Reply N° 2 to Laurent Rizzotti
Laurent : (…) « From my readings, victories were given after analysis of the combat reports and given individually to each pilot. »
- Correct. Almost all French pilots abstained from filing unrealistic claims for they knew these claims would be scrutinized. There are only a few exceptions.
« But the total number of enemy aircraft claimed was inferior to the sum of individual claims, each aircraft being only counted once, so overclaiming was not increased by this system. »
- Yes, this is correct too even though many misguided « experts » suddenly yell(ed) that the French victory system inflated the grand total ridiculously : officially 735 certain victories as compared to the actual… actual what ? 3 ? 8 ? Perhaps 106 or 237 ? THIS is ridiculous. As I already remarked, if this particular piece of criticism were accurate the grand total wouldn’t be 735 to 1,003 (depending on sources, Gisclon’s 1,003 not being credible) but 3,000 to 4,000, and everybody is able to make this calculation : adding all 1939-40 scores of all fighter pilots of the Armée de l’Air (about 200 among approximately 1,000 were Czechs or Poles, about 160 or more of these 1,000 were killed in but 5 weeks and about 140 or more were wounded for a total of casualties of approx. 300 – BUT IN 5 weeks only (the remaining 11 days were almost idle, not quite).
Laurent : Still overclaiming existed in French Air Force too, of course.
- Yes, of course. Nobody (or so I think) disputes this. But I am adament that French overclaiming was far lower than in other nations‘ air forces. I explained the reasons for this already. Let us take the exactly opposed example: 1939-40 RAF. Their fighter pilots – most of them extremely young and very enthusiastic about shooting down the Huns, very combat-eager – were perfectly aware that victory claims were not screened, not scrutinized and not officially confirmed, and not credited to any pilots. So they felt free to claim whatever victories they believed they had won. There is no doubt that some of them overclaimed deliberately (like Balthasar and Wick, Luftwaffe’s worst phoneys).
Numerous victories, actual or fake, inevitably brought you fame, medals and promotions, including from NCO (sergeant etc.) to officer (P/O, F/O, even Flight Lt or Sqn Leader), not to mention the dames. This was not unattractive. I feel nobody can blame these very young fellows who (most of them) were not able to control their extreme excitement in air battles, their enthusiasm and their firm, sincere belief that they had scored and s/d some Huns. As I already mentioned British expert John Foreman found out a British overclaim-rate of 5 for 1940, which concurs exactly with my own assessment of 5. This can hardly be purely coincidental. On September 15th, 1940, the famous „Battle of Britain Day“ which is celebrated every year since, RAF fighter pilots‘ claims were quite moderate and reasonable: only 185 for a real bag of 56 (overclaim rate: 3.30). Some French fool(s) even raised this to 228 victories in their „historical“ books (I can’t remember if these fool(s) were named Pierre Miquel (he was terrible) or Professeur Henri Michel, whose very poor History of WW II (all of it) was considered The Holy Bible in France and sold very well there.
Laurent: „Sharing victories between all pilots of a formation, whatever happened in the battle, was something done in Japanese and Italian airforces at least in a part of the war.“
- I didn’t know at all. But: sharing (1/6 of a victory each for 6 pilots, or 1/2 for 2 of the six, or 1/3 for 3 of the six?). Or one full victory credited to all 6 pilots if there were 6?
Laurent: IMHO there is no good system or fair system.
- Oh, I wouldn’t say that. The French system was very good I think even if it did happen (?) that even some pilots who didn’t really deserve it were credited with some victories (but it did not create any unfair disadvantage to the others). After all they, too, were risking their very lives as soon as they sat in their aircraft, risking to burn alive in the flames of their petrol, and sometimes simply on the ground (bombs, strafing...). Being credited with one to four victories too many was not a terrible overcompensation. « Addding all individual scores to get an inflated grand total » is ridiculous libelling on the part of anti-French fanatics and very naïve amateurs who are prepared to believe any nonsense spread by so-called « experts ».
