied claim lists.
misinterpretation was often very common in air combats on all sites when the pilots move with 500km/h and more and have to keep an eye also on the overall situation.

I think it is quite fair to say that there is an 25% error margin for each ace on all fronts. But also keep in mind that several German pilots had many never credited claims/victories especially in 1945.

It would be very interesting to see a statistic with losses / claims / etc unit-wise like the lists that John Alcorn presented about BoB in the magazine Aeroplane in 2000 while cross-checking with other sources.

Re: German overclaims in the East. Hartmann and others...
 

I do not think any reliable picture of combats of German airmen is possible. The reason is simple - lack of German narratives and combat reports. Place and location is just not enough and may lead to serious mistakes.

The question is if records of VA level are accurate enough. Personally I doubt it and would not draw any definite conclusions without checking documents of eg. AP level.

I would just sort all the claims as single and twin engined. It makes life much simplier.

I have mixed feelings concerning the article. Certainly interesting approach but the tables are more misleading than informative.

Re: German overclaims in the East. Hartmann and others...
 

Several years ago, a reader in another forum said that Hannu Voltonen researched available statistics and reported that Finnish and Luftwaffe pilots had inflated their aerial victories by (at least) 3 to 1 in 1944.

I have heard this author's name come up occasionally, but I don't know the specific reference source quoted from. Does Valtonen have anything available in English?

Re: German overclaims in the East. Hartmann and others...
 

Re: German overclaims in the East. Hartmann and others...
 

From article by Christer Bergström :
http://www.elknet.pl/acestory/hartm/hartm1.htm

The sudden steep rise in "Bubi" Hartmann's success rate created suspicion among several other fighter pilots. One of them was Lt. Fritz Obleser, a twenty-year-old Austrian who had joined JG 52 a couple of months after Hartmann. Obleser also had achieved a large number of victories, and he found it hard to believe that another relative newcomer could rise to such level in such a short space of time. So Obleser asked the Gruppenkommandeur if he was allowed to fly a mission with Hartmann, and he received permission to do so. Hartmann and Obleser took off from Novo-Zaporozhye at 1200 hours on 1 October 1943. As they returned fifty-five minutes later, Obleser admitted that his earlier suspicions toward Hartmann had been unfounded; he had personally witnessed how Hartmann had blown two La-5s out of the sky in a matter of minutes.
---------------------------------------------------------------


I have following infos about Experten claims
Walter Wolfrum - 177 claims including 40 reject (177/40)
Walter Schuck 236/30
Peter Duttmann 194/42
Johannes Wiese 208/75
Walter Nowotny 280/22

Re: German overclaims in the East. Hartmann and others...
 

In my opinion it's quite clear that Hartmanns claims are several times too high.

Following indices (not prooves) speaks for this.

1.) From July 1943 up to the end of war, there were no longer eyewitnesses needed to confirm a kill. Instead of, the kills should be checked "after the war". But this is the time made most of his kills.

2.) Already in 1942 german Pilots like Graf and Dickfeld overclaimed several times.
some examples:
13.5.1942 Luftwaffe claimed 65 kills, of these 42 belonged to JG-52; but VVS lost in reality only 20 planes.
14.5.1942 claimes by III/JG-52 47 kills,
out of these were: Graf 6 kills; Grislawski 2 MiG-3; Dickfeld 9 kills.
Indeed VVS lost 14 planes; 5 Yak-1, 2 Il2-2; 4 LaGG-3 and some biplanes.

4.) Günther Rall fights at least one of Hartmanns claims, described in Tolliver/Constable.

5.) Hartmanns was highly interested to become a hero (not such a untypical behaviour for fighterpilots), which gave him also not a well reputation by his comrads.

6.) In accordance to 5.) Hartmann everytime has his best days, when he was "close" to the 200 or 300 kill border ;).

7.) In accordance to 6.), when Hartmann reached the 300th kill, he was awarded with the diamonds next day. No "long and strict confirmation procedure" was suddenly needed.

Re: German overclaims in the East. Hartmann and others...
 

