[rof120]

CORRECTION : Me 109 loss percentages

Here (next paragraphs) is the relevant part of my preceding post on Me 109 losses. The reduction of all 1,348 existing AC of this type was not about 50 % but about 38.58 % (see below). It was over 50 % for those 1,016 which took part in combat operations over the main battle area Netherlands-Belgium-France. Please note: according to W. Murray in Table III there were - on May 5 - 1,369 Me 109s (21 more), no matter where (including in test facilities, used in pilot training etc.). A technical bug in my PC when erasing a few words mixed up both mentioned loss percentages (38.58 and 50 %) and I failed to notice it, sorry. My apologies for this (and the culprit – my PC – will be punished).

“…part of the table on page 66 (J. Prien’s JFV, volume 3): on 11 May 1940 all German fighter units (this excludes Me 110s) had a real complement (in German: Ist = Real, Actual) of 1,348 Me 109s, I presume including those (about 300 AC) based far from the front, protecting some important areas. Please note that this figure does not take losses suffered on May 10 into account: I counted 11 destroyed plus 11 damaged in Peter Cornwell’s giant book TBOFTN (or BFTN).

On 22 June 1940 the same figure was 828, which is 520 less (a reduction by over 38.58 % in but 38 days; the reduction was over 50 % for those units which were actually engaged on the front with a total of 1,016 Me 109s). Production in May and June 1940 was 615 Me 109s according to Prien, page 61, footnote 84 (other authors concur like Vajda et al). I feel everybody is able to draw his own conclusions: at the end of the French Campaign the German fighter units were weaker by 520 Me 109s in spite of a record production of 615.