Just think for one second: how can it be possible that about 800 highly-trained, highly-skilled French professional fighter pilots (including those from Aéronavale, the French Navy fliers, and from various, miscellaneous units : ELDs, DAT etc.) won only 245 or even 355 victories in 46 days, as a French moron posing as an expert and also as a tough jungle-fighter claimed some years ago ? This is simply not possible and I stick to my figure of over 800 (more on this in my next post, tomorrow Saturday October 19th). In « Telve days in May » about 100 Hurricane pilots (they received reinforcements but their losses were so high that I presume that their number was not raised), during the same first phase of this campaign, claimed 499 victories plus 123 probables, let us say 500 victoties plus 122 probables for it’s clearer. This error of 1 to 500, or 0.002 %, is nothing as compared to overclaiming rates of 400 % ! Their claims were lowered by Brian Cull (HE was not lynched) in his book « Twelve Days in May » with a remarkably cautious formulation : « It seems that at least (at least!) 299 of these (German AC losses) fell to the guns of the Hurricanes.“
Incredible but TRUE : during these same 12 days in May (May 10-21) French fighters claimed, believe it or not, 299 « certain » victories too, which must be considered an absolute minimum (my evaluation : approx. 420). So 100 green Hurricane pilots claimed as many victories as at least 800 experienced French pilots. All rigt, let us assume that only 600 French pilots actually took part in the main fighting, the others being stationed far away (but this is not quite true for entire Groupes de chasse of 26-34 fighters each were sent, for example, from the Paris area (for which they were earmarked) into the battle of Sedan (May 13-16 or so). But okay, let us say only 600. So during the same period of fighting which was very fierce for all of them, every Hurrricane pilot claimed 5 victories (at least 3 actual ones according to Brian Cull) whereas approximately 600 French pilots claimed 1/2 each. Each RAF pilot was AT LEAST 6 times better than a French fighter pilot. There is no need to comment on this typically English wild overclaiming. According to the German fighter pilots the French die-hards were much better (80 % according to JG 2 pilots) than the RAF green pilots (they were brave but green) but according to English sources RAF pilots were AT LEAST 6 times better than the French. A more precise calculation could give a result even worse, like 7 times better. I need not comment on this.
Laurent : Shooting down a B-17 with a Bf 109 was probably far more difficult that shooting down a Bf 109 with a Mustang, (…)
- Oh yes, you’re perfectly right.
… but still it is one victory in both case."
- Not quite. The Luftwaffe or RLM credited one victory for each AC but « Viermots » (four-engined bombers) were clearly mentioned to stress their importance, today like « He won 115 victories including 17 Viermots ». They were considered tough enemy AC, difficult to down (not least because of their escorts). German fighter pilots were credited with more points for « Viermots ». The number of victories was the real number but these points made it easier to get medals including the Knight’s Cross, and promotions to a higher rank. Four victories for one s/d B-17 or B-24 is Allied nonsense spread after the war by bilious, envious people like JE Johnson (the Western top-scorer ?). One B-17 or B-24 s/d was ONE German victory not four.
To be continued the day after tomorrow, Sunday, October 20th. Be patient. I’ll answer Stig on those strange 162 Me 109s claimed as « certain » by French fighter pilots ; add the « probables » and quite a few shot down by other French aircraft (hundreds of these were cannon-armed…) and by AA too. ”It’s not that simple”.
Brian Cull credits ”his” famous Hurricanes with 38 Me 109s (Twelve Days in May, top of page 308). At the same rate French fighters would have s/d 38 x 6 = 228 Me 109s. For 700 Fr. fighters : 38 x 7 = 266, almost double what they did claim as "certain". Who has unrealistic claims ?
Be good in the meantime all of you and don’t burn any French flags for it can’t change anything and is not gentlemanlike.
More details here:
http://yves-michelet.over-blog.com/2...victoires.html