Hello again, Six Nifty .50s
I took a little time and checked a newer book, Kalevi Keskinen's and Kari Stenman's LeR 3. Suomen Ilmavoimien Historia 18. Loviisa 2001. ISBN 951-98751-1-5. LeR 3 was the Finnish AF fighter formation which fought over Karelia Isthmus in June 1944. One of the appendix in the book gives all the claims of the sqns belonging to the LeR 3 with the info of the victim's unit if the match is found from Russian documents. And they have found the match in 1:2.22 cases, if I counted right. I only checked timeframe 6.6. - 30.6.44. I don't know if the researcher, who has done the archivial research in Russian archives, has found more matches after the book went to print.

HTH
Juha

Re: German overclaims in the East. Hartmann and others...
 

Re: German overclaims in the East. Hartmann and others...
 

I feel all fighter pilots from all nations overclaim. It is hard to say, we where not there. In a large scale hot fight a couple good hits on an enemy plane you would probably call it a kill. Now a quick high G turn to check your own butt, now search out another enemy plane. Do it all over again. I dont think it is realy fare to question the integrity of these great warriors of any nation. As for claims of type, in the Pacific War just about every Japanese fighter shot down was called a Zeke. Lets be careful, to publicly question these men might stop them from answering our questions. I have written to a few German fighter pilots that had stopped talking about the war because of this type of thing. We may only have a few years left to get the story from them. I would rather trust their memories than somone who has never flown in combat and was not there.

Re: German overclaims in the East. Hartmann and others...
 

I agree here with Franek.

Based on excerpts from the VVS' 5th Air Army documents I received, the amount of detail included in them is not enough for an accurate individual breakdown of victories and losses.

Also, the enemy airplane recognition skills of many Axis (and Allied, for that matter) pilots was rather questionable, so I would also stick to: single engine fighter/fighter bomber, twin engine bomber/reconnaissance, etc. categories.

Claims of historians that a certain pilot X who claimed Y number of Z type of aircraft and there was none of those lost that day in that area thus pilot X was lying is not scholarly enough (moreover, it gives a feeling that that particular author did not actually want to find a possible match for the researched pilot's claims)...

Re: German overclaims in the East. Hartmann and others...
 

Hi, Denes!

I can partially agree with you. One, surely could not find out who shot down who basing only on 5 VA documents. But, I have notes almost through all levels of documents, starting from IAPs to VA. Comparing it with time, place and altitude in TW lists it is not so difficult to figure out at least which units participated in a particular combat. This method grows more complicated when it comes to match records during stiff battles as Kursk or some days of Kuban.

Regards.

Re: German overclaims in the East. Hartmann and others...
 

Hello!

Nikita, your comments prompted a question. Did VVS units keep war diary on the eskadrill level? As far as Finnish AF goes, the "juiciest" stories or comments can be found at the flight level (VVS eskadrill and Finnish lentue being more or less the same unit size). At higher level war diary entries are more general and dry.


Regards,
Kari

Re: German overclaims in the East. Hartmann and others...
 

Hi, Kari!

The main tactical unit in Soviet VVS was regiment, but not "escadrillya". However, there were some separate "escadrillias", the best document level one can find on the so called "regiment fund" in TsAMO. Unfortunatelly they are not always full. Our experience on fighters show that some 30-40% of IAP's funds are empty. So, the next step is "division fund" - documents of the division to which this regiment was subordinated during the war course. It mostly duplicate regimental operational documents. However, on the VA level all losses and victories are summerized, although not in the detailed form.

Regards,
Nikita.

Re: German overclaims in the East. Hartmann and others...
 

