[Christer Bergström]

Boandlgramer, I'm afraid you didn't read my post as close as you perhaps should have done.

You compare "the losses of the USAAF and RAF for europe/africa ( just first line losses: combat and accident)" with "claims of the german luftwaffe and flak".

Then you say that "it is not possible to do such a simple calculation ( see christer bergström´s post above)".

That of course is correct, because of what Graham Boak points out - "accidents made up as many losses".

But my figures for Soviet losses were more precise than your figures for US & RAF losses, and thus more suited for a comparison with German claims. Whereas your figures included "combat and accident" losses, my figures explicitly dealt only with combat losses. I quote my first post:

"the USSR lost a total of 46,100 aircraft in combat between 22 June 1941 and 10 May 1945."

(Due to the same source, Krivosheyev, the Soviets lost 106,400 aircraft between 22 June 1941 and 10 May 1945, of which 46,100 were lost in combat.)

But maybe you didn't misread me? Maybe you mean that it still is not possible to do such a calculation as I did in my post?

I think we can agree that the German overclaims ratio indicated by MB seems to point at an actual number of only something like 16,000 Soviet aircraft shot down by German forces - see my first post. (If you don't agree, then please give me your alternative assumption.)

Boandlgramer, then please explain to us all: Considering the latter, how can it be wrong to ask for the reasons to all the other maybe 30,000 Soviet aircraft combat losses? How come that is not a justified question in your eyes? Please explain how you think when you say that "it is not possible to do such a simple calculation"?

After all, a combat loss is per definition caused by an enemy of flesh and blood. . . You can't have 30,000 combat losses (two-third of all combat losses) without any enemy serviceman being involved in any of those losses.

PS: Due to official USAAF statistics, the USAAF lost 14,621 aircraft in combat - to enemy aircraft or to enemy AAA - in Europe and the Mediterranean during WW II. I think that figure - and not your "all causes loss figure" of 25,022 losses - could be compared with Axis claims. Don't you agree?