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Re: Luftwaffe losses Italy 27 Jan 1944
I would not take the types seen by the various pilots as 100% true.
In the confused actions over Anzio on this day, Spitfires and P-40s were trying to intercept Fw 190s escorted by Bf 109s. A natural tendency for fighters pilots was to "upgrade" their opponent's aircraft to a more "prestigious" ones. So Bunge said he was shot up by a Spitfire but it might be a P-40, and Scrase had possibly fired at a Bf 109.
It could even be worse. In Mediterranean Air War Vol 4, you can read that Allied fighers claimed 15 Fw 190s and 10 Bf 109s during the day over Anzio area. As often in this book, the narrative is not up to date with the tables at the end of the day, as it is written that the 25 'confirmed' Allied victories "do not appear to have actually resulted in a single truly confirmable aircraft shot down", while the German loss lists show 5 Bf 109s lost, 3 by Spitfires (and one unidentified, that my source above shows as a Bf 109 of I./JG 4 shot down by enemy aircraft. Confirmed with no more details in JG 4 book by Eric Mombeek).
MAW 4 only lists two German victories in the area: a Spitfire by Lt Joachim Ahlert of 4./JG 77 and a Dragonfly (observation plane... Auster or L-4) by Hpm Manfred Spenner of 3./JG 4. In the loss list compiled years ago by Tony Wood, there are two other Spitfire claims by Uffz. Wich-Fähndrich of 6./JG 77 and Uffz. Leo Sliwa of 5./JG 77, with no time, the source being JG 77 book for Prien.
MAW 4 lists four Allied figthers shot down in air battle (2 Spit and 2 P-40s, with a 3rd damaged by e/e and crash-landed at base. The loss list says that one of the P-40 was shot down by a Spitfire ! Nothing about it in the narrative) and 3 possible (one Spitfire of 93 Sqn that crash-landed due to engine failure after an air battle and 2 Spit of 225 Sqn lost to no given reason).
My guess is that in the confusion, it is possible that a part of the Allied overclaims were actually real... but Allied fighters.
In the end, I doubt that it will possible to link Bunje's report to any precise Allied claim. Especially as we don't know when the five actual German losses took place.
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