Gentlemen

Regarding the Hartmann/Obleser statement, it does is not true Obleser did not question Hartmann's claims, probably never flew together either.
There was almost a mutiny with the rest of Hartmann's staffel as they seem not to have been happy with him, though this could be his avoidance of anything other than high altitude combat. It does seem that Hartmann was ambicious and had worked out that the best way to be the best is to survive the longest, so cut out all the risks. However that doesn't mean is was making fraudulant claims, though most frauds followed a set pattern of huge daily claims, Hartmann certainly falls into this catogory! But you must have others to help you, nowotny had his schwarm, Rudorffer had Tangermann, also it would seem to be the leaders of the largest total i.e Wick to 50 Gollob to 150, Graf to 200, Nowotny to 250, so why not Hartmann? With Gollob he was making huge daily claims in 1942, yet on a day he flew with Viktor Petermann from another unit he had add only one, so perhaps this suggests opportunity. Also you must look at whole Geschwader JG5 in the East and JG2 in the West seem to have been the worst for wholesale overclaiming, though even then some amongst these remained honest. Hans-Joachim Marseille's claims seem at first glance fraudulent, but any of his that didn't actually come down(and most did) he thought they had come down, so he wasn't dis-honest only mistakes. Egon Mayer had a problem with Josef Wurmheller, who was a massive overclaimer, and not only looked like Marseille, but had the same huge ego, one turmed out to be a fraud, one honest, I nthink that Egon Mayer suspected Wurmheller of fraud! As Hartmann seemed unpopular perhaps he also was a fraud, personally I suspect that he was, but I do not actually know, I suspect that Rall, Barkhorn, Hrabak, Gratz, Trenkel and Obleser were honest. In the West the Luftwaffe authorities counted up the wreck sites, in the East the front was fluid, most claims were behind enemy lines, JG5's front was stable, but like JG2 most of there claims were over the sea. Also in the West the night fighters were more accurate, I don't think we can say they were more honest, I would say that with there cannons they more often than not set the enemy on fire, therefore are less likely to think they have shot one down when they havn't. Kurt Welter was a notorious fraudster, but most of these were when he was flying the single-seater Me262. The single engined night-fighters had the greatest difficulty in confirmations as they flew alone, had no crew members as witnesses, and other flew over cities where the flak could also have been responsible!
One final observation.....fraudsters seem to have there big days at notable points in there totals i.e around the 100, 150, 200 e.t.c mark!
Sad thing is that they kept the honest guys away from more deserving decorations!

Regards

Johannes

Re: German overclaims in the East. Hartmann and others...
 

Johannes,

Could you please deliberate what is "almost mutiny' agaist Hartmann in his staffel? Any details will be interesting.

Re: German overclaims in the East. Hartmann and others...
 

I think some people need to think more carefully about words like fraud.

In general over claiming increases proportionally to the intensity of combat and the distance from the own lines. A lot of fighting on the Eastern Front was close to the front line, and visible by eye witnesses from the ground.

Now many high score Jagdwaffe pilots in the West were proven to be near enough to the mark, or at least in tune to the overal over claiming for any particular campaign.

How does accusations of fraud stand in the light of Hartmann's long post war imprisonment by the Soviets.

Would a simple fraud and third reich glory seeker be given lead of the first Bundesluftwaffe fighter squadron?!

Does a character of fraud and medal hunting conform with said post war character of the professional soldier and his activities once retired?

I don't doubt that over claiming was part and parcel of the air war (but that doesn't include further blanket statements about the actual ratio of claims etc), but it takes far more convincing before you can call a particular claim fraudulent or even a clear over claim.

Re: German overclaims in the East. Hartmann and others...
 

I have to agree with Ruy. Trying attach motive to 'overclaiming' to anyone long passed away is an exercise in futility. We'll never know. We're talking about combat in the air with multiple pilots attacking the same targets from every direction in that environment, while trying to seek your next target and trying to be sure an enemy wasn't about to blow you away from above, below, either side or whatever. You didn't stare your target into the ground. If you did, you died. And the bottom line is, EVERYBODY OVERCLAIMED, the Lw, the RAF, the US, the Japanese, the Russians or whomever I left out. Get over it - expecting everything to match up exactly or for an individual's claims to be perfection when said individual was also trying not to be someone else's victory is inane. All that stuff transcribed by Tony or in any publication are CLAIMS, the fact that some governing body accepted them has as much to do with propaganda for the folks back home as their validity.

Re: German overclaims in the East. Hartmann and others...
 

The following may be speculative, but I find Hartmann’s 11 Victories on 24 Aug 44 to have be conducted under suspicious circumstances. The Third Reich had suffered its worst setbacks on both fronts. After two months of hard fighting, the Normandy front had collapsed with the Allies seizing a sizeable bag in the Falaise Pocket. Furthermore the East front had seriously and rapidly contracted during Operation Bagration, initiated by the Soviets shortly after D-day in June. This little known campaign resulted in the virtual destruction of the most formidable assemblage of German military might–Army Group Center. (The extent of the loss of territory as well (as some the encircled remnants of Wehrmacht units) is illustrated here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:BagrationMap2.jpg ). Let us not also forget the failed assassination attempt on Hitler!
A distraction seemed called for and –so what do you know- a PK unit appeared on the scene to record Hartmann’s 290th -301st victories –and this was all too conveniently wrapped up in one day possibly so everyone could get it over with; Nazi Germany now had a new ‘Babe Ruth Luftsiege King’ or -better yet- a ‘Bubi next door Uberhero’ to distract some from the harsh realities of a disastrous and unsalvageable war.

