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Re: KG51 losses on 23 August 1942.
Joerg
You just hit the nail, though I think you are a little bit unfair towards Soviet aviation. And talking about big companies, it recalls me Enron.
Andreas
Please do not twist my words. I have written several times that German loss records are incomplete, inaccurate, and indeed sometimes doctored for various reasons.
I would also like to ask you not to play any dirty game on me. In regard of 9 April 1945 raid, the problem is not with lack of loss returns but with the fact that for some reason surviving(!) German action report explicitly state there were no losses, despite hard evidence to the contrary.
Otherwise, sorry, I was not responsible for destruction of documents at Auxerre. Nonetheless this shows the exact point - lack of majority of German documents and dispersion of surviving bits. I am curious, how the one can be so sure of accuracy of those data, if he had no chance to cross check them all.
1. Most courts find witness statement as enough to hang a man, but we are much more strict here. Still, we should not reject any statement based on oral evidence just because nothing else is available. Miles of gun camera films were exposed during the war, but most of them was disposed years ago, and we are often left with a pile of paper. Still, those reports do include very interesting observations, like statements of multiple witnesses, eg. whole wing observing a single victory, statements, that wreckage was filmed or parachute observed, notes that another pilot filmed whole action from behind, etc., all written within hours from action. What to do if it is contradicted by GQ6? Cases, that victorious airman took some material evidence from his victim are rare, though still the one can find a bit of parachute which is not reflected in German documents in any way.
2. This confirms there was nothing abnormal to the procedure. Does records of aircraft losses and movements within respective Luftflotten survive? Or perhaps we are left with the highest level stuff only?
3. Yes, I mean data provided by Galland for Grosse schlacht. Our calculations, made with Wojtek Matusiak, were based on widely available data eg. published by Don Caldwell and on detailed research on Polish Spitfires (Poland was the largest operator of the type apart of RAF). We have assumed that Spitfire is similar enough to compare to Me 109, and that some vital statistics should be similar. Data on Polish aircraft were used because of their reliability and completeness, but as noted, the number of aircraft used was significant, so allowing for generalisation. Correction was made for different conditions - Luftwaffe did not need to fly across the Channel. This way we have achieved aircraft losses per capita killed, showing a major discrepancy. Another interesting observation was a very low number of German airmen saved on parachutes, see JG26 in April 1942 for example.
We did it as a kind of joke for too serious people, so I am astonished to see that our estimates were so close to Galland ones!
On a final note, I am adding detailed footnotes and sources to my research, whenever possible. It is not my problem some people do not read it.
PS I am not trying to play intellectual, but rather intelligent.
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