[Andreas Brekken]

Nope, Igor.

you missed the point entirely.

What I stated was that there is a POSSIBILITY that there are a lot of CORRECTIONS to the entries especially for 1943, but also for earlier entries. Some of them we can see traces of in the records, as they are entered in pencil onto the original records. This was however only done to some of the copies. The GenQu records were made in over 10 copies, sent to different higher headquarters as shown by the Verteiler.

All corrections in the documents (except a few still to enter for 1940 of bad quality) that are available have been entered into my database, giving more than 13000 corrections. This indicate that not only were these records filed, but there were some kind of double checking going on, especially with regards to personell losse based on the Vordruck II popularly called Namentliche Verlustmeldung.

The problem we are facing is that the records from 1944 is missing, we do not have the detailed information contained in them. Some of us are slowly piecing together the information from this year using other sources, a tedious process.

What I am really objecting to is the assumption that some people generalize some discrepancies into the conclusion that the records as a whole is totally worthless, because they contain some errors. What I, and Nikita earlier, and also yogybär mentioned is that the general quality of these records are good, and that there could be discrepancies in cases where:

- units were disbanded
- units were moved between different Luftflotten
- units were overrun

What I want to see more of in the discussion, is that people that make claims like you do:

25.10.42 in Armawir - 20 aircraft damaged. Here, firstly, the 20 aircraft are all aircraft lost to enemy action during the entire reporting month of October 1942. I can find 8 in the loss records, thus 12 are seemingly missing. I do not know this incident, but I guess that we are talking about twin-engined bombers - and we must keep in mind that the reporting to the GenQu only was done for aircraft being damaged MORE than 10% as estimated by the engineer examining the damage.
It might be possible that some of these aircraft that were damaged, and thus was transferred to a repair facility with regards to HALTER or holding unit , but were NOT reported to the Generalquartiermeister. But again, just a possibility, it could be that these aircraft were really destroyed or damaged to a high degree and that the report is missing.

This eyewitness - what is his name, how did he report it? Are there any additional records, for example aerial reconnoissance photos or reports from when and if the airfield was taken over by the allies showing what information could be gathered by examining the wreckage on the site (as far as I know there should be NKVD reports when german aircraft wrecks were encountered in Soviet controlled area)? Any intercepted radio traffic? Any reports made in remaining German records on unit or higher headquarters level?

And you seem to state that there was a general underreporting of losses in the Luftwaffe based on a court martial against Helbig? What was the outcome of this court martial? If this is the case, can you statistically or otherwise show it?

Also - how did the Luftwaffe units replace their aircraft? Or did they also invent numbers with regards to how many aircraft were in the unit in the strength reports? They must have since you state they didn't report their losses...

I guess most of the soviet and allied aircraft downed during the latter part of the war must have been downed by pilots running around on the ground flapping their arms and making engine noises with their mouth... since there were no more aircraft left in the units due to unreported losses.

It would also be interesting at some time to see the same kind of records emerge from the soviet side, so it is possible to make comparisons (and I am not meaning general reports stating 2 I-16 or 5 I-153, but detailed information with aircraft serials and so on)

Regards,
Andreas B