Re: German overclaims in the East. Hartmann and others...
 

Hi, all.

From time to time this issue 'spring to life' on this and other boards.

I like the approach Nikita has.

The discussion is however futile until ( if ever) it is possible to research the original documentation from all sides on a detailed level. The main reasons that this has not been done is two - a lot of RLM documentation on detailed level not selected for archiving and thus destroyed during the war, and the fact that availability to check in soviet records has been rather restricted.

We must also take into account that the regimes we are talking about are two of the largest propaganda machines of all time, .



Regards,
Andreas

Re: German overclaims in the East. Hartmann and others...
 

Hello
not being Hartmann specialist I have no firm opinion of his claim accuracy, only that “Blond knight” would have been most appropriate material for Göbbels‘ propaganda machine. But more generally.

1) not all overclaimed, vast majority of pilots who claimed victories overclaimed but not all. And the extent of overclaiming varied greatly, even inside units. IMHO vast majority of overclaiming was made in good faith in the heat of high tempo very dangerous actions but on the other hand some had more realistic view of the effect of their actions than others. Just claiming that everybody overclaim we simply closed our eyes from realities of human nature and in fact advance boastfulness and do disservice to those who were careful in their claims and so were often more forgotten than some of their more boastful comrades. But I agree that we must be careful in our conclusions because it is very difficult to dig out the truth in many cases.

2) On the other hand. pilots being humans, IMHO there is no doubt that some because of glory seeking/career advancement/competition between pilots might well sometimes “forgot” to mention in their combat report that the plane they claimed was already clearly very badly damaged. A few even went to fraud for ex. the "Expertenschwarm" of 4./JG 27. The risk of being exposed was not very great and the official punishment not necessary harsh. We don’t know for sure why Sawallisch got killed in a/c accident shortly after their fraud was exposed but Bendert, besides being sent to train new pilots, which he might or might not got as a punishment, got his Ritterkreutz for his troubles. Harsh, isn’t it. But that goes to at least most of AFs, in all successes bought medal, career advancements, glory etc not only to the pilot but also to his unit and so also to its CO. So if the CO begun suspect that one of his “stars” was in fact overclaiming badly he might well try to solve the problem inside his unit and not report his suspicions to upper echelons.

3) Then there was the propaganda aspect. I have always been rather sceptical for “Bully” Lang’s world record on kills per day because it just happened to happen just before the day when one of the most humiliating defeat of WM happened and just in right place, namely in Kiev which Soviets retook/liberated almost without fight after Vatutin had completely outfoxed Mannstein. What a coincident, Göbbels could put on main pages the headline that a glorious LW pilot single handled shot down 18 “Red…..” planes and put somewhere else a small news that “by a brilliant tactical manoeuvre WM succeeded to disengage from Kiev”. I don’t doubt that Lang shot down a number of Soviet planes on that day but 18, timing is a bit too good for my liking. So I wasn’t surprised when Caldwell wrote in his JG 26 WD Vol 2 that while an excellent Kommandeur (of II/JG 26) he also had tendency to overclaim. So I’m not claiming that Lang was frauding his claims IMHO he was simply overclaiming but that when his 18 claims on 3 Nov 43 were accepted there might well being some propagandist element in it.

Juha

Re: German overclaims in the East. Hartmann and others...
 

Definitely, the mentioned 11 Hartmann claims were already "confirmed" by Propagandakomapnie and the GröFaZ himself. And looking at H.'s claimlist one can definitely say that he was not as heroic as many "Sturmovik- and Bomberkillers".

But who can judge on that? His advantage was: He survived.

Anyway, I would not say that the Bundeluftwaffe looked into Hartmann "frauding" or not, that was a different time then now, the whole democratic Germany was full of Ex-3rd-Reich people in high positions. They needed good people as well as "Aushängeschilder".

