Quote:
Originally Posted by edwest2
I will bow out of this thread.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Bruce Dennis
I'm with Ed.
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Ed and Bruce, I have sent each of you a private message, with a simple message - I would be glad if you stayed!
I shall take a moment to respond to kalender1973, because he asked a short question which drives to the heart of the matter:
Quote:
Originally Posted by kalender1973
How you come to the conlusion: "Western air power defeated the Luftwaffe and therefore enabled the USSR to survive"?
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Kalender, thank you for your praise and let me outline my reasoning:
1. The Luftwaffe suffered considerable losses of aircraft and personnel before the German invasion of the USSR. See Table 10 on Page 23 for details. This materially eased the burden on Soviet defenders in 1941.
2. Even when the Luftwaffe had concentrated most of its resources in the East, in the second half of 1941, the RAF and Commonwealth air forces inflicted substantial losses on the Luftwaffe. In consequence, the Eastern front accounted for just 25% of total German aircraft losses from the outbreak of the war in Europe until the end of 1941. See Table 11 for the details. Thank you for drawing attention to the fact that the Commonwealth air forces were involved.
3. You made the observation that I wanted people to make, that German losses were quite evenly divided between East and West from mid-1941 to the end of 1943. This is not the whole story, of course. Table 13 shows that three-fifths of the single-engine fighters were destroyed in the West, and almost all night fighters. The German war effort was very precariously balanced and its central component was air superiority, which was maintained by the fighter force. Therefore, the defeat of the German fighter force in the West was of critical importance to the survival of the USSR, relieving the pressure of German air power on the Soviet armed forces. Take a look at Table C-2 on page 51 as well, when the non-operational losses are included, the importance of the fighting in the West is drawn into even sharper focus. I believe that this measure of losses, including non-operational ones, is the most useful, because non-operational losses were a consequence of combat. Without the pressure of combat operations, non-operational losses would have been much lower, so it is eminently reasonable to add non-operational losses to operational ones.
Kind regards,
Dan