Identifications of German victories over East Prussia in October 1944

[Stig Jarlevik]

Originally Posted by Courtois Laurent

this fight matches that claim :
Wilhelm Batz of the Stab III./JG 52 shooted down a LaGG at4000m at 14:39 in the sector 25389.
this victory is not confirmed by the Soviet archives
The Soviet sources available to me do not allow me to identify the other battles that led to German claims. However, the lack of loss of Lagg-5 and Lagg-7 during the day suggests that all of JG52's victories come under Overclaiming.

As far as I can see from JG 52 sources and Johannes Matthews, Batz did not claim anything on Oct 22nd.
The only unit of JG 52 that claimed that day was II Gruppe and I don't think they were in Poland/East Prussia but rather defending Hungary.
Bernd Barbas put them at Taktakenéz.
What is your sources regarding this unknown claim by Batz and other JG 52 claims in "your area"?

With regard to II./JG 52s activities in the defense of Hungary I am sure our knowledgeable Gabor knows basically everything.
Understandably he probably like us to buy his forthcoming book and does not want to go into details here
I will buy his books anyway though!!
Cheers
Stig

[HGabor]

Thank you Stig, the book is in the final phase, lots of work going on with the editor and the typesetter. I hope it will be available in early March. Just a little more patience... ;-)
Thanks,
Gabor

[Stig Jarlevik]

Originally Posted by HGabor

Thank you Stig, the book is in the final phase, lots of work going on with the editor and the typesetter. I hope it will be available in early March. Just a little more patience... ;-)
Thanks,
Gabor

You bet I can wait Gabor!!

Cheers
Stig

[Courtois Laurent]

Originally Posted by Stig Jarlevik

As far as I can see from JG 52 sources and Johannes Matthews, Batz did not claim anything on Oct 22nd.
The only unit of JG 52 that claimed that day was II Gruppe and I don't think they were in Poland/East Prussia but rather defending Hungary.
Bernd Barbas put them at Taktakenéz.
What is your sources regarding this unknown claim by Batz and other JG 52 claims in "your area"?

Hello Stig Jarlevik,

We are spoken about the 23th october, the 22th is an other tread. For the 23, i tried to work from Tony WOOD's list of which I am attaching an extract below





In my mind the III/JG52 was based in :

10.44 - 10.44 Lobellen Bf 109G
10.44 - 11.44Jürgenfelde Bf 109G

Them it's seam to me that Batz claimed victory in East Prussia.

[Stig Jarlevik]

Ahh

It seems e-mails overlap here.
I took an interest in the subject because Gabor stated some real losses (I am interested in Soviet aircraft where
their production numbers are mentioned).
After pressing enter I got an immediate automatic reply and never checked anything above that so I never saw
dates etc had been changed.

Sorry about that.
Thanks Gabor for the Il-2 losses for the 23rd as well!!

Cheers
Stig

[Stig Jarlevik]

PS: Looking at Wood's list I wonder why the claims are written as they are?

Obviously the NJG 5's claim has nothing to do with III./JG 52' claims and should be on a separate line.

Also Batz' claim 10.43H is out of line and should be listed after his 10.33H claim and not after his afternoon claims.

As far as III./JG 52 goes, looking at the times, they thus flew one morning mission and one afternoon mission.
Unless the Germans were still shooting up the clouds or thin air it begs the question what morning missions
did the Soviets fly?
I cannot see any relevant details in your summary of 1VA
If the Soviets did not fly any missions in that period the German claims are not overclaiming, they are plainly falsified!

Cheers
Stig

[HGabor]

"If the Soviets did not fly any missions in that period the German claims are not overclaiming, they are plainly falsified!"

It happened in Hungary too. One day in November, 1944 the weather was so bad that the Soviets had only a single A-20G Boston recon. sortie during the entire day (which by the way returned OK), all of their other planes stayed on the ground, yet the Germans claimed 'aerial victories'.

Surely these claims were reported way before the age of the Internet and public access to the military records of the other side.

Gabor

PS: I am not saying that only the Germans did such things, but now we are talking about them.

[Stig Jarlevik]

Laurent

Excluding the SG 4 claim, I only see III./JG 52 making two missions.
No way Bartz is making a claim 14.00 going back to refuel and up again in a new combat 40 minutes later making a new claim. Just don't buy that.

The Germans early claims are extremely marginal vs the reported Soviet mission times.
Somehow I need better details than that....

Cheers
Stig

[Courtois Laurent]

Originally Posted by Stig Jarlevik

If the Soviets did not fly any missions in that period the German claims are not overclaiming, they are plainly falsified!

Cheers
Stig

There remains the possibility that the German pilots attacked weather reconnaissance and reconnaissance flights. Each Soviet regiment sends out a patrol at the beginning of the day to test the weather. Despite the absence of Soviet losses, it is therefore possible that shots were fired against Soviet planes, which were very easily able to escape due to bad weather conditions.

We could therefore be more, as the 2:39 claim shows, in overconfidence than in pure fictional victories.