Overcaliming itself is definitely something personal (frauding also), as it also happens in todays world:
Some humans are selling themselves as "expensive" as they can, others do not want/need this. One more (very small) group even makes up some stories about their successes, but they are definitely a minority and I guess they were also back then.

==>
1) I think overclaiming is stronger in some pilots/persons then in others
2) I would not call them liars, but over-optimistic (also keep in mind their age: 90% = 20-25...)
3) I don't know what is the sense in identifying THE overclaimers in VVS, Lw, USAAF, ...
EDIT: Can anyone answer point 3 please?

Re: German overclaims in the East. Hartmann and others...
 

1) Agreed.
2) Agreed but also they were people trying to make sense (in retrospect, full of adrenalin, amazed to still be alive) of a series of fleeting impressions. Our minds do try to put all these memory fragments together into a coherent story.
3) Only that historians try to establish what actually happened and a lot of the stories/reputations that became established do not stand up to examination. But frankly, if Hartmann only shot down 10% of his claims, he was still a highly successful fighter pilot.

There's also something about incentives to overclaim in different air forces' approaches to medals/promotions. Some may have made the problem worse.

P.S. A lot of my research makes me suspect that the Luftwaffe verification process wasn't always followed to the letter.

Re: German overclaims in the East. Hartmann and others...
 

I see a lot of speculation, but hardly any foundation.

So certain that in response to defeat A, propaganda victory B was executed.

The simple fact that Nazi Germany thrived on propaganda means that all these claims must be seen in that light.

I disagree.

That doesn't mean that there is an element of wanting to create heroes, but there is a difference of intent. To what extend this wishful thinking differed from the other combattants, or was worse than the other combattants is arguable. Only the high claim numbers differ and that must be seen within a proper context.

There is a big difference between numbers fed to the public and those that are official. The Volkische Beobachter would have been the tool of propaganda, but not the regular claim's system.

Today we say that Marseille's claims are legit, but not long ago people like Johnny Johnson called it Nazi Propaganda. Marseille is not alone with having plus 100 claims that seem to be reasonably accurate.

In the east those figures seem to fall apart, but do we have access to all the Soviet figures?

We easily dismiss German claims, but also dismiss that not little part of the fighting was witnessed by friendly ground forces, since the Luftwaffe was playing fire fighter for most of the time in direct support of the troops.

So if the claim for type A isn't correct, we shouldn't dismiss that type D might have been shot up. That perhaps the damage to type D was reported a day later or whatever.

I find the claim that some of the Jagdwaffe claims to be directly related to some defeat to be pretty far fetched.

Re: German overclaims in the East. Hartmann and others...
 

good points .. and of course it wasn't followed at all from some time during January 1945, when Hartmann had, what, a 'mere' 280-odd vics....I blame Alfred Price - and the chapter on the validity of Jagdwaffe claims process in his old 'Luftwaffe handbook'. 'Claims' are basically worthless unless there is a corresponding loss.

But then on the other hand we can hardly blame Hartmann for all those fantasy artworks with the '352' rudder marking. It seems to me that much of the 'propaganda' occurred post-war ..at the height of the Cold War..

Re: German overclaims in the East. Hartmann and others...
 

Hello Ruy
Quote: ” We easily dismiss German claims…”

We? I have not seen anybody here to dismiss German claims easily. I have no doubt that some 100 highest scorers of WWII were all LW fighter pilots. What I don’t know is was Hartmann the top scorer or not. Barkhorn seems to have usually been a reliable claimer, so if his claims were say 80% accurate and Hartmann’s 60% accurate, which in fact wasn’t bad claim accuracy, Hartmann isn’t anymore the number one in actual kills. I can easily believe that Hartmann was among the 20 most successful fighter pilots of all times but what was the actual number of his kills, who knows. There may be some gaps in Soviet loss figures but we know that Soviet researchers have more easily found matches to the claims of some German aces than to claims of some others. Nowotny seemed to have been very unreliable claimer at the beginning of his career, how accurate he was later, I have no exact info. There seems to have also been problems with a number of Hartmann’s claim but on that I don’t have any exact info either.

