[marsyao]

I am spending the whole weekend reading this book, and almost finished 80% of it, and the impression it gave me is great, the only problme, I may be a little greedy, is that when I was waiting for this book, for years actually, I kind of expect when it descript the great air battle over Stalingrad, it would be more like a day-by-day, blow-by-blow account, used both side accounts in detail, I may read too many books of Chirstopher shores, you guys shall know what I means, I do not mean Black Cross Red Star Vol. 3 was not good, but although christer did provide daily claims submitted by German fighters (those claimed by Luftwaffe bomber and flak units were not included), I usually could not find how many aircrafts actually lost by VVS, and according to Soviet records, how many of those were shot down by Luftwaffe fighters, how many down by German flak, and how many simply did not return from mission ? for example "When 18 September was over, more than one third of the II-2 in 228 ShAD and 291 ShAD had been either lost or put out of commision in a single day's fighting, The German fighters claimed 77 victories for a single loss." "In total Fliegerkorps VIII's German fighter pilots claimed 25 Soviet aicraft shot down against only four of their own combat losses on September 16. Meanwhile, Romanian airmen reported another four victories", "30 Soviet aicraft reportedly shot down by Fliegerkorps VIII that day, Romanian airmen contributed with three" etc. etc.
Christer did provide the VVS loss data in some time period, for example "16 VA, with an average of less than 100 operational aircrafts, 1ost 111 aircraft between 4 September to 11 September. To Those figures should be add at least as many aicraft lost by 8 VA and 102 IAD PVO", but not a day-by-day loss data. the comparision of VVS claimes and actually Luftwaffe losses were more available, but still was not for everyday,
I understand that this book was not title with "air battle over Stalingrad", so that could not be go to too detail, and it was possible some of those VVS war time doucment still not available to public, but I still wish it could be a little more, like Christopher shore, a two way street, first claim from one side, then from other side's account, how many aircraft really lost, and if possiblem what were the causes ?
I wish Christer would not say I am too pigy, because overall, it was an excellent and highly recommand book.