[Franek Grabowski]

I see the discussion goes out of control and I am afraid we will be discussing Spanish Armada by the next week.

Even in August 1944, when the Western Allies had opened the second front in the West, there were 2.1 million German troops deployed in the East while 1 million opposed Western Allied operations in France. Between 1 July 1944 and 31 December 1944, the Wehrmacht sustained an average monthly loss of 20,611 killed on the Eastern Front and 8,294 killed on the Western Front. (Kriegstagebuch OKW, vol. VIII, p. 1509.)

Does the number include Germans killed in anti-partisan operations and major battles like Warsaw Uprising? Is Poland considered Eastern or Western Ally?
What is influence of those numbers on condition of any air force?

At the same time, I think it is an irrefutable fact that due to exactly the same factors, the victories attained by the Western Allied fighter pilots in the in 1944 also were comparatively “easy” due to the low quality of German pilot training standards. In 1944, German rookies who barely knew how to fly were shot down to the hundreds when they were caught in a position of altitude and speed inferiority by numerically superior Western Allied fighter pilots. Those Western Allied pilots were up to far greater difficulties when they were unfortunate to encounter such super veterans as Theodor Weissenberger, Emil Lang or Alfred Grislawski - but even those super veterans had to face a huge numerical superiority, and they were hampered through the disastrously low quality of the rookies who were assigned as their wingmen and Rottenflieger.

Have you ever seen any document that showed what was the experience of such a 'rookie'? German problem was definetelly not how to fly but in preparing to a combat. A slightly different thing that applies to Eastern Front as well.
Concerning those 'super veterans' as you call them, please give samples how those and other aces like Huppertz, Simsch, Weber, Wurmheller or Zweigart were outnumbered in their last combats.

Forgive me for entering this discussion late, but what exactly were the standards for Soviet pilot training?

Just before Barbarossa 15 hrs on a combat type. As mentioned in this thread, advanced flying was introduced in late 1942.

Recently I saw a documentary about the Battle of Britain where former RAF Spitfire pilots confirmed that it was absolutely routine for a new pilot to have just (9) hours in a fighter before they were sent into combat. Basically, they knew how to take off and land -- and not much else. The rest was on-the-job training for those who managed to survive the first mission. Many did not.

I have a copy of a log book at hand. Pilot in question finished OTU at the end of July and logged about 30 hrs on Hurricanes. I will ask a friend who finished his training at the heat of battle but did not seen operational flying, what standards were then. Anyway, as long as I cannot check any such log book, I do not believe those 9 hrs. In any way RAF suffered heavy losses up to the Battle, so it cannot be considered a normal situation.