On Lang’s 18 accepted claims on 3 Nov 43. Now he was leading all volunteer lonely schwarm fighting all alone from Kiev airfield, during next night the small band were hiding from marauding Soviet T-34s and their tank-riders in the ruins. Add to that that he overclaimed later during Normandy fighting. And of course Göbbels' machine made on Lang front page stories in weeks to come, after all Winter 43/44 wasn’t the most successful time for 3rd Reich. But IMHO the most important thing in Lang's military career was that he was a very good leader of his men not that how much he overclaim.

And the the "Expertenschwarm" of 4./JG 27 and how Edu Neumann handled the case are facts. But as I wrote, overclaiming wasn’t a German phenomenon but universal.

Hello FalkeEins

yes, in 50s there was a great need on "Good Germans" because West-Germany was wanted to be integrated into West and into NATO.

Juha

Re: German overclaims in the East. Hartmann and others...
 

I admit that there is one thing that concerns me with this thread and that is the fixation on one person and nation. There is little doubt in my mind that the vast majority of claims were made with the best intentions and equally that some individuals of all nations went the extra step to boost their own scores with the active encouragement of what we would now call the Spin Doctors.

What does encourage me is the reaction of other pilots to those that went shall we say, the extra mile. That is of course almost contept. I have read about American, British, German and Japanese pilots who spoke with bitterness about such pilots. Unfortunately these comments don't get much publicity as the papers of the time wanted the 'good news' stories.

Re: German overclaims in the East. Hartmann and others...
 

FalkeEins - on a slightly different tangent to this discussion, I have researched very thoroughly several battles from 8th Bomber and Fighter Commands perspective, and two that you may be interested in.

Contact me via PM to send me an email contact so that I can send you November 26 in particular - for the battle over Misburg.Erich contributed very strongly on JG301 attack and I put the JG1/JG6 part (still researching).

The focus was the 355th FG which was the sole escort for the 389th, 445th and 491st BG that day. The 361st was on a sweep to the Brunswick - Wittengen area and first encountered JG1/JG6 inbound from east-northeast. The 339th was to provide withdrawal support just east of Dummer Lake. From Gardelegen to Celle to Misburg to south of Misburg to south of Hannover from 1210 to 1245 only 40 Mustangs from the 355th and 7 from the 2SF, attached to 355th, were available to try to fight off the two German thrusts into Misbutg.

If the Tony Woods list is used as the primary source of Luftwaffe awards, then the ratio would be close to 2:1. If Reschke's narrative is used as a foundation for research, the overstatement of both the number of USAAF a/c destroyed, particularly Mustangs, as well as the number of US fighters that he encountered would be far overstated.

Regards,

Bill Marshall

Re: German overclaims in the East. Hartmann and others...
 

In the book I wrote about the June-Oct. 1941 air campaign over the Southern sector of the Eastern Front (‘From Barbarossa to Odessa’), I tried to collect - together with my co-authors - all available information from all warring sides on a day-by-day basis. One cannot really go into any more detailed research than that.

Having all available shotdown claims (including many submitted by anti-aircraft artillery crew - a detail often overlooked by historians, who tend to focus on the actions of the fighter pilots) it came to my surprise how claims did not match losses. And by rather great margin. This was valid to both the Axis and Soviet side (however, the Soviets seem to have overclaimed more).

I decided not to get engaged in the overclaim issue - except for one notable day - as this was not the main scope of the historical research.

Quite understandably, people tend to look at the spectacular side of the otherwise rather dry historical narrative. In my opinion, this secondary issue should never cloud the focus of the authors, as it only leads to endless debates.

Personally, I would like to see more books written in a similar way, namely a day-by-day account of the events, with a general overview and conclusions at the beginning and the end of the book, so every Reader could draw his/her conclusions, including about the overclaim issue.

Re: German overclaims in the East. Hartmann and others...
 

Hello Denes
I agree that the claim accuracy is a secondary issue. Much more important was how much a pilot X contributed to the effectiveness of his unit. And shooting down enemy planes was only one way to do that, others at least equally important were how well he protected others, how eager he was to teach to others, especially newcomers, the tricks of the trade, was he good in keeping the spirit of his comrades up etc. And to leaders much more important was their ability to lead both in air and on the ground and their organizational skills.

Juha

Re: German overclaims in the East. Hartmann and others...
 

