Observations on the victories of the Normandie-Niemen

[ZhekaB]

Hello, Laurent!

I am interested in the subject of the air operation in East Prussia and have already gathered some information. I also paid attention to the differences in the list of victories of the French pilots in the French and Soviet sources. As far as I understand it can be explained as follows. In the marching log and French sources the data of victories are primary and more truthful. In the Soviet reports the information about victories basically repeats them except for one moment: shared victories were attributed to one person (in the Soviet practice by this time they moved away from shared victories). Additionally, wanting to award Soviet decorations to certain French pilots, group victories could be attributed to them and then specified in the award submissions. I'm not sure if this was the rule. However, in my opinion, the French victory records are a more primary source. But, perhaps the distribution of victories in them may also have been oriented to awards.
Regarding the Hs.129 battle on 18.10 there is no contradiction there - French and Soviet pilots did chase German strike planes dozens of kilometers behind the front line and shot them down west of Gumbinnen as well.