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Old 10th March 2015, 15:06
GuerraCivil GuerraCivil is offline
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Sitzkrieg in air - both German and Allied victory?

I wonder if anyone has made general study of air combats at the Western front during the so-called Sitzkrieg period 3.9.1939 - 9.5.1940?

From the fragments that I have seen it seems that both sides claimed victory - shooting down more planes than lost themselves.

Here something on German side during Sitzkrieg:

About 150 - 160 air victories for Luftwaffe, more than half of them - 78 - credited to JG 53 (or III/JG 53), which lost only 11 pilots in air combats. Source: Kurt Braatz: Werner Mölders. Die Biographie.

Although Bf 109 D or "Dora" was considered somewhat outdated (at the side of "Emil"), the units flying with it showed clearly victorious balance sheet of Sitzkrieg:
the loss of 8 Bf 109 D and 5 pilots was balanced by 16 air victories, of which 8 were Allied fighters (5 MS 406 + 3 Hawk 75).

However, also French fighter units could show favourable balance sheet of the period of "drole de guerre" of 3.9.1939 - 9.5.1940:

70 confirmed air victories against the loss of 28 fighter planes and 13 pilots. However the recce and bomber units suffered somewhat more. Source: Barry Keitley - French Aces of World War 2.

Of the RAF records of "Phoney War" I do not know the official "kill/loss" -scores, but I would not be surprised that they would show that RAF (fighter units) destroyed clearly more German planes than RAF lost in air combat.

So both sides won in Sitzkrieg/Drole de Guerre/Phoney War shooting down more planes than lost themselves in air combat?

What do researched/surviving loss records of both sides tell? Was it actually German or French/British side which came clearly over the top by downing/destroying more planes than lost themselves? Or was it more or less even? Was possible (or better said usual) overclaiming more or less of the same scale by both sides?
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