Hello

I have been reading this discussion and others related in this forum and I would like to drop a few words.

Discussions about 'fraud' and 'overclaiming' seem to forget the reality of the day: a war between countries, each with their own politics, armies, culture, military cultures, etc.

In my opinion, it is not possible to compare fraud/overclaiming between Germany, the US, the Soviet Union and so forth, without a deep research into the political/cultural/historical environments in which the respective air forces operated.

This contention seems to level beligerant fighter pilots and air forces operating in very different cultural/military environments into a international score board of truthfulness or the opposite.

To illustrate what I'm trying to say I would like to draw your attention to the photo after page 112 in "The Blond Knight of Germany", entitled 'Hungarians with the Luftwaffe': Hartmann, Barkhorn, Lipfert with Hungarian pilots.

How possible it was for a german pilot to conceal his frauds from a colleague in a total war environment? If there were frauds and overclaiming how could these men be smiling in 44 and keeping their high spirits?

Of course, misclaiming must have happened and the technology of the day is consistent with this possibility.

Perhaps the answer is in culture, especially military culture. German pilots were few and their veterans had experience brought down from older generations while, for instance, soviet pilots were many but lacked experience from command to individual flying skill level.
We must remind that Germany was, until 1945, a nation orientated to war, as it had been in the previous centuries; as such it was a nation of warriors from grandfathers to grandsons and unity between soldiers taught and learnt from generation to generation. Fraudulent soldiers would be the total and early undoing of the German Armed Forces even more than the efforts of their leader(s).

It is not possible, in my opinion, to discuss Hartmann or any other alone, detached from the Luftwaffe as a whole (or the sum of 'many wholes'). As an example, I think, Hartmann was part of a system and if he overclaimed, the rest would have known and would have talked or written about it. Otherwise, it seems to me, it is like the 'conspiracy theory'.


I think it must have been very hard for a pilot like Hartmann, Rall, Barkhorn, Rudorffer, Lipfert, Nowotny or any other to overtly overclaim, under Luftwaffe's confirmation rules, even with the urge of propaganda, without controversy between fighter colleagues and the complete disestablishment of the Luftwaffe's structure as a fighting force.

Just my perspective.

Re: German overclaims in the East. Hartmann and others...
 

We are researching history, not politics, personal attitude or something like this. If one has handful of accounts from both sides, he could draw a picture as regards to matching claims and losses.
The problem starts from the accuracy of those accounts, e.g. my thread on Brandle's 100th victory below. If nobody has definite answer on this, how it be possible to find out something on less distinguished flyers, taking into consideration that different claim lists sometimes contradict each other. Despite all this conclusions should be drawn, otherwise history research is of no sence at all. Get rid of emotions, place facts, back them with available documents and let the readers deside for themselves who was fraudster, dreamer, reliable claimant etc.

Erich Hartmann Overclaims:
 

Let’s get the New Year going with a BANG!

Three years ago I made the following post on this thread (Post 25):
http://forum.12oclockhigh.net/showth...gration&page=3

Now the answer is starting to come to light. Not definitive, but indicative:

Link (Post 162):
http://reibert.info/threads/%D0%AD%D...n.76229/page-7

Google Translation:
23 - 08/24/44 he already shot a 19 aircraft, + his comrades to shoot another 14, only 33 stated craft. 2Ba same losses in the region of Sandomierz in these two days all 11 aircraft, of which 7 were listed under 3/A, 1 missing and 2 downed IA: Po-2, P-39. Incidentally last really knocked Hartmann. Thus overkleym like Air Force to - 10 to 1. Of the 19 aircraft claimed Hartmann shot down one (exactly).

My Interpretation of above:
In the consecutive days of combat on 23 and 24 Aug 44: JG52 claimed to to have shot down 33 aircraft: Erich Hartmann claimed 19 of these; his comrades 14 more. The last was actually shot down by Hartmann. Soviet 2Ba losses in the region of Sandomierz in those two days totalled 11 aircraft of which 2 were shot down (Po-2 + P-39), 1 was missing and 7 were shot down by 3/A (AAA) [also 1 in an undetermined category?]. Overclaim ratio about 10 to 1. Of the 19 aircraft claimed by Hartmann; he shot down 1 (exactly).

Erich Hartman claims:
23 Aug 1944
23.08.44 Oblt. Erich Hartmann: 283 9./JG 52 LaGG  11 411: at 1.000 m. 14.15 Film C. 2035/II Anerk: Nr. 932
23.08.44 Oblt. Erich Hartmann: 284 9./JG 52 LaGG  11 413: at 1.200 m. 14.18 Film C. 2035/II Anerk: Nr. 933
23.08.44 Oblt. Erich Hartmann: 285 9./JG 52 LaGG  11 278: at 1.000 m. 14.20 Film C. 2035/II Anerk: Nr. 934
23.08.44 Oblt. Erich Hartmann: 286 9./JG 52 LaGG  11 363: at 1.500 m. 17.10 Film C. 2035/II Anerk: Nr. 935
23.08.44 Oblt. Erich Hartmann: 287 9./JG 52 LaGG  11 333: at 1.500 m. 17.12 Film C. 2035/II Anerk: Nr. 936
23.08.44 Oblt. Erich Hartmann: 288 9./JG 52 LaGG  11 412: at 1.200 m. 17.15 Film C. 2035/II Anerk: Nr. 937
23.08.44 Oblt. Erich Hartmann: 289 9./JG 52 LaGG  11 421: at 1.000 m. 17.17 Film C. 2035/II Anerk: Nr. 938
23.08.44 Oblt. Erich Hartmann: 290 9./JG 52 LaGG  11 444: at 3.500 m. 17.30 Film C. 2035/II Anerk: Nr. 939
8 Claims

23 Aug 1944
24.08.44 Oblt. Erich Hartmann: 291 9./JG 52 LaGG  11 416: at 2.000 m. Baranov Airacobra 13.18 Film C. 2035/II Anerk: Nr. 962
24.08.44 Oblt. Erich Hartmann: 292 9./JG 52 LaGG  11 417: at 1.500 m. Baranov Airacobra 13.15 Film C. 2035/II Anerk: Nr. 961
24.08.44 Oblt. Erich Hartmann: 293 9./JG 52 LaGG  11 421: at 1.200 m. Baranov Airacobra 13.19 Film C. 2035/II Anerk: Nr. 963
24.08.44 Oblt. Erich Hartmann: 294 9./JG 52 LaGG  11 427: at 1.500 m. Baranov Airacobra 13.25 Film C. 2035/II Anerk: Nr. 964
24.08.44 Oblt. Erich Hartmann: 295 9./JG 52 LaGG  11 419: at 1.000 m. Baranov Airacobra 13.27 Film C. 2035/II Anerk: Nr. 965
24.08.44 Oblt. Erich Hartmann: 296 9./JG 52 Airacobra  11 443: at 3.000 m. Baranov Airacobra 13.40 Film C. 2035/II Anerk: Nr. 966
24.08.44 Oblt. Erich Hartmann: 297 9./JG 52 LaGG-5  11 335: at 1.500 m. Baranov Airacobra 16.00 Film C. 2035/II Anerk: Nr. 1064
24.08.44 Oblt. Erich Hartmann: 298 9./JG 52 LaGG-5  11 363: at 1.200 m. Baranov Airacobra 16.03 Film C. 2035/II Anerk: Nr. 1065
24.08.44 Oblt. Erich Hartmann: 299 9./JG 52 Airacobra  11 447: at 1.200 m. Baranov Airacobra 16.06 Film C. 2035/II Anerk: Nr. 1066
24.08.44 Oblt. Erich Hartmann: 300 9./JG 52 Airacobra  11 441: at 1.000 m. Baranov Airacobra 16.10 Film C. 2035/II Anerk: Nr. 1067
24.08.44 Oblt. Erich Hartmann: 301 9./JG 52 LaGG  11 422: no height. Baranov Airacobra 16.20 Film C. 2035/II Anerk: Nr. 1068
11 Claims

Oh and by the way Nick - you're welcome!

Re: Erich Hartmann Overclaims:
 

Rob,

those 7 "D/A" were not "damaged aircraft" but were 7 aircraft shot down by flak. "З/А" is an abbreviation for "зенитная артиллерия" (flak).

2 aircraft (Po-2 and P-39) were shot down by fighters and 1 was missing.